I am currently in a graduate studies program. My degree concentration is in International Policy and Conflict Resolution.
The amazing thing about my school is that the majority of the student body is international. In addition to getting an education from the publications and professors, my classmates often have first-hand experiences in a region we are a studying.
I have learned about the Arab Spring from a Cairene who was in Tahrir Square when the revolution began. My close friend from Angola has taught me about the down side of foreign direct investment in his country when coupled with government corruption. My friend from Palestine had two of his brothers murdered by IDF soldiers and he still desires peace with the Israelis.
These students have made my educational experience that much richer.
The cost of my private institution means that the students, no matter their home country, usually come from a privileged background. Unfortunately, many of them are lacking insight into "how the other half lives." This isn't always the case but there is an undercurrent of elitism that remains in the classroom.
One need not have lived in abject poverty in order desire its eradication or to have a modicum of compassion. However, a life of relative ease coupled with youth and inexperience sometimes causes a frightening lack of concern for vulnerable and exploited populations.
This might be merely unfortunate in a student of finance or business but with students of public policy (who will very likely be crafting policy in the future) it is appalling.
I have heard fellow students make excuses for development models that devastate local populations by forcing them into a life of abject poverty and servitude.
"Well, at least the sweatshop gives these women a option other than prostitution," they might say.
The false dilemma seems to be a popular go-to fallacy.
Today, our instructor asked if it was fair for the economic system to assume that because no one was being forced to work in a sweatshop, that they had entered into that job freely, that that made it okay.
Remarkably, some people seemed to think that this sort of work was better than "nothing."
We watched a video on women in Bangladesh who work for 12-14 hours a day for 8 cents an hour in the smothering heat of a factory overseen by men who may hit them when they "slack off."
I'd like to think some of my classmates rethought their original positions after that.
Some of them still reasoned that wage increase would fuel mass unemployment, drive businesses to other markets or kill innovation and investment.
Happily, none of them seemed to object to having a fan installed in the factory to circulate the stifling air- so I guess there's that.
I will now insult the reader's intelligence by pointing out that the people thinking this way are the ones who will always profit from the situation. Neither they or anyone they know personally will ever have to work in these conditions.
Noticeably absent from our debate were any actual sweatshop workers. I assume if they had been present they wouldn't have shocked me by confessing to an enjoyment of being abused and shat on by powerful foreign multinational corporations.
Sweatshops do not empower future generations or allow for the formation of a middle class. They keep people in a constant and lasting state of poverty.
Heaven forbid one of these workers should become incapacitated and unable to ever work again. There is no health coverage or unemployment program to take care of ill and injured. There are also countless workers to replace the ones that have been rendered "useless."
The lack of ethical conviction in some of my fellow students kills me.
So many people are willing to shrug and say that some sacrifice is necessary for capitalism to thrive. As long as said sacrifice stays abstract and doesn't hit too close to home, it's perfectly acceptable.
Soon the Fall semester will begin and a whole new crop of students will appear. Some of them will continue to embrace and defend the same tropes that have allowed for some of the worst abuses against our fellow human beings.
Inevitably, several of them will try to get away with this sort of crap in one of my classes.
Heaven help them.
The amazing thing about my school is that the majority of the student body is international. In addition to getting an education from the publications and professors, my classmates often have first-hand experiences in a region we are a studying.
I have learned about the Arab Spring from a Cairene who was in Tahrir Square when the revolution began. My close friend from Angola has taught me about the down side of foreign direct investment in his country when coupled with government corruption. My friend from Palestine had two of his brothers murdered by IDF soldiers and he still desires peace with the Israelis.
These students have made my educational experience that much richer.
The cost of my private institution means that the students, no matter their home country, usually come from a privileged background. Unfortunately, many of them are lacking insight into "how the other half lives." This isn't always the case but there is an undercurrent of elitism that remains in the classroom.
One need not have lived in abject poverty in order desire its eradication or to have a modicum of compassion. However, a life of relative ease coupled with youth and inexperience sometimes causes a frightening lack of concern for vulnerable and exploited populations.
This might be merely unfortunate in a student of finance or business but with students of public policy (who will very likely be crafting policy in the future) it is appalling.
I have heard fellow students make excuses for development models that devastate local populations by forcing them into a life of abject poverty and servitude.
"Well, at least the sweatshop gives these women a option other than prostitution," they might say.
The false dilemma seems to be a popular go-to fallacy.
Today, our instructor asked if it was fair for the economic system to assume that because no one was being forced to work in a sweatshop, that they had entered into that job freely, that that made it okay.
Remarkably, some people seemed to think that this sort of work was better than "nothing."
We watched a video on women in Bangladesh who work for 12-14 hours a day for 8 cents an hour in the smothering heat of a factory overseen by men who may hit them when they "slack off."
I'd like to think some of my classmates rethought their original positions after that.
Some of them still reasoned that wage increase would fuel mass unemployment, drive businesses to other markets or kill innovation and investment.
Happily, none of them seemed to object to having a fan installed in the factory to circulate the stifling air- so I guess there's that.
I will now insult the reader's intelligence by pointing out that the people thinking this way are the ones who will always profit from the situation. Neither they or anyone they know personally will ever have to work in these conditions.
Noticeably absent from our debate were any actual sweatshop workers. I assume if they had been present they wouldn't have shocked me by confessing to an enjoyment of being abused and shat on by powerful foreign multinational corporations.
Sweatshops do not empower future generations or allow for the formation of a middle class. They keep people in a constant and lasting state of poverty.
Heaven forbid one of these workers should become incapacitated and unable to ever work again. There is no health coverage or unemployment program to take care of ill and injured. There are also countless workers to replace the ones that have been rendered "useless."
The lack of ethical conviction in some of my fellow students kills me.
So many people are willing to shrug and say that some sacrifice is necessary for capitalism to thrive. As long as said sacrifice stays abstract and doesn't hit too close to home, it's perfectly acceptable.
Soon the Fall semester will begin and a whole new crop of students will appear. Some of them will continue to embrace and defend the same tropes that have allowed for some of the worst abuses against our fellow human beings.
Inevitably, several of them will try to get away with this sort of crap in one of my classes.
Heaven help them.
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