Concur. This "Ethical Hedonism" series is pure fluff. Not up to usual standards, Tyee.

Bought a pair of pyjamas for myself at the Zellers store in Williams Lake yesterday. Made in Bangladesh. Also a "laser" tool at Canadian Tire, made in China. When we see a Canadian made product, we just about faint.

In the '50s and '60s Vancouver was full of small manufacturing companies, including mine, making hundreds of items from kitchen cabinets to boat paddles, nails, barbed wire and C clamps, employing thousands of skilled, or semi skilled people, making decent wages, with one breadwinner needed for a family.

Now, with "wealth creating globalization", all we can see are goods made in China and in other slave labour countries, two breadwiners in a family here can hardly make it, with "homeless" children running around, fat as pigs, pumped up on McDonalds fries and and other junkfood garbage, because Mom has to make money on some chickenshit job to survive. They call this "careers that free them from household slavery"

There were clothing manufacturers, especially for women, like "Marjorie Hamilton", shirts and
shoes for men and women, all made locally. I worked for some, building offices and showrooms, mostly down in the Water St. area.

So, where are the benefits of the so called "globalized free market economy", with slave labour on one side, and minium wage part time service jobs on the other, global warming and pollution caused by the oil economy, making a small percentage rich, impoverishing the rest, no repair shops, because it is "cheaper" to buy new junk, drug addiction, obesity and cancer epidemics and garbage dumps overfilling from the unrepairable "cheap" junk. Work clothing that wears out in a few months, while staining washing machines full of other clothes with running dyes. Made in Timbuktoo.

"Costs can not be cut, only transferred on other sectors, the environment, or the future"

And we have the good examples of the "wealth creating global marketplace" surrounding, impoverishing, choking us into sickness and death. But the GDP is up, according to our harebrained economists and politicians and global wealth is just around the corner.

Ed Deak, Big Lake.

Not so fluff after all.

I wanted to respond to the commenters who were concerned this story was "fluff." The point of the Guilt Free Hedonist series (which Gladrags is part of) is to highlight those making a conscious decision to work ethically within a local economy, which is commonly pointed to as an element of sustainability. I was concerned about the impact of my choices -- like clothing -- and the impact these were having on the environment, social justice, health, etc. I noticed most clothing I had in my closet came from China, and I didn't want to continue to have such a large environmental "footprint."

The article offers the reader not opinion but reported information about how the local economy works, and an explanation of challenges faced by people working in it.

The Tyee is about investigative reporting and many other kinds of reporting as well. One form is ‘solutions’ oriented, for which we are offering a journalism fellowship. One solution or alternative to supporting large corporations using sweat shops and large amounts of energy to manufacture and transport clothes is to go local. I wanted to investigate whether going local was a viable choice in this particular sector of the economy (a sector with a high rate of consumption). I think that's worthy of an article and look forward to hearing what other readers think.

Fait gets the real thread of what this "fluff" story is more indicative of.

(It's mostly either just that some of Tyees "writers" are so used to writing for mainstream media, they bring their "no real opinion" view of things here with them, or the other possibility of course,That Tyee really just wants to be another "air head" media manifestation itself. Too close to call. I think I'll keep my betting money in my pocket.)

Certainly the markups keep most of this stuff beyond the reach of my pocketbook. And that's true whether it comes from here of China say. Where a CBC show on this very subject the other evening gave one of many examples where a men's sportcoat that cost 28 cents to manufacture there, sells here for $348.00. Hell, this has more in common with outright fraud theft than serious or "desirable" economics. All of which, of course, is what passes for capitalism on this side of the system's evolutionary curve.

Which "theft" of course, the proponent rightwingnutter defenders of "high exploitation capitalism" will momentarily be in here to defend-, as some kind of noble "right" of the rich to exploit their underclasses. On the other hand, of course, don't you organize into a trade union and demand "too much".

They really are princes and princesses (thinking mabellbc), aren't they?

Should be "fraud or theft" of course.

The Grammar-Nazi noticed two things. 1) The author of this article is an assistant-editor of The Tyee. And 2) she should've said "Woodend and me."

It's a common error, but such an easy error to avoid.

Split the subject in two ... try "caused Woodend to set ourselves a challenge" ... then try "caused I to set ourselves a challenge." You'd never say that something "caused I" to do anything.

Putting the two subjects together "Woodend and me" doesn't change the objectivity.

There have been way too many typos lately but that's for another day.

I thought the article was very worthwhile. Dismissing it by calling it "fluff" or "useless" completely misses the point. In my younger days, when Vancouver wasn't so expensive to live in and I had more disposable income (on a much lower wage -- how did I manage that?), I wore clothing locally designed and manufactured. Now-a-days, I am more familiar with the sale rack at Reitmans. Although I am delighted when I DO find something made in Canada in my price range.

Conscious choices 'can' make a difference. Unfortunately, the budget (and the free time) necessary to put those choices into effect is probably a lot closer to Carole Taylor's Gucci allowance than it is to that of the 'average' family working through circumstances akin to those described by Ed Deak above. For those of us who can make such ethical moves we'd be irresponsible not too.

However, as part of a 'movement' to make the necessary 'changes' in a culture and a society that is in serious trouble such things are little short of useless. Real 'changes' are going to have to occur elsewhere – and not just in people’s attitudes or ethical sensibilities. As a symbolic exercise, the concept of ethical hedonism is more about making a particular sort of person ‘feel’ good than it is about real positive change. I don’t think that reduces it to fluff, but, all the same, it’s pretty light material.

As for the typos - not a big deal surely.

Maybe the author should talk to the Doukhobors....I think they have the solution on clothing....

Hey Fiat -

Aren't you part of the problem? I understand the article to suggest that there are options and you preface your anti-globilization rant by confessing that you're as big a mark as the next guy. Either you care enough to try to make a difference or you don't. Which is it?

