Imagine your friend tells you that she's found this great new coffee shop that sells their drinks at a fraction of the cost of Starbucks. The way they can cut costs is that they use child labor to gather their coffee beans. Child labor in a third-world country doesn't cost much. She doesn't have a problem with it as long as her coffee stays cheap. It's a win-win, right?
Horrific, no?
That's the point that Kristen Howerton made on her blog, Rage Against the Minivan, a few weeks ago. Why? Because most of the major commercial chocolate companies are doing this very thing.
Kids like this little boy in West Africa do back-breaking labor to gather cocoa pods so we can have our Three Musketeers bars. As Kristen says:
But honestly, what concerns me even more is that we, as consumers, are not demanding that this be stopped. People continue to buy chocolate even after learning about these human rights abuses. I’ve heard excuses from people in my own life that sound pretty similar to the ones I made in the coffee post. We rationalize that we can’t afford fair-trade. We joke about how addicted we are. We justify that we can’t change everything. And I think secretly, we don’t relate because these are kids in a far-off country, and not our own. It’s okay as long as we don’t have to see it happening right in front of us.
This isn't one random fringe company you've never heard of; it's "pretty much every snack-size candy bar that will be available in stores this Halloween."
Please, read Kristen's blog post here.
And before you shop, check this list of slave-free chocolate here. And here are some non-chocolate options.
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