One of the world’s great instances of immorality—indeed, a case of cultural genocide—is the attempt of the Chinese to persecute and, indeed, wipe out the Uyghur Muslim minority, most of whom live in the Xingiang Autonomous Region in the northwestern part of the the People’s Republic of China—the area in red below:
According to the BBC, over a million Uyghurs have been forced into “re-education camps”—the Chinese government denies their existence)—while the AP reports that there has been forced sterilization of Uyghur women as well as other forms of coerced birth control, all meant to diminish the population.
Another form of persecution of the Uyghur is the use of the captive population by the Chinese as forced labor to make products or components of products that find their way to America and other Western markets. Companies like Coca-Cola and Nike, for example, have been accused of using materials or products (e.g., entire shoes) made by forced labor (it’s not clear whether the workers get any remuneration, but they’re working against their will, and often doing so in these camps, always under surveillance).
Other companies implicated, according to the recent (Nov. 29) New York Times article and the Business Insider articles below (click on screenshost), include Adidas, Amazon, Apple, BMW, Costco, Calvin Klein, Campbell Soups (some of the forced labor is involved in growing food), H&M, Patagonia, and Tommy Hilfinger. The NYT also reports that there are 82 foreign companies “that potentially benefited, directly or indirectly, from abusive labor transfer programs tied to Xinjiang.”
Now many of these companies, when asked to provide statements, deny that they are complicit in the use of slave labor, and assert that their own protocols and investigations have exculpated them. (Some give no comment.) But, as Business Insider reports, denials are not convincing in light of the obstructions that China places against independent inspection and auditing:
Apple, Nike, and Coca-Cola have over the years been accused by human rights groups of a variety of labor abuses and worker exploitation, particularly in China. They have also made various pledges and taken some steps to address that criticism.
Monitoring that, however, has become difficult. Five major auditing groups hired by Western firms told The Wall Street Journal in September that they are no longer carrying out supply chain inspections in China because restrictions imposed by government officials have made it too difficult to effectively and independently evaluate working conditions in the country.
And the NYT concurs:
. . . for many companies, fully investigating and eliminating any potential ties to forced labor there has been difficult, given the opacity of Chinese supply chains and the limited access of auditors to a region where the Chinese government tightly restricts people’s movements.
In response to these reports, and in a very rare show of bipartisan support, the U.S. House of Representatives passed a new bill, the Uyghur Forced Labor Prevention Act (see the bill here), whose provisions include these (from Wikipedia):
The Uyghur Forced Labor Prevention Act would make it U.S. policy to assume (a “rebuttable presumption”) that all goods manufactured in Xinjiang are made with forced labor, unless the commissioner of U.S. Customs and Border Protection certifies that certain goods are known to not have been made with forced labor. The bill also calls for the President of the United States to impose sanctions on “any foreign person who ‘knowingly engages'” in forced labor using minority Muslims. The bill would further require firms to disclose their dealings with Xinjiang. A list of Chinese companies that have relied on forced labor would be compiled.
In light of Chinese obstructions against investigations, it seems reasonable to presume that slave labor has been used in Xinjiang-origin products, and for companies to either stop importation of products from the region, or conduct genuine, independent, and non-obstructed audits to certify that slave labor has not been used. In fact, the bill passed the House by a lopsided vote of 406-3 (the “nay” votes were Justin Amash, Libertarian-Mich; Warren Davidson, R-Ohio; and Thomas Massie, R-Kentucky), with the Senate predicted to pass it as well. If it passes both houses of Congress, either Trump or Biden could sign it into law, and it looks like there’s enough votes that Congress could override a potential Trump veto (Biden won’t veto it).
However, the three stories below, also including one from the Washington Post, show that some U.S. companies have lobbied against this bill. While Nike denies the lobbying, asserting that it merely had “constructive discussions” with congressional staff (I don’t believe them), I am puzzled about why there would be any lobbying if the companies aren’t depending on forced labor. You might respond that they aren’t doing that, but that companies don’t want to go through an onerous and expensive process to prove it. But can’t they farm out the labor to places where it’s not forced and used as a form of persecution? Granted, it may be a tad more expensive, but I doubt Americans wouldn’t pay a bit more for assurance that slave labor isn’t being used.
