Your intentions are good, but the result of this would be to put many of these people out of work. It's not enough to say, well it shouldn't be like that. That is how poor countries get richer.
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'This American Life' Retracts Show on Foxconn Working Conditions over Fabricated Claims
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Your intentions are good, but the result of this would be to put many of these people out of work. It's not enough to say, well it shouldn't be like that. That is how poor countries get richer.
The problem: someone who lies about the actual conditions in the manufacturing plants presents a huge distraction to the true issue and may actually be undermine the process of addressing the concerns.
This exact same thing happened with sumofus.org: their original "ethical iphone" petition contained Daisey-style blatant lies. Their original petition reeked of false n-hexane claims. They have never apologized to anybody, retracted their original petition, etc. To some extent, sumofus has become the story. That's sad.
I have listened to his stage show, tv talk show interviews and the retraction episode that This American Life did.
The fact he is desperately trying to HIDE what he did makes me believe he did present it as real and factual.
If he really was using this as a theatrical piece why is he trying to defend what he did and just admit a lot of it was made up for his stage show?
First, why insult people? Are you so fixated on Apple being evil that when someone is a proven liar you have to call people who don't like being lied to "fanbois"?
Now you say that "many of the facts about poor working conditions are true". Interesting mixup. Actually, _all_ the facts about poor working conditions are true. _Facts_ are always true, that's what "fact" means. However, all the _claims_ are not true. Daisey's claims are proven lies. So now when we take any _claims_, we _know_ it is possible that the claims are blatant lies, because it happened before. We also _know_ that claims might be strongly influenced by Daisey's claims (like if a newspaper printed the lie that you were caught robbing a bank, your neighbours might then claim that you always showed a violent nature, and they might even believe it). So if we take Apple's "Supplier Responsibility" report as a base line, what claims have been made going beyond that by sources that can be trusted?
About the translator, I would like a link that supports your claim that Li Guifen is an "official Chinese government translator". Just curious, and not in the mood to take _anything_ without evidence, especially since you make this claim and take it as a reason that she should not be trusted. But then the translator who had to be present during all interviews and who therefore _must_ know who Daisey talked to and what was said would be the very first person to ask. If the stories are different, I would then not know who to trust, and check further. But she is definitely the first person to ask. And of course Daisey _admitted_ that he was lying.
I would also think that the duties of a translator are (1) to make correct translations, and (2) not to produce any lies about what she translated, because that would make the translation worthless. I would also think that you would record all the interviews (hard to do if they are invented), so the translation could be checked independently.
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Hear, hear. @Thunderbird's claim defied logic -- and it violates the ground rules for this forum.
Bingo. Double bingo.
Since some of Daisey's claims are blatantly false, anything and everything he says is called into question. Ditto with sumofus.org -- the new petition org that latched onto some of Daisey's whoppers. They removed the n-hexane claims from their petition, but have done nothing to inform the signees of the toxic mistake in their original drive. An "ethical watchdog" organization must itself operate in an ethical fashion.
Shame on Daisey. His is a combination of laziness and greed. To present theater as journalism compounds it. Shame on This American Life.
I think what you and others are not following is that it doesn't really matter to my point if TAL was totally misled and bamboozled by Mike Daisey. All they needed to know was that Daisey is theatrical performer, not a journalist, which is obvious to anyone who's seen his stage performance. Since they played part of his stage performance on the show, they clearly did know its origins and cannot credibly deny that knowledge now. To have missed that he's an editorialist has to be the height of gullibility. If they did truly miss it, then they should be embarrassed. Very, very embarrassed.
In my view, the real problem here is that TAL freely mixes what they call journalism with people telling stories about things, often trivial things. They were begging to get bitten, and did. So now they are milking their failure of judgement for all it's worth? They get no sympathy from me.
Somebody compared Daisey to Michael Moore. That's a totally fair comparison. Would anyone invite Moore onto their radio program expecting him to provide them with unbiased reporting? He's an editorialist, and that's what they are going to get from him.
As for Daisey, I think his act is a bit of a cheap shot. I don't care for what the man is saying, but I will defend his right to say it. It seems this is what separates my opinion from a lot of people here. Sad, but apparently true.
With that, over and out. At this point either you understand what I am saying or you never will.
So really you're just using this opportunity to bash TAL, a show you happen to not like.
Listening to the retraction show, and knowing TAL's broadcast history as a longtime listener, it is abundantly clear that they do absolutely journalistic pieces on subjects. Not 100% of the time, but they often do. Look at their pieces about the housing collapse, patent wars, european debt crisis, etc. All are journalistic pieces about current subjects.
