Should You Feel Guilty Owning an iPhone?

[descendency]

A one word answer: "No."

 

[descendency]

The problem with all of this negative attention is that one simple fact is being ignored. Companies who do ship products that are created by companies that abide in fair labor practices are not bought often. They are forced out of the market by companies that create products using cheap labor.

The consumer has spoken. It has no remorse.

 

[sdm004]

One of the best articles I have read on here in a long time. And to the idiot(s) who claims this is only apple bashing...you need to grow up and take the time to read more than the introduction before you engage in intelligent debate. The internet is not a whitewall for your ill-though positions. Foxconn is a perfect example, as they make products that go onto almost every motherboard. Take at look at your I/O panel on your motherboard. $20 says it says Foxconn on there.

 

[klavis]

Imperialism never went away, we just modernized it and privatized it.

 

[anamaniac]

I'd absolutely love to own a iPhone!
I could sell it and then afford to buy a sweet Symbian or Android phone!

 

[gfair]

Fully agree with tayb's comments. Attention-grabbing headline. Weak. Either this is news, or a tabloid, you can't have both.

 

[JonnyDough]

The company is believed to import more than $10 billion of goods from China every year and you would have no trouble finding questionable working condition

Another way of looking at this is that Walmart imports over 90% of their stuff from China (read this a few years ago in an article about short term local economy gain and the major long term local economy loss of Walmart coming into a community.

Thank you for this article. I wish we had real truth like this on every news station every night across America. We should really burn all Walmart stores to the ground. Unfortunately its been a growing investment for rich people like politicians and the short term gain makes them look good so they can re-elected or elected into higher offices. The truth is it isn't Walmart that is to blame, it is politics that are America and China's #1 problem. We need laws in place to block this kind of stuff from happening, or simply for the FTC to do its job.

 

[joshua4693]

well this is the way the world work when somebody gain somebody have to lose in this case it was the chinese worker. btw blaming apple (in the title) is wrong there are many reason to hate apple but this is not the right one

 

[zodiacfml]

I agree with the second post since most news i've read regarding Foxconn is manufacture of Apple products. We know that Foxconn is a parts supplier that happens to get bigger now that they can manufacture their own motherboards and various electronic gadgets.

Simply, I just want to say that is not just Apple and Foxconn that has a problem. It's almost all companies that outsourced one of their processes has this problem, yet, there's little we can do (outsourcing location culture).

I could only think of starting here at Tom's or any tech review website. We can start by providing higher quality product reviews so that we could empower consumers the information they need so that they'll only buy the product they need for a price that is reasonable and not jacked-up by clever and/or smart marketing.

I am thankful for this website and information found on the web to reveal the truth in most products.

 

[muncher]

Great article to get people thinking. I see this article as not about picking on a particular brand but raising an in-principle issue.

 

[omnimodis78]

I have 3 friends who own iPhones, and each of them felt that they needed to justify owning one - so I'd say yeah, most of them feel a natural sense of shame for wasting money on a crappy iPhone. Deep down inside (or not so deep down in some cases), all iPhone owners know they they are just being herded by Jobs.

 

[Guest]

"...those individuals who purchase those gadgets and subsequently think it is funny to walk out the store and keep smashing it on the sidewalk to find out how much it takes to destroy the device."

Some people should have written this in front of their eyes all day long. Stop wasting.

On the working conditions - IMHO I don't think anything can be changed from here in an consumer oriented society. The change has to come from the countries where it's happening. If the factory is breaking chinese laws, it's chinas apparatus that should stop it. If they don't, who can? Anybody thinks Apple or Microsoft will come to them and say: "Hi, could you please raise the manufacturing costs?"
But just thinking about some economics principles makes me sick.

Boycott is a form of protest, but as long as I'm alone, it just isn't working. ;-)

 

[didymus03]

"Countless big U.S. and non U.S. corporations are guilty of exploiting human workforce and looking the other way when it’s convenient."

- This is from the article - those who read it without getting fixated should have noticed it wasn't singling out and blaming one company.

- The actual focus of the article really is a problem and I'm glad it was brought up. I'm not sure what the right solution is, but it is good for people to be aware and to want change. Its better for people to be complaining about high prices for toys than for others to be suffering in a much more direct and real way. Calloused selfishness is definitely something to feel guilty about.

