Clips week continues
May 2nd, 2008 | by Paul |Originally ran Feb. 12 as “What I’m Wearing”
Why the hell were my American Eagle jeans made in Hong Kong?
Probably the same reason my Hanes undershirt was made in the Dominican Republic and my Croft and Barrow boxers were made in Thailand.
Hanes’ slogan, by the way is “An American Original.” American Eagle is part of the Martin + Osa brand, claiming to be the moral descendents of Martin and Osa Johnson, “photographers, explorers, naturalists, authors … and native Kansans.” Croft and Barrow is a “quality private brand” of Kohl’s, a store name trademarked to Kohl’s Illinois, Inc.
Kansas and Illinois are U.S. states, for my burgeoning international audience, which - if I’m reading Google Analytics correctly - consists of two guys from the U.K. and a Canadian and Swede who accidentally clicked on the site, then hit return.
It started as a cute blog idea - take a look at what I was wearing at the moment I started the entry. Then I got disgusted and realized that the only articles of clothing I was wearing that didn’t blare the name of a country with notoriously low labor standards were my socks, my belt and my 1970s velour shirt.
(Long story short, my maternal grandparents bought the shirt for my father when my parents were just dating. He was ashamed to wear it, but couldn’t throw it out considering he wanted to marry their daughter. I proudly wear a shirt a man who got married in a velvet tuxedo with a ruffled shirt was ashamed to wear in the 1970s.)
Anyway, the socks and belt have no markings declaring their country of origin and the 30-year-old shirt’s country of origin was faded. So it’s not that they weren’t made in sweatshops, it’s just that I don’t know. But once I took the velour off to read the label, I decided not to put it back on. I threw on a red Van Heusen dress shirt that turned out to be made in Mongolia.
Mongolia. Here’s the CIA World Factbook entry on Mongolia. Read that then tell me if you think that’s a country in the best place to make fair labor practices for its workers.
But thank God all these companies have standards. Take Van Heusen’s corporate responsibility page. It declares, in part, “Employees of our vendors must be over the applicable minimum legal age requirement or be at least 14 years old or older than the age for completing compulsory education in the country of manufacture, whichever is greater. Vendors must observe all legal requirements for work of authorized minors, particularly those pertaining to hours of work, wages, minimum education and working conditions. We encourage vendors to support night classes and work-study programs, especially for younger workers.”
Well, thank God for that. I wouldn’t want 13-year-olds making this very nice red 65 percent polyester, 35 percent cotton blend shirt that is on my back right now. They’re a good company operating out of Mongolia, not like that Dong Fang Guo Ji factory out of Ulaanbaatar, Mongolia. You know, that one that the U.S. government banned in 2000 due to forced child labor. According to that government press release, Dong Fang Guo Ji put out 90 percent of its textiles under its own brand name and 10 percent under the name of the companies they subcontract for.
Great country to get a shirt from, huh?
What about the rest of my outfit? My Dominican Hanes, my Thai Croft and Barrow and my Hong Kong Eagles?
Well, I’m tired, so I’ll let the U.S. government do the talking. U.S. state department reports on human rights violations in the Dominican Republic, in Thailand and in China (home of Hong Kong).
Search for “child labor” in those links. Search for “forced labor.” I’m not saying the clothes I’m wearing were made in sweatshops. I’m not saying they weren’t. I’m saying I don’t know.
But even if my clothes weren’t made in sweatshops, do we really want to be rewarding those governments by sending our consumer dollars over there?
I’ll put in more frivolity and pictures of George Peppard and Michael Jackson in later entries. Right now, I’m tired, disgusted and want to go to bed. I wonder who made my blanket?