She has had more than enough posts on this site so far to find her voice, and I finally decided that it was worth saying something that her voice does not jive with what I believe the site to be about. It’s not my site so I have an infinitesimally small influence, but I thought I’d speak my mind either way.

It’s much different than saying, “Oh, this article doesn’t apply because I don’t have kids.” I would now bet money that all of her articles start with some innocuous purchase that turns out is leading to the pillaging of the environment, child slavery, poisoning of groundwater, etc. because of some NPR special she heard with dubious data and obvious motives.

That last paragraph was slight hyperbole, so PLEASE don’t take me too literally.

Consider improving your communication skills above the level of name-calling. I’m a big advocate for debate, but debate should be based on facts and opinions on the subject at hand. “Nyah, nyah, nyah, you [pick one] liberal loser/conservative idiot” is meaningless.

Plenty of prom and wedding dresses in goodwill with lots of tulle and satin. That stain on the train will be cut off for a 4 ft princess and a lot of poly/acetate can be gently hand-washed or steamed for cleaning without the cost for drycleaning. Can’t sew? Fabric tape and hot glue. Not like they’ll wear it next year anyway.

Need a disney belle or cinderella dress? look for southern belle type in yellow or blue and voila!

but all those saying they only like what he writes and only like to read stuff like he used to write…

jes sayin’

the next thing you know those food corps start producing their own lines of “organic” foods…and there’s an organic choice in every supermarket, large company and small local.

There may be political discussion about the merits of one over the other but the fact remains that change happened because of people thinking about how they spent their paycheck.

besides, the article DID say, that the cost of her “political” preference did enhance her bottom line simply because she had to think about when and where to drop $4 on candy, and that her budgetary limitations also added to her fitness bottom line (limited opportunity for weight gain) so presumably she saves on gym fees…

an article about thinking about how you spend, and pointing out how doing so improves your bottom line…

hurm, sounds like GRS to me.

of course the realist in me says good luck with convincing average Joe ‘Merican to give up his m&m’s for the sake of some exploited kid in china (or anywhere else).

but yeah, if america quit buyin’ the chocolate because of a company’s business practices, they’d improve the business practices…seriously, who eats the stuff other than us? We ARE the market.

Almost 99.5 pc of Belgian chocolate sold in supermarkets contains cocoa harvested by child slaves, says Oxfam. Oxfam calls on Belgian producers to use cocoa beans from Fair Trade.

More than 70pcs of cocoa beans are harvested in West Africa, in countries like Ghana and Ivory Coast, where children are exploited for the harvest. Small farmers earn so little that they have no money to pay staff for the collection, said a spokeswoman for Oxfam. In West Africa, more than 100,000 children work in the cocoa sector. An estimated 15,000 children are slaves from neighboring countries like Burkina Faso, added the representative of Oxfam.

In Belgium, K***, the parent company of C*** , admits that child labor is a problem and says it is not able to guarantee that the chocolate was not produced with beans harvested by child slaves.

“Since November 2009, we work with beans certified by the Rainforest Alliance. Plantations using child labor automatically lose their certificate” says K***. “In 2012, all cocoa used for the C*** chocolate should have this label.”

but when I have any choice in the matter, when I have information available, I’ll make the choice to spend my money in a way that supports business the way I think business should be done. and no, I don’t have a diamond. I made it very clear to my husband (and even my boyfriends before him) that a diamond was not in my dream courtship. my engagement ring is American sapphires and my wedding ring was my great-grandmothers

Ask those kids’ teachers, doctors and dentists how much impact Halloween has and I’m sure they’ll tell you it goes well beyond a single day.

I’m kind of glad I live in an apartment so I don’t have to worry so much about the opinions of little kids

Listen. Those of us in the first world can sit here all day and make value judgments about how terrible it is to let our precious little snowflakes do actual manual labor. And to the extent that cocoa production crosses into literal human slavery, I would advocate for its abolition. However, where you see a “forced labor camp” may be an African family’s only means of survival. Children don’t have steady schools so learning a skill is the next best alternative. Remember when American children would work on their parent’s farms…for nothing more than food on the table? Well, fast forward two hundred years and we have increased productivity, but others are not so lucky. I am not “for” exploitation of children, but if you accept a poor family’s position in life, you may find a lot more voluntary action than you initially perceive.

Full Disclosure: I have not read this particular NPR report, however I have read a lot about other “sweatshop” labor where the usual story given to reporters is “This is the best job available to us. We would rather do this than grow rice all day.”

“Since when is anything moral having to do with money simply
equated to all things moral having to do with anything???!”

Note that I was equating a moral/money situation (chocolate/child labor) with another moral/money situation (gays/charity). I don’t see your point here.

My point is that if I see an article about a topic that doesn’t interest me — like saving money on coffee when I don’t drink coffee or which U.S. credit cards are the best when I don’t live in the U.S. — then I just ignore it. Bloggers can’t please everyone all the time, and if an article is a waste of my time, well, they didn’t force me to read it.

I do think people should voice their opinions and we should read things outside of our interests and comfort zones, but I also think we need to take a more active role in our media consumption — and take responsibility for our choices as an audience.

I will never be the house that gives out raisins or oranges or whatever because ugh, but my favorite house growing up was the one which gave out foreign coins in small denominations. I like that idea.