I bought two Canadian made garmets this month, swimming briefs and a windbreaker. I paid double over a comparable garmet made in China. But the cut of the fabric, and the fabric itself make the fit and make it all worthwhile. I think Canadian manufacturers make a product that is and looks entirely Canadian. And I think Wal-Mart, Sears, et al, make a product that is worldwide generic. People do comment on my clothing. That suggests that others know the difference too.

Excellent set of observations, bro.

And yup, like I predicted, here come the rightwingnutters, attempting their obfuscations and ongoing blame shifting to the consumer/worker victims of the current "global capitalism scam", who are supposed to spend all their waking hours in a wash of "off shore exploitation products", looking for that Made In Canada needle in a haystack. They know better of course, but essentially because they support the de-industrialization of the nation, (Unless you will all agree to work for free, of course.) off-shore and deep integration with the so-called "Free Trade" global system plumped by the US Empire, they are left only to obfuscate here, with feigned righteous, and hypocritical moral indignation.

It is you folks and your Neoconazi ideological, don't interfere with my personal right to enrich myself at any other's cost view of the world, who are at the heart of the problem. It's about ME, ME, ME. Fug the poor. Fug the working class. Fug the nation. Up with the Rip-Off System, and don't stand in the way of MY obscene profits, where e're from I rip and scam it-, all the while decrying the efforts of other folks, the poor and workers, organized and unorganized, here and off-shore, to secure a "meaningful life" share of this global GDP being ever scammed from them.

You are such tranparently phony shitts.

HEY noleftnutter:

Get out of peoples faces..we know you`re a lout

I knew one of our friends, like rightnut, working man, or godschild will have something very clever to say.

I bought pyjamas made in Bangladesh, because there are no Canadian made in small towns, served by large, basically all US owned corporations, like the HB. Neither are there any other clothing, boots, or shoes, or tools, or anything. If there are any, anywhere else?

Great, wealth creating foreign investment pouring into Canada.

There are 2 stores in town selling such things. Fields and Zellers, both HB owned. Fields had none, Zellers only had some from Bangladesh.

The nearest larger town, like Kamloops is over 300 km, 3 1/2 hr drive and $150. vehicle costs, plus the pollution transferred on Earth at large. If there are any Canadian made products in the foreign owned stores there at all ?

Now, the Williams Lake town council is drooling over the possibility of bringing a Wal-Mart to town, which will gut the existing stores, desolate the downtown and I hope I'll never have to set a foot into the dump.

But then, it could one day be the only store in town. Which in warped neocon minds means " The
competitive equilibrium brought on by free, globalized enterprise".

Now, neocons and their economic pimps have a good solution: "If you don't like it, move to a city and perhaps you find something made in Canada.??????"

Which means total public dependence, not on publicly controlled "pinko, commie, socialist nanny-state monopolilsm", but the benevolent exploitative powers of a foreign controlled oligipolies, raising prices every week to please their shareholders while screwing their employees and the public.

I wonder how much those poor slave workers in Bangladesh have received for my $13. pyjamas ?
So, what the hell are we supposed to do, when the economy is controlled from abroad, killing our own manufacturing sector, and flooding us with slave labour crap. Like the 4200 factories owned in China by Wal-Mart.

Rest assured, I'd never wear anything with a Nike slash, even if Tiger Woods gets $50,000 US per day for wearing their slave labour made cap. At least, there I have choice.

Ed Deak, Economic nationalist,

BTC - Like wise

Coyote - cute but wrong, in less thatn five minutes I was able to find, at least a Made in USA laser tool and one at Lee Valley. I appreciate that Fiat is your Yoda but he's also a hypocrite.

I think Fiat hit the nail on the head. It would be difficult to find Bangadeshi pajamaa in the city priced over ten dollars. The retailers have us by the nuts.

"Either you care enough to try to make a difference or you don't. Which is it?"

Fiat buys a pair of off-shore pajamas and y'all get your knickers in a knot! I wonder if all the free-market, bootstrap pulling advocates who love to come by and criticize have every accepted a GST cheque or baby bonus or government largesse? I wonder if they live their lives as assidously, never deviating from the principles they so vociferously trumpet.

The position that one must do everything or nothing at all is stupid and defeatist.

Of course Fait has it right. (And I make no apology for having great respect for the guy. As for rightwingnutter, on the other hand...) I live in a small town where, with rare exceptions, one is going to have the same needle in a haystack shopping experience.

Even in Vancouver, when I lived there, unless you knew exactly where to go for a particular item, and had the day for it, the likelihood of having few choices but the "slave labour" item were great. And for those great numbers of people marginalized by the current deindustrialization, global, "free trade" , off shore manufacture, starvation wage and living on $500 a month welfare, woman raising kids alone capitalism, and there's a Wal-Mart nearby full of cheap slave production items, you know where these folks have little choice but to go, and do. And the Neocons know they have vulnerable and increasingly hard pressed folks by those short and curlies as well. It is what is enriching them, or at least giving them their wet dreams of hope that they too can be "one of the Big Boys" too.

The hypocrisy these neocons are so steeped in, is staggering, and our society is awash with their spewings right now.

Like bob the cat says,"...we know you`re a lout."

And mindless, self and ruling class serving louts they indeed are.

I've been dealing with Lee Valley for 25 years and really appreaciate that they make many and mark their items "Made in Canada". All top quality, the best anywhere.

Unfortunately, they don't sell pyjamas, boots, undershorts and shirts.

If anybody has some, or all, their defunct "Wood Cuts" magazine series, I wrote a number of illustrated articles in them and did all the "Shop Tips" illustrations in all the issues.

So, tell me rightwingnut, why am I a hypocrite if I'm forced to buy foreign slave labour made clothes, when there are no others in our "foreign investment" owned stores and have to eat a snack on the way home in the "foreign investment" owned Tim Horton's, because there ain't none others than the foreign chains anywhere?

Wonder when Canadian Tire, and Home Hardware will be selling out ?

Ed Deak,

And bang on Stump.