From the New York Times:
From Business Insider:
From the Washington Post:
This is a serious charge, especially given the political climate in the U.S. today, formed in part by a justified repugnance towards slavery. Isn’t it possible for these companies to simply use non-forced Chinese labor from areas other than Xinjiang? What heartens me is that the House and Senate can work in a bipartisan way to effect positive change, even if this bill is a no-brainer.
I mixed with uighurs in my role as a journalist, and although the greater part of the population are suffering, it is on account of a very few hot-headed Muslims among them who planned to remove Chinese from their province and turn it into a fundamentalist Muslim country. The same problem was seen when fundamentalist Rohinga Muslims attacked their Thai neighbours while trying to bring about a fundamentalist Muslim state. Of course we should demand better treatment of Uighurs, but we should be sentient about this new phenomenon of fundamentalist religious revolutionaries who draw down utter misery upon their own population in pursuit of a fourteenth century religious paradise of frequent beheadings and the enslavement of women.
Good point.
Maybe Burmese neighbors?
GCM
Burmese…
An important comment, but I doubt that you are referring to the Chinese language, and therefore need a “the” before the “Chinese”.
Isn’t the languages actually Mandarin, Cantonese, etc.? IOW, is “Chinese” a language?
I speak American, not that English nonsense.
We need (or I, at least need) a proper linguist to step in and explain the languages spoken in China and whether they are considered separate languages or just dialects, like American English vs. other variants around the world.
“Language” is a label, not a unit. Chinese dialects differ more from each other than European languages. Yet this doesn’t imply that their speakers have a stronger regional than national identity.
I don’t think anyone suggested anything about speaker identities. The sole question in my mind is whether the phrase “the Chinese language” is meaningful in linguistics and whether is is misuse to refer to people as Chinese without prepending “the”. (I’m not advocating here since I don’t know the answer.)
I think you misunderstand me. I claim that “the Chinese language” is a meaningful term, but that it also depends on context.
Example: The Chinese language is written using a set of pictographic characters.
This is no yes/no question. Perhaps this helps: https://zipfslaw.org/2016/02/04/language-versus-dialect-a-language-is-a-dialect-with-an-army-and-a-navy/
I’m not a proper linguist. There is a definitional problem distinguishing between dialects and languages – at what point do different dialects become so different that they become mutually unintelligible? Sometimes nationalism insists that dialects are different languages.
My mother tongue is English, dialect NZ. I have no difficulty following strong local British Isles’ or American dialects, though when I watched No Country For Old Men, it took me a few minutes before I could understand one character’s pronunciation.
Cantonese and Mandarin have, as far as I can tell, very similar grammar and writing (though China now uses simplified characters and HK uses traditional characters) but often different vocabulary and definitely different consonants, vowels and tones. In spoken form they are not mutually intelligible and are learned as separate languages, though many words are obviously related and one can detect systematic sound shifts. My wife (mother tongue, Cantonese, third language, Mandarin) can’t understand Shanghainese.
For example:
Eng: Hong Kong (= Fragrant Harbour)
Cant: Heung Gang
Mand: Xiang Gang
Eng: I don’t know
Cant: Ngoh mmh zhidou
Mand: Wo bu zhidao.
Pulling down statues of historical slavers is one thing, but I can’t see the activists responsible giving up their iPhones and Nikes any time soon…
Since this is a rebuttable assumption, I don’t have sympathy for the companies affected. It’s clear that liberal politics are just so much marketing for many of these organization.
I’m not following…what is being assumed here?
What is being assumed here is the notion that the Chinese are indeed employing slave labour to produce goods for their foreign clients.
If they are not, then why won’t they allow verification/inspection?
If that is what Dr Brydon says is an assumption then why did he follow it with this; “I don’t have sympathy for the companies affected” ? Perhaps he’s (?) unhappy with the companies attempts to distance themselves from slave labor. It isn’t clear to me what he meant. I can be slow on the uptake.
But do you think the slave labor accusations are unfounded? That it happens is merely assumed? Why do you assert that?
Sub
Very interesting
On a more general note, I wish it were possible to report and comment on ethnic conflicts without immediately labeling one side righteous and the other evil. And not to condemn all those who disagree, especially if you know as little as the average news anchor.
sub
I welcome a ban on such products, however, don’t believe for a second it got anything to do with humanitarian aims. It’s conspiciously timed just when there is already a trade war with China, and a new administration comes rolling in that needs to serve up a new story why they continue what they do. It’s a nice story, I guess. Does the US care about human rights in other supply chains from other parts of the world, e.g. the mining of rare earths that are known to be horrible? Of course not.
