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Related: Editorials & Other Articles, Issue Forums, Alliance Forums, Region ForumsChinese forced labor camp worker puts haunting note pleading for help into box of Kmart decorations
This amazing story was on the front page of the Oregonian newspaper this morning. It gives me the chills thinking about this desperate person basically working as a slave taking the risk to ask for help from the person who happens to wind up with that particular box of Halloween decorations in the United States ...
http://www.oregonlive.com/happy-valley/index.ssf/2012/12/halloween_decorations_carry_ha.html
The letter came in a box of Halloween decorations purchased at Kmart, but for a year Julie Keith never knew. It gathered dust in her storage, a haunting plea for help hidden among artificial skeletons, tombstones and spider webs.
Keith, a 42-year-old vehicle donation manager at a southeast Portland Goodwill, at one point considered donating the unopened $29.99 Kmart graveyard kit. It was one of those accumulated items you never need and easily forget. But on a Sunday afternoon in October, Keith pulled the orange and black box from storage. She intended to decorate her home in Damascus for her daughter's fifth birthday, just days before Halloween.
She ripped open the box and threw aside the cellophane.
That's when Keith found it. Scribbled onto paper and folded into eighths, the letter was tucked between two Styrofoam headstones.
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limpyhobbler
(8,244 posts)I wonder will the note-writer be in a lot of trouble.
Arugula Latte
(50,566 posts)S/he wrote it more than a year ago ... I wonder if that person wakes up every day wondering if that will be the day when s/he is hauled off by authorities to suffer an even worse fate. 
RZM
(8,556 posts)If this is investigated further, we might find out for sure. But I don't see enough here to take it to the bank.
NewJeffCT
(56,848 posts)I have no doubts that a lot of factory workers in China labor under horrific conditions, but I'm guessing a lot of them would struggle to write that much in Chinese - let alone English.
Arkansas Granny
(32,265 posts)with decent grammar and spelling. Not impossible, I suppose, but unlikely.
adieu
(1,009 posts)who stuffed it into the box.
It could just be a conspiratorial attempt to make a stab into the Chinese Communist Party (CCPG) by some of the more intellectual group among the populace. Hence, the value of the claim could be questioned.
Nevertheless, I think the statement will suffice to put off enough people, possibly, that there will be greater demands on better working conditions.
humblebum
(5,881 posts)We shouldn't be surprised in the least and are only fooling ourselves if thought otherwise.
arikara
(5,562 posts)this isn't just a labour camp but one that the government sends dissidents to be "re-educated". I would think that a bi-lingual Chinese person can wind up in such a camp just as easily as one who can't speak English, perhaps even more likely that the person would be educated.
Regardless, its heartbreaking.
Shampoobra
(423 posts)Labor camps are prisons, not career choices.
China's re-education through labor is a system of punishment that allows for detention without trial. Various reports allege followers of the banned spiritual group, Falun Gong, are sent to the reform camps – claims supported in the letter – but the facts are difficult to confirm.
...
If truly created in a forced labor camp, the Halloween graveyard kit from Kmart's "Totally Ghoul" product line could bring a blow to the U.S. chain of discount stores.
Title 19, section 1307 of U.S. Code generally prohibits the importation of all items "mined, produced or manufactured" in any foreign country by convict labor, forced labor and/or indentured labor.
derby378
(30,262 posts)Practitioners of Falun Gong (aka Falun Dafa) have long suffered persecution from Chinese authorities, including imprisonment, torture, and the occasional death. I take this sort of thing very seriously.
We should take a wide look at this, as well. The note was found among Halloween decorations from K-Mart. However, a lot of us get our Halloween decorations, including animatronics, from chains such as Spirit Halloween, Cow Halloween, and Halloween USA that import a lot of their stuff from China as well. How many of those floating zombies and jumping spiders were produced under similar wretched labor conditions?
slampoet
(5,032 posts)Just because people are poor doesn't mean they can't write in their own language or the language of others.
China contains the Second largest amount of English speakers in the world, English was also the second official language in Hong Kong under the British.
Maybe you should read more.
Nanjing to Seoul
(2,088 posts)Yes. . .here in China, poverty means much fewer, practically zero, opportunities.
Hong Kong (香港）is an SAR. They have their own government, law, economics and system.
Shenyang is in Jilin, in 东北, near Heilongjiang.
It is not a "wonderfully ignorant" view. It's pretty much accurate. I've lived here for six years.
