Is this about the Mexican reality?
Seems equally as applicable to the sweatshop workers of today.
This video brings up a very interesting point discussed through post colonialism and a women’s place in society. All Different All Equal says that in some nations/societies, a woman is still viewed as an item to be bought and sold by men and violence against women is seen only as a minor infraction of the law. I most definitely did not think that today, in the 20th century, countries such as Sweden could still treat women so poorly.
In my mind, all of this returns us to some place in history when man asserted himself over woman and made himself in charge. This mindset is so locked into our cultural norm, that changing it will take nearly as long as it did to create. You cannot change thousands of years of history in a year or two. Women need to keep publicizing these cases and working towards equality.
“Five years following the Beijing Conference on Women, this film scrutinizes the significant achievements, but also the lingering pitfalls that mold women’s status around the globe.”
Now here is an issue at home. Rather than being hundreds or even thousands of miles away, both Los Angeles and Forever 21 are American. Who can say that they have never bought anything from Forever 21? I definitely have. It is cheap, it is fashionable, and the stores are convenient. It has never occurred to me, or probably many others of our age, how and why these clothes are extremely affordable. Ironically enough, as I write this I wear a grey dress recently purchased from a local Forever 21. They may not have the best quality, we all may notice how things start to pill and wear faster than normal, but does it stop us from buying it? No. So will the knowledge gained from this documentary, of the women who must suffer through sweatshop labor to make what I have on, keep me from wearing their clothing? To be completely honest, I do not know. I will now definitely think twice before entering the store, possibly even be a bit pickier about what I buy and if I really need it, but the big question is, is will I still make the purchase. Will you?
Seemingly, the women portrayed in the original documentary have a better life today. It is nice to actually see the result of a ‘call to arms’ documentary. Daily, we see, read, and hear cries for help from those who are less fortunate and it is nice to finally see a result. These women, formerly employed in LA based sweatshop labor, now have better pay and working conditions which will ultimately lead to a better life. If only all the causes we had could turn out this way…
Interestingly enough however, I am curious to see how this documentary negatively affected the sweatshop laborers. Illegals are the primary workers in these factory’s, did they get deported? Did the factories simply burrow further underground? Did the bosses get meaner and more strict with the women in a preventative measure to ensure they never again spoke out? We tend to only focus on the good of a situation like this, when good occurs, but we cannot forget those who were not helped.
This is the afterword’s to Made in L.A. and shows what has been accomplished through making this documentary.
I have been unable to find the full-length version without purchase, online or in libraries. What I have been able to find is a trailer to the real documentary and an afterword’s clip. The documentary follows the three Latina immigrants working in Los Angeles garment sweatshops as they embark on a three-year odyssey to win basic labor protections from trendy clothing retailer Forever 21.
This video makes me want to pull my hair and scream. It is so frustrating to me that a country so close to ours and a country acting as the site of our production lines can have such abominable problems. How is it that all these murders happen so close to our own home yet go seemingly unnoticed? Why is it that the Mexican government chooses to ignore these murders rather than figure out the causes? It is the most backward way of thought for me and something very hard to grasp.
We are raised in a society that teaches values and right from wrong. I assume Mexico is not so different. However, you take a look at Juarez and see a city riddled with crime and murder. It is like one of the interviewee’s said – these girls deserve better than to be raped, murdered and tortured on their way home from work. The fact that the Mexican authorities repeatedly ignore these murders or pass the blame onto lower women of our society makes me wonder if they really do know who is doing it and simply get kickbacks. Juarez police will not arrest the culprits as long as they pay them off. This does not even seem out of the question at this point. Are there even any immediate possibilities for solutions other than activism and spreading the word?
This YouTube post is a series of videos that examine up close the murders of the women in Ciudad Juarez. They give a personal touch and help delve into the local perceptions and problems with solving all the unsolved cases. These murders very often relate to the maquiladora factories in town.
I highly recommend watching video 9 of 10 however there are 9 others. Here is the link.
