Wednesday, 15 January 2014

Feminist Factory Fodder

There are many NGOs such as Action Aid and Christian Aid who send out their missionaries to preach 'women's rights', to destroy traditional communities, to wrench a woman from hearth and husband like a baby from the womb.
These liberated women often work in conditions reminiscent of the early factory system in England, after enclosures had excluded common people from the lands and they were herded like cattle into the towns, a vast pool of cheap labour.
Here is an International Press Service report from Cambodia about the lucky young women who have taken up careers in the garment industry.

Phnom Penh: 9.1.2014
'Cambodian garment workers have two handcuffs and one weapon (against them). One handcuff is a short term contract (10 hours, six days a week). Even if they get sick, if they get pregnant, they feel they have to get an abortion so they don't lose their jobs.
'The second handcuff is the low wage, ' Tola Moeun, head of the Community Legal Education Centre, which advocates for workers' rights, told IPS from the organisation's headquarters on the outskirts of Phnom Penh. 'The weapon used against them is violence, both mental and physical.'
About 90% of garment workers are young women, mostly in their teens and their twenties. His words, which came just days before mass protests broke out in the Cambodian capital, proved prophetic, as garment workers took to the streets Dec.24 until their demonstrations were brutally quashed by Prime Minister Hun Sen's private military the first weekend in January, resulting in five fatalities and over 30 serious injuries. In the days leading up to the protest, the Labour Ministry had approved an increase in the minimum wage for garment workers  from 80 to 95 dollars a month. But trade unions and workers protested, saying it was not enough to live on, and demanded a monthly minimum wage of 160 dollars..........
(Tola said) 'The minimum is for eight hours, so most work 10 hours to get a higher income to have just enough to sleep in a shared room. Most workers are in debt, borrowing about 50 dollars each month. Workers struggle to send money home to their families in the countryside.'

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