NewJeffCT
(56,848 posts)my wife is from mainland China, I've been to China several times and also have a lot of relatives in China. I know dozens of Chinese well, including many who went to top schools here in the US and/or top schools in China and are working in very high level positions here in the US - business executives, stem cell research scientists, engineers, doctors, college professors, etc. Unless they came here when they were very young, some of the English words used in that letter are not typical uses of the English language by Chinese.
Also, Hong Kong is a special area of China where citizens of mainland China need special approval just to enter Hong Kong. They also speak Cantonese in Hong Kong, while mainland China speaks Mandarin.
JDPriestly
(57,936 posts)I don't know whether to believe this or not.
But human rights organizations could check it out.
DonCoquixote
(13,961 posts)Most the of English spoken in this world is not in the US, Canada, or the UK, it is in asia, where India alone has about 600 million speakers, and China has several million. They also have better grammar than their Anglocentric counterparts.
Nanjing to Seoul
(2,088 posts)Grammar sucks, syntax sucks, spelling is absolutely miserable.
So, it's not really wrong. Again, six years of experience living and teaching in China here. I'm still here married to a Chinese national.
tarheelsunc
(2,117 posts)I don't see how it's so hard to believe that 1 person out of a forced labor camp out of who knows how many (hundreds, thousands?) can have decent English abilities. And plus, if this is a dissident camp, it would be EVEN MORE likely people there have an above average outside education, which would most likely be acquired from knowing English well as that kind of information is nearly impossible to find in Chinese. Chances are, if you talk to 100 random Chinese citizens, at least one of them will speak great English, and that's probably an extremely conservative estimate. My wife is from a small, poor village in Sichuan and she's not even the only English speaker from there. In a major city like Shenyang, the prevalence of English would be much higher. All it takes is one person with good English skills to write this letter. And I have no doubt at all that at least one person at that camp (and probably several more) could do it.
Nanjing to Seoul
(2,088 posts)100%.
As I said in other posts, that is normal paper here in China. I have stacks of paper like that. But the writing it too good for a typical factory worker. I would accept the person having help writing it. Also, the use of the word "practitioner" seems too advanced.
Here in China. . .if you are using your hands to make a living, you don't have an education. It's that simple.
I live in Nanjing. Are you kidding about the GREAT English speakers? You're kidding, right? My wife is from Lizhuang, a small farming village near Danyang in Zhenjiang. Chances are you will get 100 people that will practice their English by saying hello and laughing when you say "hi" back to them. Or will say 听不懂 if you speak English to them.
Yes, I've been here for six years. And I still have that view point. Unless you can prove to me I am wrong, it will not change.
Democracyinkind
(4,015 posts)Nanjing to Seoul
(2,088 posts)Not condoning, but until we have clean hands again, we need to stop, as a nation, being hypocrites.
DonCoquixote
(13,961 posts)Granted, the private prison industry, inspired by China is working to make prison labor more profitable, however, in China, having the large forced labor pool is worked into the business model. Part of why WalMart has so many cheap goods is because China can bring up a huge pool of people to work for low wages. Yes, the US is trying that, but seeing as how the US Prison system is corrupted with both gang influence and corporate prison companies, they will not succeed as well. Sad is it is, the fact that the prison gangs are very organized might be the saving grace, and I say this as a former employee of the Department of corrections that saw firsthand that these gangs are a "well-regulated militia" complete with internationally organized business plans that make some Fortune 500 companies look like a pizza joint.
Democracyinkind
(4,015 posts)Hey, I'm the first to admit that we're a pretty fucked up country - I know about private prisons and even public ones like Angola.
Still miles away from forced labor camps in China.
False equivalency bullshit.
Marengo
(3,477 posts)The laogai isn't just for nong min or factory workers.
obamanut2012
(29,369 posts)And, I know this for a fact, from teaching.
Quantess
(27,630 posts)and it is very difficult to transition from Chinese to English, and vice versa.
Grammar is generally pretty bad, which is to be expected. I am impressed that so many Chinese speakers speak English as well as they do! However, your assessment is a little too rosy. There are native Chinese speakers who have lived in San Francisco for several years who don't speak english all that well.
roguevalley
(40,656 posts)they go there thinking its legit and end up like this.
malaise
(296,118 posts)Beyond suspicious
KittyWampus
(55,894 posts)My father did volunteer birdwatching for quite a few years in China and was amazed at how well some people in the sticks where he was going were able to speak. And that was in the 80's.