Sheesh, hit a bulleye in a left wing hug fest and watch the daggers come out.

Fiat - to suggest that you are "forced" to buy offshore goods is absurd. Particularly the clothing industry. Your excuse that you could only choose from small town selection is equally absurd. You clearly know how to use the internet. Again the extreme difference between what you say and what you do is hypocritical. If you choose not to take the time to search for alternatives, fine. You're just not entitled to stand quite as high on your soapbox.

Stump your point is valid, there's lots of gray area in these issues. I merely pointed out that by prefacing his ant-globilization rant by admitting his real behaviour made him appear to be a hypocite, still does. I regulalry advocate for less government involvement, not just for the left.

Coyote - So idealogically stuck that even after you support Fiat's hypocrisy you somehow twist the circumstances to come to the conclusion that by pointing it out I'm the hypoctire.

If I didn't expect disagreement I'd go the Fraser Institute site, if you guys can't stand disagrerment then close of the Tyee to the dissenters. I've only been visiting for a coupl've months but the discussions are painfully similar. Three or four folks launch idealogical attacks, anyone who raises issues is branded and chastised and then the same idealogical statements are repeated. Mix in assorted half-truths, false claims and these posts can pretty mcuh write themselves.

I am idealogically bent but at least I don't run and hide when someone asks difficult questions.

When is the last time you made someone think? Thats what I get from reading Ed's posts. When I read shite like the above by leftoutnutcase, it's the opposite. It's like sports call in talk shows. Nothing to do with reality. You'd be better off talking about the Canucks, someone might actually agree with you.

Did you at lease have a choice in pyjama print? Hockey players or cowboys?

Noleftnutty:
Missed the target completely, more like! Sheesh yourself. I've seldom seen anyone so enamored of marginal anecdotal evidence outside of a club I know where the members spend all their time studying the 'facts' of alien abduction. I think you hang around here because there's a dim bulb still burning under all the cobwebs that tells you you're on the wrong track. Keep reading and it may all come clear in the end. Be thankful there are some kind souls chez ici who’ll take the time to explain, and explain, and explain.

G west - So, what is the point? Fiat's actions are in contradiction with his behaviour. He's the local hero so no one is allowed to suggest that the emperor has no clothes. How anecdotal is that? Your post only seves to explain that you're not welcome here if you disagree.

Club - What else does Ed make you think of other than boogeymen and conspiracy theories?

NLN
Baloney! The idea is that the kind of tokenism suggested in this story is pointless (nothing more than a sop to the conscience of Liberal elitists) - and that it is complete futility to suggest your little anecdote about searching out a homegrown (US actually if you want to be precise) alternative to a mass-produced foreign import is of any significance. Or that your imagination is in any way a comprehensive critique of comments here (by Ed Deak and others) that the real problems inherent in the way we live today are amenable to anything other than concerted political action. Go ahead and try to straighten out the world with that level, but don't be surprised if the house still falls down on your head.

G West - the world is more complicated than your, and Ed's simple conspiracy theories. To suggest that some type of radical political process is going to save us all is simply way too 60's.

I've said before, most British Columbians have more prosperity, freedom and choice than ever before. You my be preaching to the converted here but your concepts aren't going to work in the real world.

Who said your not welcome here?!? Poor thing crying out for attention! You're scared and for good reason. You read stuff like the forests are dying, the fish are disappearing, the climate changing and it scares you. You lash out. We all go through that at first. Just let it all out!! It's the first step to realization.

Oh yeh, a lot more complicated than yours too, dude.
noleftnutty
Who said anything about saving?
If you feel fine about the state of affairs and you truly believe the mantra you've just spelled out - hey, fill your cup again and drink it to the dregs. Do it and with my compliments lad.
But if you really believe what you're saying, and you've taken the trouble to read and tried to understand the evidence from another point of view - and for God's sake don't listen to the people here - because there are lots more intelligent and well read folks you can consult - then for goodness sake go off whistling into the sunset and quite wasting your time here. If you think this is the best of all possible worlds then pick up a copy of Candide and put it beside your bed ‘cause your name should be Dr Pangloss.

We're not going to be convinced by your naiveté. Maybe we can't change the world, in fact, there's a big and growing body of research that says it's too late to even try. If you’d rather believe that then pick up a fiddle and start playing and leave the naive fools here with the hard work of trying to find a way to pass on something other than a dead dry rock to our children. I think the fact you keep coming back belies a certain lack of confidence on your part, that’s all dude!
Cheers.

Sorry Club, missed the mark again. I don't live in fear that climate change is going to kill me or my kids or their kids. We are idealogically different but I am hardly the one that "lashes out".

G West - I'm here in part because I respect other points of view, but much of the dialogue here isn't supported by any factual information, mostly anecdotal. Maybe it's just a good ole boys network. I'll figure out soon enough whether there's merit in paying attention to what goes on here. Until then I'm going to speak out when I feel I have something worth saying, whether anyone on your side of the political spectrum agrees or not.

I greatly appreciate Vanessa Richmond's article. As someone who is painfully aware that the clothing I choose to buy is a political act as much as anything else, I value (a) that it's been raised here and (b) that there are alternatives to buying sweatshop clothing made thousands of miles away. I hate/ detest/ avoid shopping for many reasons, especially in malls, but am glad for Made in Canada and especially Made in Vancouver options. Thanks Ms. Richmond!

When you use words like boogieman and conspiracy theory as your basis for arguement I'm trying to give you the benefit of the doubt. You call others hypocrites but don't really express an intelligent debate technique so what do you want us to believe? What idealogy are you supporting anyway! The the big brain creatures on this planet will continue to guide us on our present path to fill some sort of cosmic destiny?!? Our rightful place amoungt the ruling class of the galaxies. Or that we should aspire to be like the ultra rich. to live a life of leisure with millions working for us and our wealth. Is that it. please clarify your so called idealogy. Live long and fester...

