The Super Bowl and Child Labor

Posted by Benjamin on: 02.02.2008 /

Not a disconnect. The super bowl half time show is being sponsored by Bridgestone-Firestone, the American division of a corporation which had $25 Billion in revenues in 2006 (enough to pay for a full 6 weeks of the Iraq War, just as an aside). Why are they sponsoring the super bowl half time show? You get three guesses, and the first two don’t count.

1. So question number one is: If you or I watch the super bowl, with its multiple ads from Bridgestone-Firestone, are we thus … glorifying Bridgestone-Firestone? And by “glorifying” in this question, I mean “making more weighty, lending esteem, honor, profit, etc. to” That is, by watching the superbowl, are you giving away some of your power to Bridgestone- Firestone?

Emira Woods writes today at Allafrica.com about the ongoing use of child labor by Bridgestone-Firestone in Liberia, and the ongoing lawsuit regarding that child abuse. If you poke around the internet a bit, you’ll find that there’s quite a bit of eyewitness testimony to the horrible conditions at rubber tree plantations owned and operated by Bridgestone-Firestone in Liberia. I guess it’s probably fairly easy to take advantage of people who have the sort of widespread PTSD that Liberians without a doubt have to deal with after the years of really vicious, savage, horrifying civil war in that nation.

Emira writes:

I visited the plantation in 2005, just after Firestone signed an agreement with the interim government extending its lease until the year 2042. I met an 11-year old boy, Abu, a scrawny yet handsome kid, with long arms, skinny legs, and eyes as bright as a full moon. Abu was working on the Firestone plantation. He had been “helping his dad from before the sun was up”. Abu explained how he started at 4:30am cleaning the storage cups, applying chemicals and pesticides to trees, and then moving on to collect the white rubber sap streaming down each tree.

Abu poured the cup of rubber sap into a large bucket then hoisted two of these buckets onto a pole to move from tree to tree. When the buckets were full, each weighing 75 pounds, Abu struggled and winced in pain but his carried load a mile up the road to vast storage tanks where the rubber would be poured into tanker trucks and taken to a processing area before shipment to America. Abu shared his dream of one day becoming a doctor. Yet unable to go to school and used as beasts of burden, he and countless other children have no way out.

2. So here’s question number two: If the answer to question number one is approaching “yes”, then is it *possible* that by watching the superbowl, we actually get to participate in some of the culpability for 11 year old kids working 50+ hour weeks to help their family eke out a subsistence living on rubber plantations in Liberia (especially since it’s all for the grand purpose of us getting relatively inexpensive tires for our SUV’s and some corporate types getting richer) (now that last was uncalled for. sorry.)?

There’s your sad thought for the day.

And here’s your happy thought for the day. You can *also* use your power in really astounding ways. If a mere one percent of the people who watch the super bowl were to contact Bridgestone-Firestone regarding the conditions at Liberia rubber plants, and say that, for instance, they will not be buying Bridgestone-Firestone brand tires until they hear and see convincing evidence that things have changed, then the corporation would receive 1.3 million letters, emails, and phone calls after the super bowl. In such letters and phone calls, one could even reference the corporation’s own public community commitment to being a good corporate citizen. Do you think that would be at all convincing to them, or actually effect any change? I do.

Here’s Bridgestone’s Community Affairs contact details. I’d love to hear how that goes.

9 Responses to "The Super Bowl and Child Labor"

Comment by: StopFirestone
1 02/3/08 1:29 PM | Comment Link |
You can take action right NOW by sending an urgent action e-mail to the NFL and Firestone here: http://www.unionvoice.org/campaign/NFL08

Visit http://www.StopFirestone.org for more information and ways to take action.
Comment by: Steven Grigsby
2 02/4/08 8:58 AM | Comment Link |
I just sent an email to the Firestone community relations department. I will post here if I get a response.
Comment by: Craig
3 02/4/08 12:35 PM | Comment Link |
I’m on the e-mail lists of several faith-based activist groups who constantly send e-mails encouraging people to boycott products or shows because the company supports abortion, gay rights or the sex industry…somehow they miss reporting companies who take advantage of the underprivileged. Thanks Benjamin for posting this.
Comment by: Benjamin
4 02/4/08 2:42 PM | Comment Link |
Steven,

great–look forward to hearing back from you!

