One of the most famous John Woolman quotes is: "May we look upon our treasure, the furniture of our houses, and our garments, and try to discover whether the seeds of war have nourishment in these our possessions." At the time Woolman wrote, he was of course thinking both of slavery and also of wars that were fought over resources. In modern day translation I would add: whether the seeds of war, suffering and climate change have nourishment in these our possessions.
For example many people are aware of "conflict minerals": tin, tungsten, tantalum (3ts) and gold which are mined in African countries, and particularly the Congo, controlled by guerrilla groups using the money to fund a civil war which has killed over 5 million people since 1998. Amnesty International has also documented the use of child laborers, as young as age 7, being made to work in these mines. These materials are used to make smart phones and many computer chips. Only 16% of our phones are even recycled -so these built to be obsolete items contain materials we throw away that others have literally died for. Efforts by a company named Fairphone to build a completely non-conflict sourced phone have yet to be successful
Gold of course is also used in jewelry as are diamonds: also known as "blood diamonds" in some circles because of the violence associated with them. African miners make a dollar a day, again often use child labor and work in war zones. Violence is often directed against the workers and the environmental practices leave areas around the mine devastated. 2
The Enough Project attempts to provide us some rankings for these companies so we can reduce our complicity. For example Apple has done a pretty good job of reducing its conflict minerals followed by Google, HP, Microsoft, and trailing at the bottom Samsung and then Toshiba. For Jewelers the department stores that have the most blood on their jewelry are not surprisingly Walmart and Sears being worst, Helzberg and Costco close to the bottom and with Signet and then Tiffany's doing the best.3
And then there is Chocolate. For years the media has been documenting that African (Ivory Coast and Ghana producing 60% of the worlds cocoa) has child labor and even child slavery being used to pick chocolate.4 Many of these same issues surround the production of coffee, teas, bananas and coffee. Fortunately there is a Fair Trade designation for these products that attempts (some better than others) to document that fair labor practices, as well as environmental standards, were used in the production.5
Cotton of course is in our clothes. If not organic it has been produced with chemicals very hard on the earth. But really for all our clothes when you look at the label that says where it has been made, almost inevitably you will see some of the poorest countries in the world where there are not protective labor laws and where workers work long hours for little pay. Sweat shops have simply moved abroad. This is why inexpensive clothing can be found for prices you could not match by just buying the fabric and making it yourself in this country.
Before I completely leave this list of horrors there is also the rape of the earth categories. If you were to see pictures of areas of the amazon that have been clear cut to: provide cheap teak wood, land for raising cheap beef for $1 fast food hamburgers, or for palm oil which is in most processed foods and beauty products in the US you would be horrified by the pictures. Yet we innocently buy these products with no awareness of the havoc that was wrecked to bring them to us. Deforestation is one the huge contributors to climate change. (10 to 15% of the Greenhouse gases)
So yikes: here are the seeds of war, suffering and climate change in our cellphones, our computers, our electronics, our jewelry, our food, our clothing, our cosmetics, and our furniture. I really was not trying to depress the hell out of you! I know most of my f/Friends would not stand in front of a child factory or a clear cut forest and buy the products coming out of there. We in fact have happily believed that child labor, slavery and environmental destruction were things that were outlawed a 100 to 40 years ago. Well they were in the US. But one of the results of globalization is that it hard to find a product that in solely and completely produced in the US. Most ingredients or components at least come from other countries where they were extracted with cheap labor and in environmentally destructive ways and then the finished products or the components for assembly were sent to another country or the US for final assembly. We are inexplicably bound to suffering around the globe that is conveniently kept out of our sight. Perhaps because we would not participate in it if we could see it.
So as painful as this is the first step in changing this is bringing its reality into our awareness. Looking at our possessions and understanding in fact where they do come from, seeing the humans behind our possessions. Unfortunately, in the globalized economy it is not possible to live in an industrial country and be able to separate yourself from this chain of suffering. So there is not a way to achieve some moral purity - there is only the possibility to start pushing back and trying to create more justice and fairness one bit at a time.
What are some of the solutions:
1) Buy less - you will create less suffering - to quote an old saying: "Live simply so others may simply live".
2) Recycle and reuse and repair - as 70's as that sounds when we reuse materials more mining does not go on. When we reuse items more new production does not go on.
3) Learn about fair trade certifications and buy products that bare fair trade labels. Yes it will cost more - I think it is worth it to not support child labor, slavery and people working for $1 a day. I will have to buy less and save for some things - and probablt represents the true costs and a more fair balance of resources in the world anyway.
4) Look at the Enough Project and try to buy on the fairer end of the spectrum - create consumer pressure for products that are produced with fair labor and environmental standards. Buy a Fairphone the next time you replace your cellphone.
5) Buy less processed foods - they are healthier for you anyway but they will not contain palm oil or foods produced with cheap labor in another country.
6) Consider giving services and not things as gifts to others.
7) When possible buy items made by artisans in your own community. (Examples: hand made jewelry, clothing, items made by wood workers, bakers, carpenters, etc in your own community.)
1 http://www.newstalk.com/Can-you-buy-a-conflict-free-phone-minerals-intel-fairphone-apple
2.https://www.brilliantearth.com/conflict-diamond-facts/
3. https://enoughproject.org/reports/demand-the-supply
4. http://fortune.com/big-chocolate-child-labor/
5. https://www.fairtradewinds.net/guide-fair-trade-labels/
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