CNN is finally going to do coverage on PEAK OIL it is airing 3 times on Sat and again 3 times on Sun. Don`t know how good a job they will do on it but I think everyone should catch it, might help people realize why we should be buying all the locally made products as possible. They may be the only ones available to us in the not to distant future.

GWest, I have to here failed to adequately appreciate the subtlety of your sense of humour brother, and the understated but effective cut of your intelligence. :-) Very slip it in between the carefully selected ribs, upward and into the liver. I will not fail to appreciate it again.

I always appreciate an opportunity for a good chuckle. :-)

Say something intelligent noleftnut, and I agree with those here who say that you are hanging around here because you see something you sence that your intellectual vision has not to here been getting-, and we are certainly capable of moving on to give credit where credit is due, even to you. It must involve more evidence of a capacity for empathy with your fellow man and woman though of course, than you have at least to here demonstrated an ability for. Too much me, me, me. It's all about me. Which is typical of the ideologically rut stuck Neocon, we know.

Club - Valid questions. I used the terms boogeymen and conspiracy theory in relation to Ed's typical posts, which revolve around a variety of economic concepts, which largely reference global conspiracies and secret cabals controlling our everyday destiny, a concept that I've yet to see much proof of.

I've stated previously what my basic beleifs are. One version is that when you consider how screwed up most governments have been over the past 30 years, I favour less rather than more.

I appreciate that concept runs contrary to much of the thinking on this site. My earned income is the fruit of my productivity and it pisses me off to see any government spend it stupidly merely to buy votes. I'm socially liberal in that I'm in favour of proper social programs and fair opportunity. Unlike most opinions here I don't favour equalizing social outcomes, that good fotrune, hard work and sacrifices out to create freedoms and privleges.

Lastly, like many of the posters that I tangle with, if your final comment is indicative of how you view my perpsective on this site the I guess I should expect to continue to find disagreement every time I show up.

It can be damned hard to find locally made clothing, and until recently a lot of it was, er, rather bohemian. That web site with the listing of local retailers/designers is a godsend for local shoppers.

And speaking of the emperor having no clothes, I can't believe CNN is actually going to cover peak oil. Maybe there is hope that people will clue in after all...

Coyote - I don't see it that way and frankly, becasue I tend to disagree with many of the opinions here doesn't mean that my focus is exclusively on me. Just like my "opponents" know better than to think that they are all about "us".

You're correct though in suggesting that stimulation is part of the appeal of this site and kudos to G West, he knwos how to fight a good fight.

"To suggest that some type of radical political process is going to save us all is simply way too 60's."

If I were to compare the world of 1959 to the world of 1979 and try to figure out what precipitated some of the great changes over those two decades I'd say radical political action on the part of individuals (banding together) is perhaps the ONLY way to save us.

I'm glad to hear that the Trilaterals, Bilderbergers, the World Economic Forum, et al, and their executioners, the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund, are not conspiracies to rule the world.

Neither was the Comintern, or Communist International, under Stalin, or Hitler's Thousand Year Reich of racial purity.

The power elites just happen to get together now and then to throw the bull and have some laughs. The same for the daily growing foodbank lines and the homeless who just like the fresh air.

Ed Deak.

NLN
Thanks for the kudos, I think! As for your claim that folks here spend their time sharing anecdotes, I think you need to haul out the dictionary, 'cause that's what I'm accusing you of doing. You're suggesting that the fact someone (anyone) can find the odd substitute (that’s an anecdote) for (any more than a few) the products that form the basis of the economic system that the rest of us are criticizing is not an anecdote. These changes have been, and are, taking place within an economic structure that you, apparently, have the confidence in. In my opinion, those things are facts; facts that you can take the time to verify on your own without relying on anything anybody here might say or not. In the end, events overtake us all.

But, you're arguing from the particular to the general, a common logical fallacy, and it makes everything else you've got to say sound silly. Pick up that copy of Candide and you'll find out how silly. And, when you're finished with Voltaire you may be ready for something a little more recent, let me know and I'll give you a reading list. By the way, you might want to stop for a minute at the website of the New Republic (you’ll have to register to read their online content) but someone there (not at all connected to any of the folks here) is calling for universal single-payer health care in the good old U S of A.
No hard feelings though.
Gotta run, there's a world to save!

Ed - I appreciate that you're well read, experienced and a local legend. Fair enough, it's still not clear how being able to name a few international financial institutions and make some historical references to some nasty people points to world domination.

Connect the dots Ed, and hopefully it's something better than vague generalizations simply rationalizing previous outcomes. If you see it so clearly, how about some benchmarks in their behaviour that we'll all recongize as proof of your theories.

Goddamn it man, you and I must come out of a shared experience. I think the same damned thing. :-)

I'm watching these events unfold in France, and I'm saying to myself, " Now these are folks who understand current capitalism, and the only real language it understands."

It'd be nice if it was a parlour game, but it ain't.

This is about all the time I'm going to waste on you rightwingnutter. If you think the Bilderbergers and Trilaterals are "finacial institutions" you're either completely ignorant of the facts, or are trying to imply that everybody else is.

Do yourself a favour and go the quick way: Go to Google and type in the names of the above "institutions" then do a bit of reading before wasting our time.

In any case, financial institutions ceased to exist with bank deregulation and became licencing authorities for world control with the perceived power of freshly created imaginary capital.

By the way I'm not a bloody legend, just an old guy who has seen it all, have lived under every ideology and doesn't fall for any more ideological propaganda.

Try to think, man, instead of repeating cookie cutter bs.

Ed Deak.

G West- time is short for tonight so I'll have to delay visiting the New Republic for another time. But, I've always suggested that a single payer Health Care system was my preference, where we disagree is how that service should be provided.

As for your reading list there are other priorities in my life for the next few years that preclude my participation.

I argue from the particular to the general? The reverse could be said of most of the opinions here that I disagree with and it seems as much folly to me when people take that approach.