Craig,

No problem. Thank you for the encouragement. Do you often participate in these boycotts? Do you think they have any effect?
Comment by: Craig
5 02/4/08 4:30 PM | Comment Link |
I’m not much of the boycotting type, so no I’ve never actually participated. I guess I haven’t really felt passionately enough about the specific causes OR maybe I also don’t really see the effect that a boycott would have. Perhaps this is because it appears to me that these types of organizations use boycotts as an everyday “weapon”. Perhaps I’d take them a bit more seriously if they weren’t so whiny about the current “serious issue” facing America. But I remain on these e-mail lists because I’ve done work for these organizations in the past and like to keep in the loop, guess I just like the tension that gets created in me when I hang around people with opposing worldviews.
Comment by: Benjamin
6 02/6/08 1:23 AM | Comment Link |
Craig

guess I just like the tension that gets created in me when I hang around people with opposing worldviews.

perfect. me too! At least my ideal self likes that tension =)

I’ve reposted your comment to the top of the blog =)
Comment by: Martin Gugino
7 02/7/08 12:43 AM | Comment Link |
FWIW, there is a long history of exploiting Africans for rubber. It started with Leopold 2nd in the “Belgian” Congo. They switched from stealing ivory to stealing rubber when the tire market took off.
Comment by: Steven
8 02/8/08 11:22 AM | Comment Link |
I had emailed Firestone about this issue and this is the resonse I received.

Thank you for your interest in our Liberian farming operation. The recent concerns regarding our sister company’s sponsorship of the Super Bowl halftime show are completely unfounded. It is disheartening that some entities continue to undermine the great strides Firestone Natural Rubber Company and our employees are making in rebuilding the country’s social infrastructure - including housing, schools and medical facilities - and rehabilitating its vital rubber industry. As an educated consumer and as someone concerned about others, you should be aware of the following facts regarding our operations in Liberia. Firestone has a longstanding partnership with the Liberian people and has recently renegotiated its agreement with the Government of Liberia. This relationship is built on mutual respect, and we are working very hard to help the Liberian people recover from a devastating 14-year civil war that claimed as many as 300,000 lives and destroyed the country’s infrastructure and social services as well as much of what Firestone had built over its 80-plus year history in the country.

With regard to the unionization efforts, Firestone workers have been represented by a union, the Firestone Agricultural Workers Union of Liberia (FAWUL), which the company always recognized and with whom Firestone negotiated in good faith. The Supreme Court recently became involved because of an internal dispute within the existing union (the company was not a party in this legal challenge). As we fully respect the rule of law in Liberia, Firestone publicly stated it would await and abide by the court’s decision on which group would be the legally recognized leadership of FAWUL. Since the decision was recently handed down, the company has met with the new leadership, and looks forward to resuming progressive labor contract negotiations very soon. Please note that even Firestone Liberia’s lowest-earning workers receive more than three times the monthly average wage of other Liberian workers. Employees are paid regularly - in US dollars - and are provided many other benefits, including housing, vacation, pensions and healthcare fully paid for by the company.

Further, we are doing everything we can to prevent child labor. Because we strongly believe that the best place for children is in school, we currently operate 23 schools with approximately 15,000 students who attend free of charge. Firestone does not employ children. In fact, no one under the age of 18 is allowed to work on our farm, an age requirement that exceeds Liberian law by two years. In addition, the company’s zero-tolerance policy on child labor prohibits Firestone employees from bringing their children to work (a common practice on farming operations). If employees are caught bringing their children to work, they risk losing their jobs - which are extremely scarce in Liberia. As we continue to invest in our Liberian operations, we are also focusing on the environment. We pride ourselves on following the letter and spirit of all applicable laws, and are in the process of making a substantial investment to construct a new wastewater treatment plant to ensure that no water discharged from our operations will be sent to the river. This project is now under construction and will meet the environmental standards for water quality in the United States and any other developed country. For more information on our efforts to rebuild and improve our operations in Liberia, please visit our website at http://www.firestonenaturalrubber.com.
Comment by: Benjamin
9 02/8/08 6:37 PM | Comment Link |
Steve,

Thank you so much for sharing this with us.

I think I might post this to the top next week sometime. It present an interesting dilemma. What degree of it is “spin”? It’s always hard to tell with these things. Should we look for the words of independent 3rd party observers? Methinks: yes. And yet should we at some level believe that *within* firestone there are people who are *just* as concerned about these things as we are? Methings: yes.