It was also made abundantly clear in the show that they repeatedly asked Daisey that they were presenting this work as a journalistic endeavor, and that they expected the content to be accountable up to journalistic standards.
You may think that TAL doesn't engage in "real journalism" (however you think it's defined), but it's clear they do engage in actual journalistic productions, and I argue that they speak for themselves better than you do.
OK lets cut the BS.....not just APPLE
Foxconn manufactures (with slave labor) ALL the products for companies listed here:
(country of headquarters in parentheses)
--------------------------
Acer Inc. (Taiwan)
Amazon.com (United States) [Kindle]
Apple Inc. (United States)
Cisco (United States)
Dell (United States)
Hewlett-Packard (United States) [HP]
Intel (United States)
Microsoft (United States) [Windows Phone, Xbox]
Motorola Mobility (United States)
Nintendo (Japan)
Nokia (Finland)
Samsung Electronics (South Korea) [Galaxy]
Sony (Japan) [PSP etc]
Toshiba (Japan)
Vizio (United States)
also ANDROID subcontracts with the above companies to build and assemble the phone at Foxconn-source: Wikipedia
Foxconn manufactures (with slave labor) ALL the products for companies listed here:
(country of headquarters in parentheses)
--------------------------
Acer Inc. (Taiwan)
Amazon.com (United States) [Kindle]
Apple Inc. (United States)
Cisco (United States)
Dell (United States)
Hewlett-Packard (United States) [HP]
Intel (United States)
Microsoft (United States) [Windows Phone, Xbox]
Motorola Mobility (United States)
Nintendo (Japan)
Nokia (Finland)
Samsung Electronics (South Korea) [Galaxy]
Sony (Japan) [PSP etc]
Toshiba (Japan)
Vizio (United States)
also ANDROID subcontracts with the above companies to build and assemble the phone at Foxconn-source: Wikipedia
Many of the claims that have been made about working conditions at Foxconn (long hours, monotonous labor, military-like supervision) could also be used to describe working conditions at factories here in Japan.
Yet nobody here in Japan is complaining. Just the opposite. Japanese factory workers take great pride in their jobs and their workplace. I'd hazard to guess that the same is pretty much true of those who work at Foxconn.
(Ironically, the Western media often gushes about Japan's "modern" and "advanced" factories and working conditions.)
The point being, what is unacceptable in one society does not necessarily mean that it's unacceptable in another society.
Should Apple keep a close eye on its manufacturing partners to ensure they are treating workers well? Absolutely.
But allegations made by whistleblowers also need to be scrutinized.
Yet nobody here in Japan is complaining. Just the opposite. Japanese factory workers take great pride in their jobs and their workplace. I'd hazard to guess that the same is pretty much true of those who work at Foxconn.
(Ironically, the Western media often gushes about Japan's "modern" and "advanced" factories and working conditions.)
The point being, what is unacceptable in one society does not necessarily mean that it's unacceptable in another society.
Should Apple keep a close eye on its manufacturing partners to ensure they are treating workers well? Absolutely.
But allegations made by whistleblowers also need to be scrutinized.
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You can't really blame them because psychopaths are incapable of genuine apologies.
I applaud This American Life for not only retracting the bogus information but spending an entire episode talking about their own failings. They messed up, bad, and are taking responsibility for it.
Sadly you'd never in a million years see a right-wing organization do this. The right is not only incapable of admitting they are wrong they are not even capable of even thinking that they might be.
Sadly you'd never in a million years see a right-wing organization do this. The right is not only incapable of admitting they are wrong they are not even capable of even thinking that they might be.
These people make me sick. Nevermind that, by every measurable metric, if these people got their way it would directly lead to the true suffering and death of factory workers in third-world countries, China, and the like.
No, the biggest problem with these people is that they're so caught up in their own self-delusions that they've allowed themselves to be fooled into this absurd notion that anything--including outright lies, manufacturing of evidence, suppression of anything that undermines the position, and worse--can be permitted insofar as it furthers the cause. Historically, only one word can describe such lunacy: zealotry. This sort of thing only proves that their only aim is to destroy any rational basis for discourse. You literally can't argue with these people.
If you want to argue against third-world manufacturing, fine. Go ahead. You're more than entitled to, but you aren't entitled to your own facts. You won't win, but that doesn't mean the debate shouldn't happen.
This stuff makes me sick.
No, the biggest problem with these people is that they're so caught up in their own self-delusions that they've allowed themselves to be fooled into this absurd notion that anything--including outright lies, manufacturing of evidence, suppression of anything that undermines the position, and worse--can be permitted insofar as it furthers the cause. Historically, only one word can describe such lunacy: zealotry. This sort of thing only proves that their only aim is to destroy any rational basis for discourse. You literally can't argue with these people.