Edit- he still gets Christmas cards from one gentleman.
laundry_queen
(8,646 posts)IN my class at university, there are at least 8-10 Chinese students, and having been in groups with them, and having seen their written work, this letter could've been written by any one of them - even those mistakes are consistent with how they speak. Just because one or 2 people post here that THEY don't think it's like what they've heard doesn't mean that's not how some speak English. I'm fluent in French and I can name 3 different public figures here in Canada whose french accents and manner of speaking in English are totally different from one another - despite all having Quebec French as their first language. Heck, the English varies even within my family (french is my extended family's first language). You cannot read this letter and say, "nope, not from a Chinese speaker." Ridiculous assumption.
Fire Walk With Me
(38,893 posts)HiPointDem
(20,729 posts)
ReRe
(12,189 posts)...from someone in duress in a Chinese slave-worker camp. Most-favored-nation trading status. Does the House vote on that anymore, or is a foregone conclusion now? Maybe we had to give them permanent trading status when we started borrowing all that money from them for all our unfunded wars and tax-breaks for the rich? I guess it doesn't matter what the answer is, as it seems powerless to do anything about it. My head hurts on Christmas Eve. Just more bad news...
riverbendviewgal
(4,396 posts)I wonder what will happen of it....
K & R
agent46
(1,262 posts)Among a large group of peasant laborers, there's bound to be at least someone who had some education. Brilliant minds are found everywhere in the world, even among the impoverished and enslaved. In China, someone with knowledge of English like that would be well known among his/her peers. They respect education as a cultural value. Nothing takes place in a vacuum. Maybe he/she was put up to it by a number of others.
Nanjing to Seoul
(2,088 posts)However, I'm a little weary. I teach geography and economics here in Nanjing. That English is surprisingly good for a factory worker in Shenyang, where there are few foreigners and even less opportunity.
But this sounds about right.
KittyWampus
(55,894 posts)Democracyinkind
(4,015 posts)
saidsimplesimon
(7,888 posts)suggestions that violent revolution is the way to peace. It isn't, and I'm never going to support it.
WinkyDink
(51,311 posts)Liberal_in_LA
(44,397 posts)Beams1969
(134 posts)and other places throughout the world, I have to question the origin of this note.
As an ESL teacher who has had many Chinese students, most from well-to-do and well-educated families, the lack of certain types of mistakes (e.g., verb tense/usage and near-perfect article use), as well as the placement of other "mistakes," seem not in line with what Chinese students often do. I won't go through them, as it wouldn't make much point, but the letter seems doubtful to me for anyone but an extremely well-educated person. If it is an educated person who is being forced to work, one would assume s/he would find a more efficient route to get word out. It seems too much a risk to put into a box of decorations. It is possible, but having read hundreds of essays written under the relative minimal pressure of an ESL class, I sense other things going on here.
Anyway, my two cents.
XemaSab
(60,212 posts)Subject/verb and numbers in English take a LOOOOOONG time for ESL students from China to master.
obamanut2012
(29,369 posts)Also from my experience.
JI7
(93,617 posts)raouldukelives
(5,178 posts)We have a lot of people in this country and around the world more than happy to see people live and with a little luck, be born into forced labor to turn a profit. You can generally recognize them by the term " Financial Planner" or "Investor".
DiverDave
(5,245 posts)I fear for who wrote that.
Le Taz Hot
(22,271 posts)Whether or not the letter is authentic, the POINT is that our low-priced crap from China IS made from slave labor, whether it's in a factory camp or prison camp. So, the next time you buy some piece of crap made in China, know that YOU are contributing to that person's slavery.
truebluegreen
(9,033 posts)
obamanut2012
(29,369 posts)I don't mean that snarky. I mean we already know how horrific it is, and how so many US industries have been destroyed by outsourcing.
Having something that is a hoax does NOT help educate people. It does the opposite.
obamanut2012
(29,369 posts)For many reasons, most of which posters gave already stated.
I will add: prisoners don't have access to paper and writing utensils, and are heavily monitored.
Even university-educated Chinese can rarely write like that. And, yes, I do know that for a fact.
Sunlei
(22,651 posts)This is just like what the south did for 80 years right after the slaves were free. They got them into prisons on 'fake charges' made a felony laws like not having a job- with years of hard time.
South had decades of cheap throw-away labor leased to work in mines, factories, farms and anywhere a company wanted prisoners to work to death. Americans were re-enslaved, worked to death similar to China.
WCGreen
(45,558 posts)that is one of the reasons the private prisons came into being, to take advantage of a steady flow of prisons because of the war on drugs.
sulphurdunn
(6,891 posts)of Halloween decorations is only a little less desperate than corking a note in a bottle and dropping it in the middle of the ocean. If that's actually how the message came to the US, it tips the scales heavily to the side of authenticity, whatever the motive.
grahamhgreen
(15,741 posts)mechanisms for investigation?