Chocoholic wrote:Wow, you know what I hate to say it, but some of you guys are unbelievable!
I'm not sure why you would say that. It's one thing to lobby in support of migrant workers in another country, it's another if there is an ulterior motive. It's no secret that DP World have launched their bid to buy some US ports and this is no more than organised lobbying by interest groups within the US.
Yes, of course there is immigrant workers in most countries, getting less than the minimum wage, however I doubt to such a scale that there is in the UAE.
I would hazard to guess that Nike and Walmart combined directly or indirectly employ labour in China, The Phillipines and Mexico at similar or lower rates of pay than many labourers are paid in Dubai.
I personally have travelled to factories in China and maquiladoras in Mexico and seen the impoverished conditions and extremely low wages these people who work in these manufacturing plants are paid. The lobby groups do not make nearly the noise they should about this, simply because it means they get access to cheap textiles and consumer electronics, or in US Congress terms, it is in support of the American Way of Life.
I am really, really surprised that after other threads where everyone condems the way the workers are treated you turn around around and go 'oh well big deal'.
I think many question the motivation of the protests or at least I do. US lobbying works in strange ways.
I suspect had the protests been in any other country apart from the US, you wouldn't have slammed them.
I would be less suspicious of the reasoning behind the protest. Let's face it, the average US citizen knows almost zero about Dubai except that it's a muslim state, it's somewhere in the middle east, and it wants to buy their ports which a lot think is an issue of national security. All this in spite of the fact that the UAE is an ally of the US.
Added to that, the US directly or indirectly exploits many 3rd world countries to sustain it's "way of life" in many sectors, and it's civil rights record is one to be questioned severely.
I will reiterate, this is pure lobbying to give Dubai a bad image ahead of future DP World negotations. Lobby groups in the USA are VERY well organised.
Man, even when people there try and do something right for a change, you're still not bloody happy, which only proves to me that some people will be biased against another people no matter what they do - pretty sad really!
It's the motive behind the action that is brought into question. This isn't a conspiracy theory, any mass demonstration in Washington can always be relied on to be the work of lobbyists and with some poor saps being manipulated for economic cause when they think they're doing something altruistic.
The best way for the workers to improve their lot is to stop coming. Refuse to work for such low wages and in poor conditions. Help themselves. Of course in the process you forget a few things:
(1) In their minds, it's better to be working in crappy conditions here than not working in their home country at all.
(2) The money they make here is better than they make at home. The average wage in India is still quite low, and even 1000 dh a month puts them way ahead.
(3) They think of it as not being forever, but a get in get out deal (like the rest of us?) when they will return home with more money than before.
So whilst it might make you feel better personally that they're not being exploited, from their point of view, they're better off. No, I'm not condoning exploitation, but you might find substantial resistance to your cause from those that are being exploited, simply because they survive on the idea that the money they make will put them and their families in a better situation.