If you want to argue against third-world manufacturing, fine. Go ahead. You're more than entitled to, but you aren't entitled to your own facts. You won't win, but that doesn't mean the debate shouldn't happen.
This stuff makes me sick.
The fact remains that contrary to Daisey's claims that Apple was aware of n-Hexane use and did nothing about it because it reduced costs, the truth is that when Apple was advised of its use, it immediately demanded that the supplier stop the practice and deal with any medical issues that had been caused by its use. Daisey stated to TAL that he had seen workers as young as twelve years old, when he had not. And as others have pointed out, Daisey was asked flat-out by TAL if his claims were factually correct, and he stated without any reservation that they were.
With respect to "stock manipulation", I never made such a claim, I'm no conspiracy theorist. I just stated that his insistence when presenting the story to TAL that the material presented was fact had the potential effect of materially harming Apple and its shareholders (and in fact, I believe that Apple's stock did fall after this story first broke).
And I'm certainly not saying that there should be restrictions on freedom of speech, with the exception that making false public statements regarding another with the deliberate intention of causing harm to them is unethical, and regardless of your opinion or mine, also illegal in some jurisdictions, including many EU countries and numerous American states. How would you feel if I spread false information that you were allegedly a child molester? It's not as if no English-speaking person has ever been a child molester. So what if it was someone else and not you? What if I made the claim in a play named after you, and when reporters asked me about the play, I told them that there was some underlying truth to the story? Shouldn't I be punished in some way for knowingly making such a reputation-harming false statement about you?
Just to be clear, I am certain that you are a person of the highest quality character, and I admire your defense of freedom of speech. I just made this ridiculous argument to illustrate the unfortunate logical extension of your argument, and to show how freedom of speech must be tempered by liability for falsehoods intentionally spread for the purpose of harming others. Freedom is highly to be desired, but with it comes responsibility, and the greater the freedom, the greater the responsibility.
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i had just been to Shenzhen and its surrounding areas.
contrary to reports, i have heard from the workers and their relatives(usually siblings working in neighbouring areas) while working conditions are not ideal they are mostly satisfied as they do earn a higher than average salary and have better living conditions relative to other assembly workers in China.
there is truth to the fines imposed for almost any kind of issues you can or cannot think of but this is not unusual in any work place in China be it at the sauna/massage place...hotel...restaurants...nightclubs...etc
contrary to reports, i have heard from the workers and their relatives(usually siblings working in neighbouring areas) while working conditions are not ideal they are mostly satisfied as they do earn a higher than average salary and have better living conditions relative to other assembly workers in China.
there is truth to the fines imposed for almost any kind of issues you can or cannot think of but this is not unusual in any work place in China be it at the sauna/massage place...hotel...restaurants...nightclubs...etc
http://www.appleinsider.com/article...onn_monologue_after_admitting_falsehoods.html
So the truth does matter after all, even though it's just "theater"?
Apparently his show is now "hello... goodbye."
So the truth does matter after all, even though it's just "theater"?
Apparently his show is now "hello... goodbye."
Sorry but I give Kudos to TAL for retracting the story, and giving clear journalistic reasons why. They admit their mistake. That takes balls.
Anyone who had read the transcript would understand the disconnect in this claim. Look at page 19 of that transcript:
The transcript of Episode 460 of TAL said:
Nobody ever claimed that Daisey was a journalist. What happened was that several journalists attended Daisey's "Steve Jobs" show and got completely snookered by his claims. TAL did fact-checking, and some things did check out. But they failed to do any independent verification of the story through Daisey's translator. Daisey gave them a wrong name for the translator and claimed that his contact information for her was obsolete. Both of those claims were lies.
For the retraction, TAL was able to independently locate and contact the interpreter. That's when the journalists realized just how much they had been snookered by Mike Daisey.
This statement makes absolutely no sense. If you had read the transcript from the January episode, you would have known that they did an extensive fact-check on Daisey's claim before going with the story. Daisey lied to them -- extensively -- during that fact-checking cycle.
One more time: if you had read this weekend's transcript, you wouldn't have to wonder. They are clearly very embarrassed for getting snookered during the fact-checking cycle with Mike Daisey. Ira explicitly notes in hindsight: since they didn't contact the translator directly, they should have never run the story.
It may be confusing for occasional listeners to the show. OTOH, regular listeners know that TAL has mixed soft stories with hard ones for several years.
TAL clearly knows which stories are which. Please explain: why shouldn't they be able to fact-check on the hard stories?
Again, that makes absolutely no sense. How does reporting both hard and soft stories on TAL mean they were somehow "begging" for anything?