No question that there are serious changes underway in the world economic order. Much like the climate change discussion it's tough to tell who's influencing what and what the long term effect is going to be. If it's as complex as has been indicated then I don't see any intellectual here that has a grip on it.

Lastly, we've elevated the discussion above the rhetorical ranting and name calling, some things are worth staying up for.

...supposed to spend all their waking hours in a wash of "off shore exploitation products", looking for that Made In Canada needle in a haystack.

http://search-desc.ebay.ca/search/search.dll?sofocus=bs&sbrftog=1&fcl=3&sacur=0&fscl=1&amp%3Bsspagename=h%3Ah%3Aadvsearch%3ACA&from=R10&catref=C6&fss=0&frpp=50&saslop=1&satitle=%28%22Made+in+Canada%22%2C%22Manufactured+in+Canada%22%2C+%22Canadian+made%22%2C%22Canadian+manufactured%22%29&sacat=-1%26catref%3DC6&bs=Search&fts=2&fsop=1%26fsoo%3D1&coaction=compare&copagenum=1&coentrypage=search&fgtp=&sargn=-1%26saslc%3D3&sadis=200&fpos=ZIP%2FPostal&ftrt=1&ftrv=1&saprclo=&saprchi=&salic=-15&fhlc=1

40,785 items found on eBay.ca for "Made in Canada" OR "Manufactured in Canada" OR "Canadian made" OR "Canadian manufactured"

The eBay online auction site itself is 50 percent Made in Canada to the extent that one of the two founders is from Montreal.

http://froogle.google.com/froogle?hl=en&as_q=&num=100&scoring=p&btnG=Search+Froogle&as_epq=&as_oq=Made-in-Canada+Manufactured-in-Canada+Canadian-made+Canadian-manufactured&as_eq=&price1=&price2=&addr=&as_occt=any&cat=0&show=dd&safe=active

20,799 items found on froogle.google.com for Made-in-Canada OR Manufactured-in-Canada OR Canadian-made OR Canadian-manufactured in 1.91 seconds.

No need to spend "all your waking hours" searching for items that are made in Canada. If you use modern technology, you can do it in a few seconds. The eBay.ca search is sorted by auctions ending soonest. Auctions can also be sorted by proximity to your location, price, and various other factors. The froogle search is sorted by price low-to-high. Masochists or show-offs can sort high-to-low if they want.

For physical and environmental security reasons, it's a good idea to produce essentials such as food and energy locally. Designer clothes are not a security issue. A pollution tax should be applicable to the factories that make designer clothes and the ships that transport them - regardless of where they're made. That'll level the playing field between jurisdictions. A potato grown in Point Roberts, WA is a lot more local than one grown in Newfoundland. If the Chinese refuse to levy appropriate pollution taxes on their factories, then we can levy the equivalent in import duties, much like the Americans are doing to counter Canada's too-low stumpage fees. The difference is, we should take the high road and return the Chinese pollution import duties to Chinese environmental groups to help them with their battles.

As far as job creation goes, we can create an unlimited number of local jobs by expanding the deposit-refund system to cover other items that should be recycled. I'm glad to see the B.C. Liberals are in the midst of levying a recycling fee on electronics equipment and they're committing to doing the recycling here instead of exporting the work to China. See http://www.canada.com/vancouversun/news/story.html?id=15f2bba0-7e49-43c2-9714-ab733374c274

Even though the electronics industry is my industry, I'm all in favour of applying a true-cost system. Disassembling discarded items for recycling is a great way to learn how things are built. It would be a good summer job for kids who are interested in a product-design career. By observing what has broken in discarded items, they can learn how NOT to design things.

My first full-time job was on a factory production line. That was incredibly boring. And the repetition was physically unhealthy too. I was glad to see my job automated. In fact, I personally designed some of the equipment to automate my own production job. Instead of debating whether factory production line jobs should be located in Canada or China, it would be much healthier for everyone to automate all of them - as long as the benefits of automation are shared across all of society.

The problem is that most forms of automation use very large inputs of energy, while human labour already exist and its energy use must be guaranteed for survival, so it might as well be used in a creative way.

Production lines are definitely not creative, neither can we have people sharpening needles and razor blades by hand. The question is who will make the decisions. The public, or the corporate boardrooms ?

In many cases one off, or limited production can be very rewarding, energy efficient and sustainable, because the products become far more valuable when made by humans.

Furniture is one field, where scarce materials can be put to use for hundreds of years, while the same, massproduced items, using the same scarce materials, become worthless in short periods, causing environmental destruction and pollution.

Having been in manufacturing practcally all my adult life, I can vouch that in many cases, handmade products are no more, or vbery little more expensive than the massproduced. E.g. I grew up wirth handmade clothes and shoes, handmade bicycles, etc. because they were the only ones available and everydody survived very nicely, except the stockmarket investors didn't get anything.

I could create an unlimited number of jobs for investments under $15,000, per, where the large companies invest millions, using incredible amounts of energy per job, so they can divert the benefits of resource conversion to the artificial entities of corporate shares.

So, which will it be ? Humans, or shares ? In all my years in business, I've never invested a penny in other shares and the only shares I ever owned were the 5 BRCIC, or whatever, handed out by Bill Bennett. And we know how good they were.

Ed Deak,

Cycling Commuter
Great ideas. As I said up stream a bit, those who can do certainly should do what they can and they have an ethical responsibility to change the way they organize their lives and their purchases. That, however, is not the point. I'm sure you wouldn't want readers to think that the kinds of suggestions you're making (with respect to individuals' purchasing plans) reflect a sufficiently large proportion of gross retail sales to be anything more than symbolic.

I'm not saying that symbolism isn't important, but perspective is too.

When you tell me that Wal-mart is stocking a majority of Canadian made goods on its shelves and when Wal-mart responds to attempts by its employees to unionize with a first contract instead of a closed store I'll be the first in line to start buying there. However, in the interim I'm not going to hold my breath. As for automated assembly lines in factories; I fear that won't be spreading too quickly to low value manufacturing such as piece work textiles until there are no more third world countries whose populations aren't still available for exploitation.

