Dying For Apple

There are disturbing reports coming persistently now from China about the conditions of many Chinese workers, indeed workers from throughout the industrializing world, who make the products Americans are using every day without a thought. There are reports of workers dying, unsafe conditions, conditions of near immobilization as workers are restricted to their dormitories by policy and heavy workloads of more than 60 hours a week. We, in America, have long recognized that this treatment of workers is wrong; that workers have natural rights and that likewise child labor is inappropriate.

Yet as all these consumer goods are being made "out of sight, out of mind," so the consuming public remains largely ignorant of these egregious abuses to workers. As I sit here typing on an Apple computer, I am vexed and less pleased with my machine knowing now that Apple has gone abroad for some time now; just recently dust in Chinese factories has sparked explosions with many workers maimed or burned alive in the resulting fires. American industry has known for at least a century now how to prevent factory fires from dust: simple, adequate ventilation does the trick. And yet abroad they are dying by the hundreds so that millions here at home can have greater spending power, more consumption, and quite frankly cheaper goods. Meanwhile our national values about fair labor are eroding.

I don't feel any sense of social justice in continuing the status quo, nor the rightness that I should have a long, convenient life while young workers abroad are losing theirs for some savings to my pocketbook. There is a true cost to industrial safety that goes beyond the amount per hour paid in wages. It is a cost of ones' life and well being. There is now, I realize, a good reason why at least in sum, American goods cost more: the people who make them, for the most part, work in safe facilities and will very likely go home every night to their families. They will not be maimed or immolated while on the job. So now my reason for buying American, or at least from countries with strong worker safety records is clear. When I use something I bought, I can rest in the thought that not only my nation may benefit but also the individual who actually created the item on a far away assembly line who will likely be alive and well at the end of their work shift.

Join in a Simple life; make ethical choices about what and where you consume. Ask questions. Care about the environment and mankind in general. Advocate for worker safety world wide. Doing so will benefit you personally and the common good equally.

I Feel Fine

Something in the Way She Moves

lyrics/music by James Taylor

Listen Here

There's something in the way she moves,

Or looks my way, or calls my name,

That seems to leave this troubled world behind.

And if I'm feeling down and blue,

Or troubled by some foolish game,

She always seems to make me change my mind.

And I feel fine anytime she's around me now,

She's around me now

Just about all the time

And if I'm well you can tell she's been with me now,

She's been with me now quite a long, long time

And I feel fine.

It isn't what she's got to say

But how she thinks and where she's been

To me, the words are nice, the way they sound

I like to hear them best that way

It doesn't much matter what they mean

If she says them mostly just to calm me down

Every now and then the things I lean on lose their meaning

And I find myself careening

Into places where I should not let me go.

She has the power to go where no one else can find me

And to silently remind me

Of the happiness and the good times that I know...

If feeling troubled by something, with something which preoccupies the dark places of my own mind, "she is with me now... with me now for quite a long time", as the lyrics go, takes me to another plane.
As for the lyrics, some have said that the song was written as a result of drug use by the singer. But James Taylor himself reportedly has said he wrote the song as a young man about a person he was involved with. We can only listen to the song and perhaps guess where he went from there. Where have we all gone in our own lives, and in collective life as a community?

A long time ago I would have said he was my favorite singer, but as time has gone on, I think I have expanded my loves to include more than those few. Over time when confronted with life itself, like the traveling wise men in the christian story about the Messiah, the simple mind learns that there are more than just one love for a person in their life, more than just one sign indicating the way, that the facts prompting a story aren't always as important as how they are valued. We live a life over the long haul. How I saw things five or eleven years ago was the sum of my experiences up to that point; how I see things now is part wisdom and part of who I am today, as a result of what has come to me over the time of my life. "It isn't what she's got to say, but how she thinks or where she's been."

The Witness

"You shall not bear false witness against your neighbor. Love your neighbor as yourself; this I say is the greatest of Commandments." The Judeo-Christian Bible

Not long ago the 14th Dalai Lama accepted an award recognizing his work for Witness: witness to peace, to compassionate living, for social justice.
The holocaust survivor and author Elie Weisel, author of Night, wrote he said, because his survival of the Shoah, he felt was for those who perished, who not longer have voices to speak, who need those who can speak for them, to tell their stories, so to make a just and equitable world in which the dignity of a person is evident. Weisel uses his writing and lectures, to speak for all those who perished. Without the Witness, the one who speaks for those who cannot, their story and they, themselves, are valueless and forgotten. He writes, he says, to tell their story so they will not be forgotten.

 The 1985 feature film, Witness, starring Harrison Ford makes just this subject its focus. A young boy observes a murder in a public place. He becomes the first witness in the story; the detective, John Book (Ford), investigates, finds a link to corruption. Someone tries to kill him, he escapes to become the second witness in the story. Injured, he makes his way to the home of an Amish family who cares for him; the family becomes the third witnesses to the harm caused by others. Finally those responsible for the injury of the detective, the perpetrators, find him and are now confronted by many in this close community of Amish, all spiritual and religious believers. They, as a community, form the final and most significant act of witness, tolling the bell, confronting the killers, and like the disciples of the Christ, they stand for justice and the common good. Their significant acts of witness mirror the way of the Lord in whom they trust.

In other parts of the world today there are those whose keenly felt sense of justice has driven them to revolution, to overthrow the unjust, the dictators and the despots of the world; they work for the common good, for freedom, for peace, and for love. Then there is the police officer, who in service and protection of his community, takes a bullet; the soldier who in defense of his country, of his comrades, comes under fire and those who suffered mightily in the Communist uprisings around the world during the previous century. The list goes on. Some we call heroes; some brave, and some wild-crazy. All are Witnesses for truth, for peace, and for social justice of all kinds. They include Martin Luther King, Mahatma Gandhi, and so many more. Please add your own names here, and pray for the justice of this world. It all depends upon you.