 

[jellico]

[citation][nom]Jonnydough[/nom]We should really burn all Walmart stores to the ground. Unfortunately its been a growing investment for rich people like politicians and the short term gain makes them look good so they can re-elected or elected into higher offices. The truth is it isn't Walmart that is to blame, it is politics that are America and China's #1 problem. We need laws in place to block this kind of stuff from happening, or simply for the FTC to do its job.[/citation]
You do realize that the days of "only the rich people invest in the stock market" are long gone, do you not? Beginning in the late 80s, investment in the stock market by average people, typically via their 401Ks, not only became the norm, but created a huge economic boom that propelled our growth through the 90s and even the better part of the 2000s. Now, when you talk about these 'evil investors' you are talking about everyone from accountants to teachers and truck drivers. They look for companies that provide a good rate of return so that they can, so that they can do things like buy homes, send their kids to college, and eventually retire.

Another factor is the buying power of the dollar. Walmart provides greater buying power for the consumer by bring a huge variety of inexpensive products together under one roof. Some of it is cheap crap... but then again, how many people really want to spend $20 on an American-made plunger? Or $400 for an American-made vacuum cleaner? In most cases, you just don't need an $8 screwdriver; the $1 screwdriver does the job just fine.

 

[bildo123]

You reap what you sow. Bottom line.

 

[Guest]

Interesting how the writer glossed over the details that the companies are violating existing Chinese laws...

He expects foreign corporations to do for the Chinese citizens what their OWN government refuses to do for them? Enforce their own laws!!!!

 

[pharge]

[citation][nom]jellico[/nom]You do realize that the days of "only the rich people invest in the stock market" are long gone, ........Walmart provides greater buying power for the consumer by bring a huge variety of inexpensive products together under one roof. Some of it is cheap crap... but then again, how many people really want to spend $20 on an American-made plunger? Or $400 for an American-made vacuum cleaner? In most cases, you just don't need an $8 screwdriver; the $1 screwdriver does the job just fine.[/citation]

Well... true for the stock part... but at the same time... individual investors usually got hurted most when stock price crash... when the riches are buying at low... the individuals can only cry about their loss and hopeing that they don't have to sell their stocks at low for cash...

another thing about wal-mart.. it does bring the price down on many things, however teh pricce we pay are... less and less USA made stuffs and less and less local corner stores. We also seeing the local job markets are getting concentrated in few big giant corprates...

Is that kind of envirnment we want to live in? Is that kind of envirnment we wnat to leave it to our future generations?... I am not sure..

Nothing is pferect... however, are we willing to pay the price?
If yes.... then we have nothing to complain..

 

[marraco]

[citation][nom]joshua4693[/nom]...
We should really burn all Walmart stores to the ground
...[/citation]

There is a BIG flaw in your reasoning:

Walmart is no guilt of their sources of cheaper goods. USA government is guilt.
Walmart just logically maximize his profit under constrains that the government had set up.
The world trades in dollars, and USA prints far excess of dollars. As any recipient in which you put excess of anything, it goes out.
To save the banks an extra trillion of dollars has being printed. Basic economy says that that money should flow out. China is now the cheaper destiny, but if trade barriers are put on china, if the source of money is not cut, the dollars will go out to another place. India, Mexico, Brazil, eastern Europe.
The only solution is stop printing money, and that means stop ridding SUV, stop getting cheap food, stop subsidizing farm, stop making stealth planes, etc.
No candidate will get the votes under that basis. USA quality of life will go down, USA people will be forced to work more, and get lower pay. Employment will move up, at lower wages, factories of war goods will close. A No-No.
Fixing a country means work, effort, and sweat.

 

[dman3k]

Say about what you want about Foxconn making products for many brands, all 9 of these suicides came from the iPhone production factory. And the fact you cannot put two and two together means you're just blind.

 

[eddieroolz]

If I owned one, I would feel guilty.

My phone is 100% genuinely made in Japan. I do NOT feel guilty, knowing that there are labor standards in place, unlike in China.

 

[applegetsmelaid]

The next article title: Apple. I wonder how many pages of comments would result.

 

[osamadakhil]

I will never feel guilty owning an iphone or anything else from these products pointed at !!! chinese company signed a contract and approved a price with a company thats making more than 222 billion dollars like apple but they are not paying their own employees !!! china should do something about it not apple or apple clients !!