5 ms·
I'd like to thank the shoe company Wolverine for dumping so much of an untested chemical into the watershed that my town had to push for someone to figure out i
by q_andrew 3y ago
I'd like to thank the shoe company Wolverine for dumping so much of an untested chemical into the watershed that my town had to push for someone to figure out if it was actually bad for humans. Grand Rapids seems to be a magnet for new tap water inventions, we were also one of the first to put fluoride in our drinking supply.
- hammock 3y ago[flagged]
- Mistletoe 3y ago[flagged]
- mlyle 3y agoNo one wants toxic chemicals dumped on anyone. But there's an obvious selfish interest if making industry clean is hard, to at least have it far away from me.
- jdiff 3y agoIf it can be someone else, it can just as easily be you. Best to fight for each other as if its ourselves, or else it might be next time.
- Retric 3y agoExcept not everyone is going to make the same tradeoffs here. People in a poor country may rationally prefer more pollution if it means faster economic growth. I don’t mean this as a moral argument that they don’t deserve clean air, just that tradeoffs exist. Health isn’t always the top priority; many top athletes for example are very open about the long term negative consequences of reaching the absolute limits of human performance. The larger issue is the people impacted don’t necessarily get to make this choice themselves.
- CapstanRoller 3y ago>People in a poor country may rationally prefer more pollution if it means faster economic growth. How is it "rational" if that choice is figuratively (and sometimes literally) made at gunpoint? There's a reason every legal system considers contracts signed under duress to be null and void.
- mlyle 3y agoDuress isn't defined as "not having a lot of other great options".
- CapstanRoller 3y ago>great options For the poor globally disadvantaged people we're talking about, the options are "work" and "die". If the "work" option also carries "allow your home to be polluted with deadly chemicals", then the "die" option also gets baked in. Can you please explain how that's not a textbook example of duress?
- mlyle 3y ago> Can you please explain how that's not a textbook example of duress? Sure. Duress requires an unlawful threat. Signing a contract to have a surgeon operate on you, when you will die if you don't get the operation, is not duress and the contract is enforceable. Not that I really buy this: > For the poor globally disadvantaged people we're talking about, the options are "work" and "die". The options are more like "continue subsistence farming with risk of death, or work in factory under marginally better conditions with lower risk of death".
- CapstanRoller 3y ago>Duress requires an unlawful threat. You can use this argument to defend slavery or any manner of horrible things because it was lawful at some point (and still is, in many places). Is it really a good idea to define duress so narrowly? >continue subsistence farming with risk of death At what point does causing an "increasing risk of death" start to equate with murder or manslaughter? Being shot at increases the risk of death sharply. What about being exposed to industrial effluent without consent?
- digging 3y agoI disagree, the effects tend to be concentrated on the poorest communities and should instead be spread out more. I am obviously not excited about some nasty factory moving close to me, but my environment is relatively healthy and I could, frankly, deal with it better.
- hammock 3y ago[flagged]
- guardiangod 3y agoWait till you find out where most of US' oil come from.
- deleted 3y ago[deleted]
- febusravenga 3y agoThis is unconscious/implicit logic of economies that run developed countries. Most of unpleasant aspects of our life are outsourced/dumped to some remote location. So it's statement of fact, not someone's choice or position.
- organsnyder 3y agoI’d rather support companies that don’t dump toxic waste in anyone’s backyard.
- badpun 3y agoWhere would they dump them then?
- organsnyder 3y agoIf there is hazardous waste, it shouldn't be dumped anywhere. It should be processed so that it is no longer hazardous, or contained in a way that actually mitigates potential harm. If that's possible, the process that generates the hazardous waste shouldn't be used.
- CapstanRoller 3y agoPlease explain to us how you rank the value of life of various foreigners. It would be very illuminating.
- ejb999 3y agowhat an ignorant comment.
- organsnyder 3y agoI refuse to buy Wolverine shoes, even though I’m in Grand Rapids and they’re a local company.