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Writing to Apple about iPhone suicides, illness

hismikeness said:
13 suicides out of Foxconn's 920,000 employees? Underwhelmed. Besides, China could probably use some thinning out.
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I'm absolutely not asking you to believe, like me, that it's wrong if working people are driven to suicide or poisoned by the chemicals they work with making the luxuries I love to buy.

All I'm asking for is addresses in Apple to which we can write, since we 'think different'.
 
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Better working conditions for workers + better pay = higher prices for apple products. IMO apple products are already expensive enough.
 
nukem170 said:
Better working conditions for workers + better pay = higher prices for apple products. IMO apple products are already expensive enough.
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Yes, that argument was absolutely correct when used of cotton in the Deep South in the 1860s, and it's still true.
 
Mala said:
I'm absolutely not asking you to believe, like me, that it's wrong if working people are driven to suicide or poisoned by the chemicals they work with making the luxuries I love to buy.

All I'm asking for is addresses in Apple to which we can write, since we 'think different'.
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You can find all that info online. If you really want to change things, try a more collective effort against the industry in general. That's where the problem lies.
 
countrydweller said:
You can find all that info online. If you really want to change things, try a more collective effort against the industry in general. That's where the problem lies.
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Thank you for your advice, countrydweller - perhaps you might do this too?

I actually asked here because I *couldn't* find the information online. Maybe I've come to the wrong place.

But thank you for your help, all of you.
 
Mala said:
Thank you for your advice, countrydweller - perhaps you might do this too?

I actually asked here because I *couldn't* find the information online. Maybe I've come to the wrong place.

But thank you for your help, all of you.
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Start here:

Apple
1 Infinite Loop
Cupertino, CA 95014

I think you will get an answer, not what you want to hear. Apple isn't going to give a competitive advantage to the other manufacturers. It's a place to start. I would also contact the other manufacturers. I think to resolve the problems, will need changes from someone with power over the manufacturers. I really wouldn't know where to start.
 
I'm puzzled that the iPhones are made with so much human pressure and so little mechanisation - wouldn't you think a factory line could do it, and maybe in a bunch of different countries, including the Americas, as well as China?

Incidentally, here's an apposite quote:

That doesn't mean we're stuck with Foxconn staying the way it is. Apple has been quite responsive to shifts in consumer ethics over the past few years. Earlier this decade, environmental groups targeted Apple for its spotty record. The company's first response was to deny every accusation, but that soon became untenable; the perception that Apple wasn't green was affecting its public image. At that point Apple did something smart—it decided to turn a disadvantage into a selling point. The company rolled out a progressive environmental plan, and Jobs now touts Apple's greenness every time he releases a new product. (Greenpeace now ranks Apple's environmental record in the middle of the pack among tech companies.)
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from a Slate piece. http://www.slate.com/id/2255624/
 
This argument is invalid. 13 out of every 920,000 people is lower than the USA suicide rate. I honestly have no idea why people make such a big deal out of this.
 
antster94 said:
This argument is invalid. 13 out of every 920,000 people is lower than the USA suicide rate. I honestly have no idea why people make such a big deal out of this.
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Honestly...it's because people want to bitch. And some people have first-world guilt about how their precious toys are made.
 
Warbrain said:
Honestly...it's because people want to bitch. And some people have first-world guilt about how their precious toys are made.
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Warbrain, could you define your terms here, please? Do you think it's 'bitching' (unsure what this means exactly, not totally up with American slang - is this a sexist term?) to wish for working people to have good conditions if we're to buy the goods they make?

And how is 'first-world guilt' different from other guilt, please?
 
Mala said:
The Quaker company Cadbury, in the 19th century, faced something like this. The idealistic people who ran the company were caught in a quandary - the island of Sao Tome, the best place in the world to grow chocolate, was secretly using slaves.

The Cadburys kept sending investigators, trying to get to the bottom of this, but they didn't feel that they could stop buying from Sao Tome and give a huge competitive advantage to the other chocolate makers.

It ended with a court case, huge and unpleasant publicity, and a draining away of customer loyalty and liking.

Cadbury's got together with the other companies and withdrew from the island, until Portugal and Sao Tome changed their methods and ended the slavery. That's why you can now eat a bar of chocolate without the sour taste of human fear and pain left on your tongue.

But really, rather than saying "it's not going to work", lads, could you not just tell us who to write to?
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Very inereting, I didn't know this. I actually learned something on macrumors.
 
Mala said:
IndianBird says: "Quit and do another job" - but this is not an option for the impoverished people who work for Apple's subsidiaries. Lucky you, if you have that option. May it remain with you, no matter what happens to your own economy.
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That's not even really an option for some people in first world countries.

I hate it when people just say quit and find another job like it's that easy. For example some one was talking about how their friend is pretty much stuck in their job because of the health insurance. If she leaves, she loses it and she has some issue now that would then be considered a pre-existing condition. The meds for it are 600 a month *with* insurance. So she cannot afford to be without or all the sudden no longer have the condition be coverable by insurance.