Your suggestions about recycling are interesting too and one would be crazy not to support them. Still I don't think, in any sense, your suggestions are likely to make a huge dent in the problem. There are, as far as I know, still some massive piles of automobile tires lying around the backcountry after all.

Further, looking at Canada's record over the past 10 years toward meeting its Kyoto targets I think there is still an enormous stone to roll up that legendary hill...a hill that's going to get a lot steeper as production from the tar sands increases.

I'm glad you're finding ways to live responsibly and I hope others are doing that too. Nevertheless, we can't afford to pretend that's all it's going to take.
Cheers.

NoLeftNutter
As I recall, you were a pretty harsh critic of the Romanow Report, which I suspect you still haven't read, and you made all kinds of representations that the horrow stories I cited from the American system were nothing but scare mongering. I can go back into the archives and find what you wrote if your memory fails.

Yeah, you argue from the particular to the general. You imply that the 'particular' case that you can find a 'particular' product that is manufactured in North America is evidence that one can succeed in achieving a similar end in the 'general' case. It's a logical fallacy. Similar to a child who's told the first dog she sees is a German Shepherd and who subsequently assumes that every dog belongs to that breed.

You should read the article - and the Voltaire.
Bye for now.

shd be 'horror' in line 3, sorry!

And, since there's apparently no place where comments and links pertaining to health care generally (and not just the lonely story about the mentally ill that's by now almost hidden in the bulrushes below) there's this review article from the New York Review of Books which is available for anyone who cares about what's being said about health care in the United States just now:
http://www.nybooks.com/articles/18802
Perhaps before we permit Harper, Klein et al to throw up our system we should learn a bit more about what many Americans think about theirs.
Cheers.

I've tried to stop buying clothes that aren't local, and have learned a few things:
- Local designers (e.g. Hunt and Gather, also locally-made) really do have things at comparable prices to retail, and so much more distinctive.
- The hunt for local jeans is mostly a fruitless search, but Roots has some denim made in Canada. But beware, not all Roots products are made in Canada.
- Marks Work Wearhouse has Canadian-made socks.
- So what I can't find locally, I buy 2nd-hand. And that mostly works, except when it comes to shoes - 2nd-hand shoes are already broken in to other feet, which is no good when you have back trouble. And they're usually more worn out than I'd like. Roots is ok for work boots and casual footwear. But don't even try to buy locally-made shoes that you can wear to out or to the office unless you're very very wealthy.
Any one know where you can buy locally-made underwear at affordable prices? Just can't bring myself to do that 2ndhand.

And don't forget Tilley Endurables -- way better than jeans, and Canadian made.

Dallas
Unquestionably good clothes; not exactly what the younger generation would call stylish though. And far too expensive for the average working family's budget. Alas.

I can't believe an article on local designers and manufactureers left out Dream! (Cordova) Dream is 98% local! How much of that is produced locally i don't know...but I'm sure the odds are higher in a wholly locally themed store. Jejune Cleaver, Paperbird, Picnic, Dace, Link...all locally made.

Dismissing the hunt for locally and ethically-made clothing as "fluff" wafts of a pathological anti-establishment mentality that should really be left behind once you realize that not everything your first-year Poli-Sci prof says is the gospel. Unless you plan on walking around naked, you're going to have to buy clothing, and while a hemp sack would certainly let everyone know how totally morally righteous and pure you are, some of us have minds open enough to accept that living ethically doesn't have to mean forsaking aesthetic pleasure.
It's the pious i-am-too-focused-on-calcutta-orphanages-to-even-think-about-style mentality that makes the left and its causes so open to ridicule.

Thanks to the author for the suggestions on where to find local designers.

Also, beware that locally made does not necessarily equal ethical. There are pseudo-sweatshops here too.

elaine
Only a couple of posts actually said they thought the article was 'fluff'. Many others acknowledged that such efforts were a worthwhile but hardly comprehensive solution to a wide range of serious problems both from a supply and an economic point of view. It seems to me that if anybody's being pious and pedantic it's you. Not everybody gets their aesthetic pleasures the same way - I'd never be so dismissive about a wide range of points of view as you appear to be. Is it possible that's a characteristic of the right? By all means spend your money on designer clothes made here in BC so you can feel good, but don't pretend that, as seanorr notes above,it is necessarily evidence of anyone's ethics.

G West. You are certainly right. I was only addressing the "fluff"ers and not the subsequent debate, which, as you've pointed out, is both full of good points and well considered.
xo.e.

I think you're overstating my original point in this discussion which was this comment about Fiat's post

Again, I think that Ed's anti-globilization rant is in contradiction with his actions.

No one has a requirment to buy locally, act locally or think locally. It's a resonable standard for disucssion's sake to walk the walk if you want to talk the talk.

NoLeftNutter
I don't think I'm overstating it at all. The suggestion that a few do-gooders shopping at the local whole foods and making their own clothes from tie-dyed fabric woven of wool from Saltspring goats is any kind of an answer to the kinds of cathartic problems that Ed is talking about is nonsense. I think you know that. I said, and Ed obviously believes too, that we have (when possible) an ethical obligation to patronize and support local and environmentally responsible businesses.

But that's not enough. You might be surprised to know that all the efforts and expense we put into collecting recyclable products like soft drink bottles and beer cans actually don't help the environment very much at all. In fact, if you include all the carbon-based fuels burned up to get them to a central location and transport them, then grind them up and add more energy to process them into something else the whole effort doesn't really contribute much to the environment at all. And that $5 fee you pay per tire when you buy a new set - how much do you want to bet that doesn't even cover the cost of collecting the damn things into depots where they can sit for a while longer?

