Comments on China Syndrome

Most products made in China are safe, however... This is the outgrowth of a weird culture where there is intense pressure to make as much money as you can and little oversight.

First, hanging out at the Wah Mee (really bad taste), now trashing Chinese goods. Who's got it in for the Chinese over at The Stranger?

Basically, they're in the position the West was, pre-Upton Sinclair.

The Warehouse
The Warehouse
Where everyone gets a bargain

(and a sub-lethal dose of formaldehde!)

Nobody's surprised at this point, right? I've been living in Beijing for the past year, and it really IS a case for Upton Sinclair. The main problem, though, is that China has very, very weak rule of law when it comes to corporate behavior. They've got weak safety oversight, and a pervasive culture of bribery and "close enough" attitudes.

This stuff will not end until the government evolves truly independent, powerful regulatory systems that are answerable to the people.

What's alarming about it is not that it's happening in the PRC (who could have guessed?), but that 10 years of a Republican Congress (right?) and nearly 8 years of a radically right-wing Executive branch have essentially eroded our own regulatory systems toward a Chinese model.

In fact, as the Chinese struggle with growth, corruption and the new wealth of the middle class, they're slowly gaining more rights. At the same time, US citizens are being stripped of them at an alarming rate. The systems are beginning to resemble one another- lightly regulated kleptocracies deferential to large corporations and allergic to internal criticism, where the wealthy have rights and the poor have none.

Is that how they spell "pajamas" in New Zealand, or is that a typo? Maybe it's an abbreviation for little-people pajamas - like "pygmy pajamas --> pyjamas".

Yes they spell it that way. They talk funny as well.

I suppose it shouldn't be terribly surprising when you have a culture that is so tied to saving face and putting on the right sort of appearances that sacrificing safety and quality is quite alright. You'd think they would have learned their lesson after the grand failure that was the cultural revolution.

The Warehouse ought to change its name to The Sweatshop.

And what exactly is flannelette, anyway?

Dan, please stop bashing the Chinese. It's not their fault that American corporations have outsourced production to shitty factories in the southern part of China that pay, if the workers are lucky, shit wages almost on time. Chinese workers do not WANT to blow up Americans or poison them, they are required to do so by the demands of capital. Which comes from the US. Context, please.

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