Industrial Revolution

The older students collaboratively drafted a letter to President Obama voicing their concerns after the garment factory tragedy in Bangladesh. We are waiting for a response...

June 1, 2013

Dear President Obama,

We are sending you this letter to express our upset and distress about the families of the more than 1,000 victims of the Bangladesh disaster in Dhaka.

We are writing to support the idea of legislation preventing United States businesses from buying from overseas factories which do not meet certain safety standards. The reason they are buying overseas is to avoid our safety standards. The lack of safety standards is part of why labor is so cheap in countries like Bangladesh.

Have we not risen above this corporate greed? Have we not learned from all the disasters of the late 1800’s and early 1900’s such as the Pemberton Mill Disaster, Triangle Shirtwaist Factory Fire, and Ludlow Massacre? This suggests we have not.

If there is one thing we have learned from incidents such as this is that disasters in themselves are not nearly as dangerous as lack of disaster preparedness. The problem was not the crack in the building, but rather that the owners of the factory chose to do nothing about it.

This has wreaked havoc for hundreds of families.

We have the following recommendations:

1.   We would like to propose that more of our clothing should be made here in the US. This will have the twofold effect of both helping to deal with the US’s unemployment problem and ensuring that our clothes are made under safer conditions since the US has OSHA and not to mention laws such as the 40 hour week, minimum wage and legal protection of labor unions.

2.   We would like to propose a great number of photographers be sent to overseas factories for we believe it is more difficult for people to ignore that which they can see. Such was the methodology of Lewis Hine, who photographed the inhumane conditions during the Industrial Revolution. “Out of sight, out of mind,” or perhaps, “Seeing is believing.”

3.   We have considered boycotting all clothing made in Bangladesh until the safety standards have been met.

4.   The US government should not get clothes from countries with unsafe working conditions.

     Sincerely Yours,

Savannah Krabacher

Zerbie Hynson

Nick Russell

Emmy Newman

Autumn Kerr

Monae Lender

Nora VanCalCar

Neona Krabacher

Ciara Jones

(Nine students, in grades 5 – 8,  from The New School)

c.c. Prime Minister of Bangladesh

Senator Kirsten Gilibrand, Senator Chuck Schumer

Congressman Dan Maffei