A few days ago Pat Robertson caused an uproar among his fellow Christians by claiming that the devastating earthquake that happened in Haiti last week was their own fault because they are cursed because they made a pact with the devil.
“They were under the heel of the French, you know Napoleon the third and whatever. And they got together and swore a pact to the devil. They said ‘We will serve you if you will get us free from the prince.’ True story. And so the devil said, ‘Ok it’s a deal.’ And they kicked the French out. The Haitians revolted and got something themselves free. But ever since they have been cursed by one thing after another,”
Source: CBS News
Read more…
During the Christmas season a campaign launched in the UK drew my attention. I saw a lot of news sources ran the story and decided to have a look. After all, they touch upon my field of interest: psychology. Two sisters from London, Abi and Emma Moore started a campaign against the “pinkification” of the world: Pink Stinks. On their site they state what the goal of their campaign is:
PinkStinks aims to counteract the slurry of media obsession on women who are ‘famous’, ‘thin’ ‘rich’ or ‘married to famous men’, by celebrating those women that we see as inspirational, important, ground-breaking and motivating. On these pages we’ll point you in the direction of some of those women … some from history, some just starting out, from all walks of life. It’s amazing how great they are, and when they’re brought together in a list like this there’s a real power to them, that can only serve as an uplifting inspiration.
Also, they showcase a number of “new role models” for girls, while ranting against the feminine stereotyping of girls, dressing them in pink, selling them pink toys and most of all “force them” into stereotypical girly role models. They argue, maybe not explicit that society forces girls with a model on how to behave and how to think and how wrong that is, the current situation that is. What they don’t seem to realise is that they themselves try to do exactly the same, with other role models, other toys and other ways of dressing. It strikes me maybe because it’s all to familiar with me, with my mom being rather feministic trying to avoid the gender stereotyping. It almost seems like they have some issues with girls wanting to be girls, wanting to wear any colour pink, wanting to play with dolls and when they grow up they want to be a teacher, a nurse or wife of some famous person.
Read more…
Before I really got into the whole Fair Trade business, I knew something like “Fair Trade Clothing” existed, but I have to admit that brought an image of wearing brown canvas sacks with a rope tied around your waist to my mind. Or visions of St. John the Baptist wearing a camel-hair cave man outfit while eating wild honey. My other idea was that this fashion that’s ten years behind on “regular” fashion would be insanely expensive. I love the whole concept of Fair Trade, but there are limits. Until I saw a documentary on CNN International (yeah, yeah, I know) about Conserve India.
Read more…
Photo by Gertrud K.About a week ago I blogged about chocolate slavery. I also explained I don’t buy “unfair” chocolate, but that means I need to go to a special store because my supermarket around the corner (Albert Heijn, biggest supermarket chain in the country) doesn’t sell fair trade chocolate. A couple of days ago the Easter season officially started with them offering dozens of those small easter eggs made of chocolate. They must have about 20 flavours, none of them made of fair chocolate. So I decided to send them a nice email:
Read more…
Photo by rogiroA while ago, a Dutch TV show called “Keuringsdienst van Waarde“ investigated the origins of our Dutch chocolate. It caused a stir, because the episode on chocolate was very controversial. All newspapers, magazines and even international press started reporting on it. The film maker was sued by chocolate manufacturers (who lost the case by the way) and even reported that he received threats. What was going on here?
When paying attention to the topic, one hears horrific stories about how chocolate is being manufactured. The circumstances in which prefabricates are being made are appalling. The situation is worst in West-Africa (Ivory Coast and Ghana): more than 75% of the cocoa comes from small family businesses which hardly get any money for their products. Several tens of thousands of small children work on cocoa plantations without being paid for their work. This is de facto child slavery. Reason for it: people in the developed countries love their chocolate, but also love their money. They don’t want to pay a lot of money for luxury articles they don’t really need…
Read more…
Comments