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Tech giants sued over deaths of children who mine cobalt

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Re: Tech giants sued over deaths of children who mine cobalt

#231

Post by neonate »

steve-benjamins wrote: post #12
SQueeeeeL wrote: post #6

I feel like this is essentially trying to sue capitalism. Of course most raw materials people get is essentially sourced from exploitation. That's just the result of buying for the cheapest cost. People don't like seeing how the sausage gets made, like the John Oliver segment on children making clothes, if they shut this down it will just pop up again with another company...

Your argument is exactly what industrialists said about child labour in Britain in the early industrial revolution.

This would be less cheap and more convincing if you gave a specific example or two of how it is exactly what they said.

Re: Tech giants sued over deaths of children who mine cobalt

#232

Post by philipkglass »

dv_dt wrote: post #220
dehrmann wrote: post #160

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> The mineral supply chain in that part of the world is ridiculously hard to track Commodities, in general. They're fungible, so cobalt from one supplier looks like cobalt from another supplier.

Commodities are more trackable with detailed analysis then anyone might casually think. e.g. oil is a commodity but the signature of oil from certain regions is pretty visible by chemists, and one can force oil supply from trade restricted sources to at least try to mask the signature by mixing with other sources. Not perfect but you can raise the difficulty bar on commodity sourcing.

Cobalt has only one naturally occurring isotope, so I don't think you can use any tricks from chemistry or physics to track it back to the source after it has been separated from ore. Instead you need tamper-resistant supply chain documentation all the way back to the actual mine.

Re: Tech giants sued over deaths of children who mine cobalt

#233

Post by anodyne33 »

mcv wrote: post #123
solidasparagus wrote: post #57

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't think this makes much sense. The mineral supply chain in that part of the world is ridiculously hard to track. Even when you stop buying directly from the DRC, the minerals flow over the borders (see how Rwandan coltan exports jumped when people stopped buying DRC 'conflict' coltan). That part of the DRC is basically beyond the reach of the Congolese government and the bordering countries have been waging pro…

It being hard to track is no excuse. We shouldn't be buying products from such abusive practices. We banned slavery, child labour and other abusive practices in our own countries, but by allowing the imports of such products from other countries, we're still indirectly making use of slavery and child labour. Recently I heard that every person in a wealthy country effectively makes use of two slaves this way. So these…

> It being hard to track is no excuse.

Indeed. I have a good buddy who is inside council for a really visible guitar company. One of his main functions is tracking the provenance of any endangered hardwoods that go through the factory. From what I've been told there's a pretty big paper trail to document the date and place where "x" piece of Brazilian Rosewood or Ebony was harvested, but the penalty if they were to be caught building guitars from restricted or endangered wood is steep.

Maybe it wouldn't do much to dissuade the primary purchasers of cobalt, but a federal regulation popping them for a few million bucks for buying what essentially amounts to "blood diamonds" certainly wouldn't hurt the cause.

Re: Tech giants sued over deaths of children who mine cobalt

#234

Post by yters »

monknomo wrote: post #191
yters wrote: post #139

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The problem with colonialism is exploitation of the people, not the setting up of a just government. I'm in favor of Western countries coming in and setting up a just government, even if there is a profit motive involved. It at least is much better than a constant war torn and corrupt environment.

Where would the justice derive from in a government that was set up for the purposes of extracting resources in one area and transferring the resulting resources and wealth to a different area?

Justice as in peace is brought to the local population and they are kept from murdering and stealing from each other. Whether they get to keep their local resources or not I think is a secondary concern to whether they have a peaceful society.

Re: Tech giants sued over deaths of children who mine cobalt

#235

Post by yters »

bluGill wrote: post #182
yters wrote: post #159

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How does 'continue buying unethically sourced cobalt' improve the state of things? Ideally, it is a dual solution of don't buy the unethical kind, and set up an alternate ethical supply chain to the same region so workers can switch to a better work place. But, if the latter is not possible, one can at least help decrease the market for unethical cobalt by ceasing purchase. Plus, it is not a matter of seeming morally…

In what situation? In the case of Cobalt it probably doesn't. In the case of rubber the big companies do provide better jobs for the families they employ than anything else, ensure the family gets modern medical care (as opposed to "witch doctor" care anyone not working for them gets), and the children do go to school and so have the ability to get a better job latter. The companies looks the other way in harvest sea…

Yes, there is no inherent problem with child labor, especially if parents are involved and the companies are committed to ethical treatment of their workers. Many children today perform chores around the house, and in more agriculture societies help on the farm or in the family shop.