And that's just one example of how it's not so easy to tell some one to just quit and find another job if they don't like it. And that's just in the U.S. Nevermind a country that may have it far far worse than us where they are at best living paycheck to paycheck (if they are managing even that) and probably working as many hours as they possibley have just to live from paycheck to paycheck (so where do you expect them to find the time to find this better job? Especially if their country pretty much all those jobs are the same so the "better jobs" are practically non existant).

Yes, I buy apple products and other electronic products and I buy stuff clothing and I don't check to see where it is made but I am not so naive to try to assuage my conscious by trying to tell myself that it's those people's own problem for not finding a better job.
 
infidel69 said:
Very inereting, I didn't know this. I actually learned something on macrumors.
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Thank you!

I've got my answers elsewhere, though thanks for your help here - in case anyone else needs them, they are:

Cathy Kearney
Managing Director
Apple Ireland
Hollyhill Industrial Estate
Hollyhill, Cork
Republic of Ireland

and

Steve Jobs
Apple
1 Infinite Loop
Cupertino, CA 95014
USA

The Cadburys were amazing employers - for instance, George Cadbury, one of the brothers who really expanded the company, used to teach illiterate slum adults to read after his long work day.

He built the village of Bournville, still a beautiful place, making sure that the working people's houses would have long gardens with an orchard at the end (for the beauty of the blossom as well as the fruit), and provided a gardening teacher to help the workers grow vegetables and flowers. (A Bournville man has recently been barred from entering garden produce contests because he always wins, incidentally.)

The village had two swimming pools, one outdoors, one indoors, and a swimming instructor.

The factory was built specifically to save the workers from too-heavy work, and working hours were limited.

Here's two local kids playing the carillon, which is in a building on the village green, near the lake the Cadburys built: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=U0awxYYjkRI

Here's a brief review of Chocolate Wars (well worth reading, after a slow start) - the book, not the review http://www.guardian.co.uk/books/2011/jan/29/chocolate-wars-cadbury-kraft-200-review

and a look at the village http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hI0L4fppzro

However, we're straying from Mac-related things. Or I am.

Thanks for all your help, lads - I now have the addresses I need, and will leave this discussion with gratitude for the help.
 
if people really cared all they would have to do is not buy the products and that would stop it. but people care more about the lower prices.

the clothes on our backs, the electronics, getting your lawn cut by a 5.00 an hour employee. the list goes on and on. learn to live with less and pay more for products produced under good working environments will be the only thing that ever stops the over produced consumer based marketplace we live in today.
 
I'm getting an overwhelming urge to hold hands with a dozen people of various diversities and dance around an oak tree singing Kumbaya, all the while eschewing practicality and real world experience for my idealistic and naive view of a utopian society wherein everything is perfect and everyone is of the utmost value.
 
Mala said:
Warbrain, could you define your terms here, please? Do you think it's 'bitching' (unsure what this means exactly, not totally up with American slang - is this a sexist term?) to wish for working people to have good conditions if we're to buy the goods they make?

And how is 'first-world guilt' different from other guilt, please?
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'bitching' means complaining or whining about something. As I think you inferred, it so also be a sexist insult if directed towards a woman.

By 'first-world guilt', Warbrain meant that you feel guilty for living in a first world country, where you have it so much better than those living in third-world countries. I think Warbrain's point was that when you found out about the conditions at foxxcon, your 'first-world guilt' made you you feel pressured to react, Apple just happened to be a target you landed on (eg you feel that you should be doing something somewhere, but it doesn't matter *where*).
 
Mala said:
I think you're wrong about Apple; I think it's a company that is prouder of the wonderful revolutions it has made in personal computing and telephone technology than it is avid for profit. I hope so.
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HA. HA. HAHAHAHHHAHAHAHA. This made my day lmao. Thanks OP! :D
 
AdrianK said:
By 'first-world guilt', Warbrain meant that you feel guilty for living in a first world country, where you have it so much better than those living in third-world countries.
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Which is a stupid concept in the first place. I think it's more likely that people here live in a shell and don't realize how it is other places. Then they hear of one place that has horrid work conditions and aim their ire at that not realizing the reality of it (that that company is not unique).

And then there are the people who want to justify why it's ok not to care as they know the real way to stop it and don't want to do so but don't want to think they are bad people so they come up with the idea of "first world" guilt to describe people who care (but maybe not enough to really do what would be needed to be done to stop the practice which is cut down on what you buy so you can afford the few and more expensive items that don't contribute to the problem). So they can belittle them and pretend that it's really not a problem and only a made up problem in some people's minds (but I will say these people are more realistic in realizing what would solve the problem).

And people like me who say, yeah, I admit, I think it sucks but I also like my gadgets and I will admit it's just too hard for me to change my consumer habits and toughen up to maybe help these people (particularly since you'd have to convince a large enough amount of people to care to encourage companies to actually care. And then you'd have to put up with the toys you want being a lot more expensive, maybe even unaffordable to you). I mean I will do what I can in my habits to encourage the practices I'd like to see but I am just not hardcore enough to change all my habits. You do what you are willing to do. I mean it can still help if people change habits they are willing to make sacrifices on to help make the world a better place. But I also think it's foolish to bury your head in the sand and say it doesn't exist and it's just a made up concept.
 
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