I'm not suggesting that we should stop doing such things, but they are such patent tokenism when we do all the other wasteful and soul-destroying things with the rest of our economic activities that Ed is talking about. You may think some of his economic explanations for our current problems go too far and I'm sure you'd like to think you can do more about helping than you actually can. Look at what cycling commuter wrote, there are things we can do and I agree with them. But there's a more fundamental problem and it can only be addressed collectively and by political means. You know how I scorn people who post here when I think they are dull as stones. I don't think you are, but you need to get reading - and believe me, what Ed Deak has to say isn't a bad place to start.
I think there's a little voice in the back of your head that tells you there's more to this than meets the eye.
Hang in there, it's worth it. We may not save the earth but at least we'll know we aren't living in the best of all possible worlds as we go down the drain.

Most bottles make it to the recyling depot by bike or shopping cart! I know they're trucked from there, but that first step is carbon neutral. Go binners!

I read once upon a long time ago that archaeologists usually find evidence of recycling around the time a civilization starts the long slide towards falling apart.

Also, inasmuch as we don't want to turn the entire planet into a landfill the costs of recycling are IMO worth not having to constantly expand our garbage dumps... and is there any less pollution in trucking the stuff to a dump in Cache Creek? So, I wouldn't call it tokenism, but rather the early, baby steps to a better system of reuse.

"Either you care enough to try to make a difference or you don't."

You sound like Yoda NLN. "There is no try, only do."

You're channeling a muppet who's channeling George Lucas dude!

That kind of talk might fly on Dagobah, but here on Earth we have a saying too. "Try, try, and try again."

May the force be with you

Stump
I agree with you. I just think it's dangerous to assume that we can play this little recyling game forever and assume that everything will be okay in the end. It's going to take a lot more than that. I heard today that a company with a lot of thermal coal in a huge deposit near Tumbler Ridge wants to set up a coal burning generation plant up there to feed into BC Hydro's grid. Enough coal to last 45 years (depending upon the capacity of the plant they build of course). Want to bet it gets the go-ahead?

Seems to me that there are two main rationales for ethical/local consumption. The first is economic protectionism: buying from local producers. This is sensible but not necessarily ethical, since theoretically it deprives the Third World of its resource-based economics.

The second is environmental concern for resources consumed in transport. This is ethical but not necessarily sensible, because it presumes that transportation cannot be made vastly more efficient (e.g. lighter-than-air cargo dirigibles).

It is certainly a good thing to look at how to reduce our unnecessary consumption in today's world, but not to assume that this is how things will always be.

Yammer, I'd say the scale of cusumption has made your point all but obsolete. How many different ways, how many times can you send the same message over and over before it sinks in. 1.5 billion without clean water, arable land becoming scarcer, fish stocks depleted and peak oil upon us. The level of pollution and toxicity is killing us and those species around us, we're fighting more and more over the remaining resources and you still think its an efficiency issue? Sorry to bust up your little party here, but we're consumming ourselves into extinction. Society as it has become is not sustainable in any way shape or form. Not with this economic model in place that rewards the resource theives. Nope, the only way we will have any society in a few hundred years is if we can all share what is left and hope there is enough of it. Otherwise it's back to the caves. Future generations best be hoping we left enough scraps to hunt and gather.

My dark side already tells me that plans are in place to cull the herd. Because when society starts to really break down, when there is no more driving to the grocery store as the food supply has been gone for weeks and months, do you really want to be here? You want a glimpse of mayhem? Give some thought to what kind of place this will be if it's each man for himself.

And now back to your regularly scheduled programming.....

A whole article about ethical clothing, with hundreds of responses, and this is the only mention hemp gets? If you can't find anything local, try finding something made of hemp, if you still have no luck then go to some cheap crap box store and "help" the subsustence farmers of the 3rd world become factory slaves.

Choosing hemp doesn't mean a sack and doesn't eliminate the chance of aesthetic pleasure. Choosing hemp means not supporting the imperial war machine - it's illegal in the USA while their cotton is drowning in subsidies. Hemp is legal here in Canada, but even if you get it from somehwere else it's still a much more environmentally friendly crop to grow. Trouble finding jeans? The original Levi's were made of hemp, because it was the longest lasting. I got sick of cheap Field's leather belts falling apart on me, so a few years ago I splurged on a nice black one made of hemp, ask me in a decade or 2 if I'm still using it.

our government's take on hemp:
http://ats.agr.gc.ca/supply/3307_e.htm
http://www.nrc-cnrc.gc.ca/highlights/2004/0407hemp_e.html

shopping for clothes?
http://www.canhempco.com/
http://www.rawganique.com/indexcad.htm
http://www.rawganique.com/HAbelts.htm - BE3B is the one I got
http://www.hemptown.com/ - got a nice hoody from these guys
http://thenaturalorder.com/ - long lasting socks anyone?
http://www.torontohemp.com/cathcl.htm
http://www.ecoeverything.com/
http://www.spiritstream.com/
http://www.trendzclothing.com/

Good enough for starters?

mikev
I noticed a day or so ago that a legislator in Georgia was trying to get the sale of pot (no active ingedients) flavoured candies ruled illegal and cause for, on conviction after a second offence, a penalty of up to five years in jail.
Go figure - Thanks for the links, btw.

Pot flavoured candy?? Yuck! You'd think it would go bust on it's own!

Valhalla Pure has some sports clothes that are Canadian made. Not enough, to be sure, but their fleece tops are GREAT and their hiking pants are long-lasting. I bought a whole flock of them and wore them to work at my job in a gas-leaky pulp mill. ClO2, SO2, NH3--and many, many more lethal, poisonous, carcinogenic gasses. The pants lasted 10 YEARS, before one of them got caught on a sharp shard on a ladder and tore. I will not wear the cute tops to the mill, though; however, have gone hiking/camping in them for years and they are the best! The article does come across as a bit flaky, to be sure, but I guess the writer is very, very young. That she is interested in Canadian and ethically-made products shows promise and depth of character! I dare say by the time she's an old battle axe like me, she will have polished her diction some, and gained much more depth--maybe more than her critics, eh?:)

Oh! Forgot one more thing. It's untrue that it costs a lot to make jeans in Canada. Levi was making them in Edmonton for years, and even made a $29.2 million dollar profit from the enterprise there. However, that wasn't enough for the greedy corporate skanks of Levi's, so they moved their operation to Mexico--cheaper labour and no pesky labour, safety or environmental laws to worry about. To be sure, they will sell these jeans for the same price as if they were still made here in Canada. Don't buy them. Why don't you check Manitoba and Quebec? They're still making good, solid well-made Canadian clothes there. Don't buy from WalMart, The Gap-ing ethics or from other known slave-mongerers. Don't buy anything but rice from Burma (Myanmar), the Philippines, Thailand or the Sudan. These are the worst.