I see no reason why Trump wouldn‘t sign this law, too. It‘s well in line with his previous activity with China. The difference between the parties is generously described as minimalistic. Biden’s team is full of war mongers, and may be worse than Trump’s outgoing administration. Woke “progressive” Neera Tanden for example floated the idea in a leaked mail that countries bombed by the US could pay with oil, since they have oil, and the US has a giant deficit. These are the kinds of people that are supposed to have humanitarian ideas in mind? I don’t believe it.
The CCP has been hassling the Uigurs for many decades now – its never been a cool place to live but their ferocity didn’t reach its full volume of welcome until the last 15-20 years.
Companies lobbying against looking into it is the sort of thing that gives capitalism a bad name. Nike’s history in that regard, and Coke’s shenanigans in the developing world are well known.
D.A., J.D. NYC
https://whyevolutionistrue.com/2020/06/10/photos-of-readers-93/
I have been living in China for a year now, and I am horrified at the level of anti-China propaganda in the US. How people who are otherwise rational can be so gullible as to believe the most absurd claims when it comes to China ?
Although I don’t live in Xinjiang, I met Uyghurs many times, and I ate at Uyghur restaurants which are very appreciated by Chinese people in general. The reality on the ground is that the vast majority of Uyghurs are happy with their lives and satisfied with the Chinese government’s actions, which give them better access to education and jobs, and huge programs of poverty alleviation. I also noticed that Chinese people in general love the ethnic diversity of China, and celebrate this diversity, whether in food, music, architecture, etc. A few months ago, when the movie theaters reopened after the pandemic, the first movie showing nationwide was an Uyghur movie, with Uyghur actors and in Uyghur language (with Chinese subtitles), and it was a big success. In Chinese movies, it’s common to see Uyghur actors, some of which are quite famous.
About the claims of “cultural genocide” and “slave labor”, sorry but it’s complete bullshit. The Uyghur population has been steadily increasing, not decreasing. Thanks to their ethnic minority status which give them special privileges, Uyghurs were exempt from the one-child policy. In Xinjiang, all street signs are in both Chinese and Uyghur language. If you look at any Chinese bank note, you will see that it is written in 5 languages, including Uyghur and Tibetan.
Unfortunately, another reality is that China suffered a wave of terrorist attacks several years ago by radical Muslims, similar to those happening in Europe recently. It’s also true that many Muslim Uyghurs became radicalized through the influence of foreign forces intent at destabilizing China. Thousands of Uyghurs even joined ISIS and committed horrible crimes against civilian populations in Syria. China is reacting to this situation by attempts at re-educating people suspected of radicalization. What the Western media call “concentration camps” are really educational centers, many of which with open doors where people go home every night. Thousands of people came out of these centers with new skills, and were able to find a job or even create their own business, helped by the government.
Exactly how serious it is depends on precisely which parts of the bill these companies are lobbying against. For example, some companies are named in the bill (which strikes me as being bad lawmaking if they are). Maybe Coca Cola is just asking Congress to take their name out of the bill.
According to the WP, Apple are lobbying to “water down” the bill. If they are trying to water it down to the point where it is impotent to stop US companies from using forced labour, that is clearly unacceptable, but maybe Apple is concerned that they might have to leave China altogether because of the provisions of the bill.
Yes it’s possible, but it’s not simple.
For one thing, the Chinese authorities can transport forced labourers out of Xinjiang into other areas. You can’t simply say “we are getting this cloth from a factory outside of Xinjiang, so it’s OK”, you have to inspect the factory and make sure it’s not employing forced labourers.
You also have to consider how many levels of indirection you allow. For example, if you have a factory making clothes, you don’t want it to be using forced labour. You don’t want it’s cloth to be sourced from a factory that uses forced labour and you don’t want that factory to source its cotton from a farm that use forced labour. But what about the overalls that the workers in the clothing factory wear? What about the food in its canteen? What about the overalls and food in the overall making and food making factories. What about their suppliers?
You have to draw a line somewhere. You may choose to draw the line at having any involvement of forced labour anywhere in the supply chain no matter how indirect the link, but be sure to know that the consequences of that are that US companies will have to leave China altogether. That would also be a catastrophe for the millions of Chinese whose livelihoods depend on US money.