Relating seemingly perfectly with an issues discussed last week — masculinity and male domination. Masculine authority and ownership is a huge issues within the factories. Women are perceived as weak and unwilling to stand up for themselves therefore being the ideal worker. They concede to their every wish of their male boss. While the women work for cheaper pay in sitting jobs, a direct contrast to the breadwinner male attitude, the men that are employed stand and as a punishment work among the women. Effective, I suppose, in promoting good behavior but demeaning none-the-less.
These women, and men, need well paying jobs to sustain themselves and their families, yet these jobs are part of the reason women keep disappearing. Unionizing is not an option because factories will simply fire the culprits of unrest and hire the many other willing non-unionizing workers. Contacting the home offices the maquiladora’s seem fruitless as well due to the fact that the Mexican factories are run by management unrelated to the large corporation themselves. Finally, to top it all off, the Maquiladoras could care less about the safety and welfare of their employees, merely whether the production quota is met at the end of each shift. In a very sad way, the situation in Juarez will get seemingly worse before it gets better.
It is quite clear the Juarez authorities have no interest in solving these crimes against women, or any crimes against their city for that matter. Riddled with corruption and reportedly run by the Mexican cartel, it is a miracle that there even is a police force. Until Mexico gets their crime ridden government together and begins to address issues of corruptness on a national level, there will be nothing but more murders in Juarez. It is a shame that so many young women are killed each and everyday and prayed upon simply because of their vulnerability. However, local issues usually take root in a larger scale problem, and until these large-scale problems are fixed, there is no hope at a local level.
Thoughts?
San Diego Maquiladora’s Works’ Solidarity Network
Background information on Ciudad Juarez and the murders that have occurred over the past decade.
The more and more I delve into this idea of unionizing and worker rights, the more I see how similar it is to our own unionizing efforts of the eighteenth and early nineteenth century. Back in the day, the United States had these same problems — factories forcing their workers to work in terrible conditions, going as far as to lock them in, and very poor pay. Grassroots were as key to our unionizing as it is the that of the maquiladora industry. In Mexico “FAT, which encompassed a number of grass-roots organizations representing workers, peasants, and cooperatives, offered experience and broad connections not only throughout Mexico, but also in the United States, Canada, and Europe.” This is transnational communication at its best.
“The fact that the mass media in the United States and Mexico focused on the issues of worker autonomy and union democracy rather than simply sweatshop conditions or worker poverty indicates, first, a significant maturation of cross-border networks.” Keeping the lines of communication open between Mexico and the U.S. has allowed for maturation and a shift in the issues focus. I think it is great that we can now have a conversation focused no labor and political issues rather than those more conditional. It shows great growth, growth grounded in grassroots activism.
Another very interesting point made in this article is that it is men, in this case affected, as well as women. With all the talk of maquiladora’s and sweatshops we sometimes forget that there are men involved in these jobs just as much so as women. However, because men are stronger and less easily bullied, in my opinion, we tend to rally much more closely around women’s issues rather than men’s even though both parties are just as affected. Your thoughts?
“It is commonly assumed that transnational activist networks have greater power to compel state and private sector actors to address rights-based grievances as networks grow and activists gain greater visibility in the mass media. However, evidence from case studies of transnational mobilization suggests that the opposite may hold true under given circumstances. This article examines the struggle for an independent union in the Tijuana-based Han Young welding facility, which in 1997 and 1998 became one of the most important tests to date of labor law and institutions across the U.S.-Mexico border. Drawing international press, the Han Young factory conflict eventually drew in national labor unions, a multinational corporation, state governments, the U.S. and Mexican congresses, powerful private-sector lobbies, Mexican district courts, labor secretariats, national and regional media in Mexico and the United States, and eventually then Mexican president Ernest Zedillo and then U.S. president Bill Clinton. Despite the prominence of the case, however, the Han Young struggle ended in almost total defeat for labor. Evidence from the Han Young case suggests that as conflicts become more complex and drawn out, transnational activists’ real influence may decrease, as redress of particular demands requires increasingly complex and surgical interventions to resolve problems. When conflicts implicate internecine power struggles among government actors, solving problems requires confrontations not only over social demands, but also over implementation of agreements when they are reached.”
