Sweatshops are ethical

(a) Re: Sweatshops Don't Cause Harm In R1 Pro began his argument with the statement "Sweatshops don't cause harm." If I am bringing up the moral question of whether or not you should impose harmful conditions simply because you can, I first had to prove Pro was mistaken in writing that sweatshops aren't harmful. I have spent the past 2 rounds detailing explicitly how sweatshops are harmful. Pro never argued that the conditions I mentioned weren't harmful, so I'm assuming he concedes that things like cheating employees out of pay, sexual harassment, forced overtime (with threat of termination), etc. are in fact harmful. While I fully acknowledge that employees may choose to work in sweatshops because they consider it better than death (i.e. choosing to lose toes rather than legs), this debate is about whether or not being subject to make that choice unnecessarily is ethical. Sweatshops obviously cause harm (even if you view those harms as favorable to death) which was my point all along. (b) Re: Sweatshops Are Better Jobs Pro does not agree with my depiction of sweatshops and claims my description is biased. Since he notes that my first source in the last round was a credible one, let's go with their depiction of sweatshops since it's a source he accepts: "Verbal, physical and sexual abuse are common. Workplace injuries occur regularly... In the grueling atmosphere of desperate cost-cutting by corporations, work is accorded little value and, by extension, workers are afforded little dignity. Viewed more as production units than as people, sweatshop workers regularly suffer abuse and intimidation from factory supervisors... Workplace injuries and exposure to toxic chemicals also pose a daily risk to apparel workers... Sexual abuse is endemic" [1]. Again, this is the depiction of sweatshops presented from the source my opponent agreed was credible. Moreover, the very definition Pro gave us from the dictionary specifies that "poor conditions" must exist in order to be considered a sweatshop; conditions outside of the other negatives they mentioned (low wages and long hours). So, I think it's safe to say that semantics aside, we all know what a sweatshop is and that there should be no doubt that they are harmful (the same source also notes that to be considered a sweatshop, there have to be multiple harmful conditions). While you might think it's the actions of the employers that are harmful and not the sweatshops themselves, the fact is that the term "sweatshop" REFERS to these harms specifically, or else they would not be considered sweatshops at all. Additionally, Pro asserts that he cannot find any proof of sweatshops relocating to find employees who will work for lower wages. That's funny because I found several, including this one which notes a "race to the bottom as multinationals leap from one low-wage country to another in a quest for the cheapest production costs" [2]. Pro says that sweatshops are ethical because in some (rare) cases they provide food and shelter. That's true - "In some cases, a sweatshop may provide housing and food for workers, essentially keeping them on the grounds of the facility at all times, and employees may be denied access to the outside world, which includes labor advocates, family members, and law enforcement" [3]. In other words, the sweatshops that grant these "provisions" actually treat their employees like they're in concentration camps. Pro writes, "Next my opponent uses the basic laws of economics to refute most expert economists who have talked of the matter. Wait, what? ... My opponent apparently never looked at my first source in the first round, which went into detail about how much better sweatshops paid compared to domestic labor." On the contrary, I did read that source -- a source that noted many economists are AGAINST sweatshops. Pro's own source mentions: "The letter [against sweatshops] had 434 signatories - 73 percent of whom were economists. At least one scholarly article by an economist, (Miller 2003) 'Why Economists are Wrong About Sweatshops,' has criticized the mainstream economic view of sweatshops." So, if Pro's trying to use economists to argue ethics (which is flawed in and of itself), then his own fallacious appeal to authority in noting that economists must have all the answers about *ethics* makes his standard faulty, at best, considering many economists are indeed against sweatshops. Moreover, Pro's same source notes that while multinational corporations may pay a higher average than the average, it also points out, "While this is true, it does not speak to the situation in which most garments are produced throughout the world – which is by firms subcontracted by multinational corporations, not the MNCs themselves." So as you can see, Pro's own source indicates that there is still much dispute in the economic community about the effects of sweatshops and their harms. Therefore, you cannot ignore the arguments I made in the last round about supply, demand, and workers' wages simply because Pro referenced some economists who are pro-sweatshops. I have noted the same source mentioning some economists AGAINST sweatshops, meaning you must consider the economic arguments Pro made against mine which were non-existent. (c) Re: Voluntary Work / Ethical Standards - CI vs. Consequentialism This is an ethical debate. Pro writes, "Life is not fair, but it doesn't help to prevent them from taking the best options that they can get." I never once said not letting them work in sweatshops was the ethical solution (nor did I mention any solution possibility), so this is a blatant strawman of my arguments. Once again, the ethical standard I raised was Kant's Categorial Imperative which my opponent never responded to directly. It states that human beings should not be treated as a means but always as an end in itself. Once employees are used *solely* as a means (profit) without consideration of any other standard, it is inconsistent with the CI whether the people agree to work in those conditions or not. When employers take advantage of bad situations and desparate workers, they undermine the autonomy of those people who have no better options (we agree that death is not better). Consequentialism in the way Pro used it views human beings solely as tools to use for your advantage, which stands contrary to the CI though Pro never explained why his standard is better. As I have explained, consequentialism fails - particularly if you believe in objective morality (which Pro does). A prima facie wrong action - such as the deliberately unjust punishment of an innocent person - is unethical even if the consequences benefit another. Egoism prescribes that actions may be ethical even if they are detrimental to the welfare of others. Consequentialism expands beyond EE to include even ethical systems contrary to EE such as utalitarianism. So, I can easily use Pro's standard (consequentialism) to say why sweatshops are unethical -- because the consequences of the impact they have on society (or most people) are not morally worth the employer's profit. Consent to work does not answer the moral question of whether one should be subject to something simply because they can be. Consequentialism does not adequately distinguish between positive and negative responsibility. The claim is that consequentialism is indifferent between states of affairs that are produced by what an agent does and those that occur because of what someone else would do that the agent could prevent. Measuring consequences is a problem; it also undermines an agent's integrity [4]. For these reasons, the CI is superior to consequentialism (at least so far as Pro has explained it). [1] From #1 Source Last Round [2] http://www.spiritus-temporis.com... [3] http://www.wisegeek.com... [4] http://www.bookrags.com...