Norweigian newspaper, Aftenposten, created a reality show for the purposes of gaining insight about the sweatshop industry. Ludvig Hambro, Anniken Jorgensen and Frida Ottensen are fashionable consumers who were chosen to experience what it is like to work in the typical sweatshop for a whole month. A few big chain retailers have been famously called out for engaging in crude corporate practices, particularly for utilizing sweatshops like the one featured in Sweatshop: Dead Cheap Fashion.
What it's Like Working for 3 Bucks a Day
If these three individuals' eyes were not opened about the harsh realities that go on within the clothes making industry, they have now gained consciousness about the matter through this experience. Cameras followed their every whim, move, and emotional outbursts as they communed with workers in a Cambodian sweatshop in Phnom Penh. The three young women were in awe of the conditions that they were asked to work in and the type of humdrum work that they were requested to complete. One of the young women expressed that she had to sew the same inseam repeatedly on garment after garment for hours at a time. The conditions of the sweatshop were death defying with hot, stuffy air circulating through the workspace, no room for stretching and restrooms without any toilet paper. They had to sew and work on chairs that were almost as hard as a brick! The bleak conditions seen in the sweatshop just goes to show that the cheap prices paid for clothing at a typical chain retailer like GAP or Old Navy, also come at a dark, inhumane price.
They Have no Money for Food....
One particular exchange was extremely saddening for 17 year old fashion blogger, Jorgensen to learn. One of the sweatshop workers expressed that her mother died of starvation because she did not make enough money to be able to feed both herself and her children. Workers in this Cambodian sweatshop expressed that they received little more than $2.80 per day. The workers don't have money for life necessities and they cannot even afford the garments that they are demanded to make.
"What it actually costs to live here, you just don't get to know, they don't have money for food, the big fashion chains starve their workers and nobody holds them responsible" Ludvig Hambro stated.
Requiring Social Responsibility
As more media outlets and fashion industry insiders learn about the eye opening realities that go on within the industry, more consumers will be encouraged to purchase from companies that make it their business and mission to engage in socially responsible and ethical business practices. There is a battle that is continually waging and it must be fought so that workers in sweatshops will be allowed to work in humane conditions and given the rights that belong to them. As industry insiders and consumers alike religiously sound the alarm and hold big chain, big-name retailers responsible for the heinous conditions that they place their workers in, large-scale changes will be seen and heard by all. Thankfully, documentaries such as Sweatshop: Dead Cheap Fashion are being made, and are useful for capturing the fashion crimes that go on in our world. The five part series web documentary can be viewed here. Photo credit: Marissa Aorton, Sweatshop Project
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