The disconnect is that many of the attendees to his stage program thought he wasn't completely fabricating major segments of his story. You seem to be second-guessing the fact-checking process of TAL. You also imply that you have better skills in identifying a con man than some very smart people. That's a rather dangerous attitude.
The crucial point is that it's an OPINION. Are you a professional fact-checker? Would you have been better at identifying this con man in a fact-checking cycle? We will never know.
One warning for you: the people who wind up getting conned are the ones who believe they can't be taken. Anybody and everybody can be conned, including you. Take care.
Good catch! But I wouldn't hold my breath waiting for @IJ_Reilly to reconcile this.
The Agony and the Ecstasy of Mike Daisey: rapid changes were needed on the fabrication line.
I challenge this claim from the AppleInsider story:
I bet it was Daisey's choice, but the theater would have cancelled the show if he hadn't "decided" to remove the whoppers.
I can also imagine the audience's shouting out "LIAR" repeatedly if the manufacturer had kept his original fabrication intact.
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Mike Daisey is in a world of trouble. Apple could sue him for literally hundred's of millions of dollars and probably win if they chose to. This is slander. This is perhaps the greatest instance of Slander in American history. I don't think he understands the immoral and illegal implications of his actions and the affect it has had on the company.
This situation bears a bit of similarity to the effects of the revelation on falsified global warming research uncovered a couple of years ago on those both supporting and opposing the theory- it damages the cause (whether the cause is right or wrong isn't the issue, so much).
Mike D will ultimately not be sued by Apple because ultimately - the claims are relatively true - regardless of whether or not he, specifically, fabricated them or not. Apple would have the burden of proof if they sued - and at this point - I really don't think they want to open that can of worms more than it already has been. Not to mention - Apple would gain nothing other than his guilt. Mike D isn't some incredibly wealthy guy. I'm sure he does OK - but it would be like Apple suing the pants of of many on here. At best - they'd prevent him from ever performing or distributing in anyway, his show. Again - not that much of a big deal at this point. Cat's already out of the bag.
The worst has already happened to Mike D. He's been called out and his reputation, to some degree, tarnished to the point where all future claims or "claims" will either need to be verified - or a big fat warning in the playbill stating that there's been theatrical license with the facts.
The worst has already happened to Mike D. He's been called out and his reputation, to some degree, tarnished to the point where all future claims or "claims" will either need to be verified - or a big fat warning in the playbill stating that there's been theatrical license with the facts.
That is well-said. Daisey tried to gain credibility for his accounts by making "eyewitness" statements. Unfortunately, if those first-hand accounts are proved false he winds up doing exactly the opposite.
It reminds me in an odd way of a fake Einstein "Everything is Energy" quote which is bouncing around on social networks and some websites:
Somebody other than Albert Einstein (and definitely not a physicist) said:
The fake quote was indubitably concocted by some Law of Attraction enthusiast. It was intended to lend credibility to that movement. For me, the fraudulent quote does the exact opposite.
To some extent, I suppose. Mike Moore is still making 'documentaries' as is the History Channel still producing 'educational' shows telling 'history.' Lots of people still watch it and everyone loves conspiracy theories, so I'm sure this guy will continue to have a big market.
At no time did this ass-clown ever prefice his "theatrical show" by letting his audience know that portions of his show were total fabrications. On the contrary, he led his audience and American Life to believe that his "show" (and I use the term loosely) was entirely true and based on fact.
Now he's scrambling and making excuses because he's been found out
If his "show" was all or even partially based on fabrications he needs to make it perfectly clear that it's a fabrication or exactly what parts are fabricated. ESPECIALLY when you are singling out a single company the way that he did when other companies are far worse in this area.
Like I said when this story broke, the guy is a media whore and now we all know that not only is he a media whore but he's a liar as well.
Anyone in the true theatre community who supports him should be ashamed.
On the topic of worker abuse and worker conditions etc., it's great that it is getting attention and improvements are being made, but this clown's stupid stunt has hurt the cause, it didn't help it. It makes people distrust these stories.
Now he's scrambling and making excuses because he's been found out
If his "show" was all or even partially based on fabrications he needs to make it perfectly clear that it's a fabrication or exactly what parts are fabricated. ESPECIALLY when you are singling out a single company the way that he did when other companies are far worse in this area.
Like I said when this story broke, the guy is a media whore and now we all know that not only is he a media whore but he's a liar as well.
Anyone in the true theatre community who supports him should be ashamed.
On the topic of worker abuse and worker conditions etc., it's great that it is getting attention and improvements are being made, but this clown's stupid stunt has hurt the cause, it didn't help it. It makes people distrust these stories.