Marysue
I'd heard that about the Levis plant. Whatever happened to GWG jeans, weren't they made in Edmonton too? I guess they've been bought up or sold out or manufacture them off shore now too.

What about Mountain Equipment Coop stuff? Is it made locally or jobbed out? That's one I'd forgotten and they are a bit of a local (now more or less cross country I guess) success.

I just checked the tag on my MEC sportsbag -- made in Vietnam.

That should encourage the lefties, buying from socialists!

ps Isn't the most ethical gladrag that which is vintage and/or previously owned? I am a thrift store enabler (my wife is the junkie).

Then you can't win! Are socialist sweat shoppes better and capitalist ones? Jeez, the distinctions you have to make - if it we're a warmer climate I guess we could all wear loincloths made from used tablecloths.
Sheesh!

from the New York Times: March 25, 2006 (Some reasons why you might want to check where your inexpensive clothing comes from) [in two parts]

Bethany, Conn.

NINETY-FIVE years ago, March 25 also fell on a Saturday. At 4:40 p.m. on that sunny afternoon in 1911, only minutes before the end of the workday, a fire broke out on the eighth floor of the Asch Building, a block east of Washington Square in Manhattan.

The Triangle Waist Company occupied the top three floors of the 10-story building. There, some 600 workers were employed in the manufacture of ladies' shirtwaists, most of them teenage girls who spoke little English and were fresh off the boat from Russia, the Austro-Hungarian Empire and Italy. The fire, probably caused by a carelessly tossed match or cigarette butt (there were perhaps 100 men working at the Triangle), engulfed the premises in minutes.

The factory owners and the office staff on the 10th floor, all but one, escaped onto the roof and climbed to an adjacent building on Waverly Place. But on the eighth and ninth floors, the workers were trapped by a deadly combination of highly combustible materials, workrooms crowded by dense rows of table-mounted sewing machines, doors that were locked or opened inward, inadequate fire escapes, and the lack of any plan or instruction.

Before the first horse-drawn fire engines arrived at the scene, girls — some holding hands, in twos and threes — had already begun to jump from the windows. The hundred-foot drop to the cobbled street was not survivable. The firemen deployed their nets, but the force of gravity drove the bodies of the girls straight through to the pavement, and they died on impact.

The ladders on the fire trucks were raised quickly, but the New York City Fire Department of 1911 was not equipped to combat fires above six stories — the limit of those ladders. The top floors of the Asch Building, a neo-Renaissance "fireproof" warehouse completed in 1901 in full compliance with building codes, burned relentlessly.

The workers trapped near the windows on the eighth and ninth floors made the fast and probably instinctive choice to jump instead of burning or suffocating in the smoke. The corpses of the jumpers, by some estimates as many as 70, could at least be identified. But the bodies of most of those who died inside the Triangle Waist Company — trapped by the machinery, piled up on the wrong side of doors, heaped in the stairwells and elevator shafts — were hideously charred, many beyond recognition.

Before 15 minutes had elapsed, some 140 workers had burned, fallen from the collapsing fire escapes, or jumped to their deaths. Several more, critically injured, died in the days that followed, putting the official death toll at 146.

And here's the rest of the column:

By most contemporary accounts, it was common knowledge that children were usually on the premises. They were hidden from the occasional inspectors, but underage girls, as young as 9 or 10, worked in most New York garment factories, sewing buttons and trimming threads. Where were they on this particular Saturday afternoon?

There are no descriptions of children surviving the fire. Various lists of those who died 95 years ago today — 140 named victims plus six who were never identified (were some of those charred remains children?) — include one 11-year-old, two 14-year-olds, three 15-year-olds, 16 16- year-olds, and 14 17-year-olds. Were the ages of workers, living and dead, modified to finesse the habitual violation of child labor laws in 1911? How many children actually died that day? We will never know. And now 1911 is almost beyond living memory.

But we will also never know how many children were among the dead on May 10, 1993, in Thailand when the factory of the Kader Industrial Toy Company (a supplier to Hasbro and Fisher-Price) went up in flames. Most of the 188 workers who died were described as teenage girls.

We will never know with any certainty how many children died on Nov. 25, 2000, in a fire at the Chowdhury Knitwear and Garment factory near Dhaka, Bangladesh (most of the garments made in Bangladesh are contracted by American retailers, including Wal-Mart and the Gap), where at least 10 of the 52 trapped in the flames by locked doors and windows were 10 to 14 years old.

And we will never know how many children died just last month, on Feb. 23, in the KTS Composite Textile factory fire in Chittagong, Bangladesh. The official death toll has climbed into the 50's, but other sources report that at least 84 workers lost their lives. It's a familiar story: crowded and unsafe conditions, locked exits, hundreds of undocumented female workers as young as 12, a deadly fire. There may never be another tragic factory fire in America that takes the lives of children. We don't lock them into sweatshops any more. There are child labor laws, fire codes.

But as long as we don't question the source of the inexpensive clothing we wear, as long as we don't wonder about the children in those third world factories who make the inexpensive toys we buy for our own children, those fires will occur and young girls and boys will continue to die. They won't die because of natural catastrophes like monsoons and earthquakes; they will die because it has become our national habit to outsource, and these days we outsource our tragedies, too.

Katharine Weber is the author of the forthcoming novel "Triangle."