Re: Tech giants sued over deaths of children who mine cobalt

#236

Post by Ericson2314 »

Nasrudith wrote: post #210
DSingularity wrote: post #47

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Raise public awareness? I think they are seeking remedy. Sad that the courts are so slanted in the favor of corporate interests. Why do these cases get dismissed?

Because they are seeking remedy from the wrong parties in a fungible market without proof of more direct involvement. It being in "corporate interest" doesn't mean it is wrong. To be frank they are acting a lot like extortionists.

The legal system needs to catch up with the laundering effects of global and fungible markets. There are "know your customer" rules for other things. Eventually we need to get serious about goods' provenance.

Re: Tech giants sued over deaths of children who mine cobalt

#237

Post by Robotbeat »

dmix wrote: post #230
Robotbeat wrote: post #96

I found this is very insightful thread on this lawsuit and context behind it: https://mobile.twitter.com/enn_nafnlaus/status/1206896495993... 0) lawyers suing have questionable history BUT 1) Child labor in Africa is a serious problem that needs to be addressed, and just about anything sourced from Africa will have this problem. 2) The Kamoto mine in question is a copper mine. Cobalt is a secondary product. (One coul…

The fact they'd even need to have to try to get the Congolese army to enforce what happens on their own mine property says a lot about the problem. It's largely just a security problem. But I'm sure the activists don't want violent military guys pushing off the pirate mines. The other question is the pipelines that purchase from the 'artisanal' mines. Those people could be targeted and better regulated. But as we've…

I think stable government and general development (education, economic) is really the ultimate solution to this and everything else will either be largely ineffective or have significant downsides.

There needs to be some international/African Union pressure to stop some of the proxy warfare going on in central Africa and some way to ensure stability in Congo.

Re: Tech giants sued over deaths of children who mine cobalt

#238

Post by celticmusic »

bryan_w wrote: post #162
celticmusic wrote: post #131

Earlier quoted context omitted.

seriously. How the fuck are people's moral compass so off? I understand reality is reality, but there are some things that should not be, and for slightly cheaper electronics of all things? fuck that.

I mean, you typed that message using something that probably has cobalt inside of it or used cobalt in it's manufacturing. So... why is your moral compass so off?

oh please, I reject that argument outright.

This is about stopping the exploitation of children. While you're trying to squabble over whether or not some random internet person is using a keyboard with cobalt in it, children are being forced down into these mines and risking their lives.

Get your priorities straight.

Re: Tech giants sued over deaths of children who mine cobalt

#239

Post by celticmusic »

pgcj_poster wrote: post #193
netcan wrote: post #165

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What do you consider grandstanding?

"Grandstanding" is when someone talks about problems that don't affect me. For instance, if someone says that we should prevent child slavery, that's grandstanding because I'm not a slave. On the other hand, if someone says that whiteboard interviews for engineers are unfair, that's not grandstanding because I'm an engineer. Also, if I agree with something, then it's free speech and therefore not grandstanding.

grandstanding is when you say or do something for no other purpose than how it looks to others.

Re: Tech giants sued over deaths of children who mine cobalt

#240

Post by shantly »

solidasparagus wrote: post #217
shantly wrote: post #204

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Efforts , but have companies been made to pay a cost for failing to source "ethically", even when they say "well gee we tried and it's just really hard"? Things tend to get more serious when money is on the line, rather than just PR. Doing it right would clearly take verification, not just documentation, which means requiring access for outside inspectors.

You can't prove that a certain mineral came from an unethical production location - that's the core problem I believe. How would you punish a company for using conflict minerals if no one can figure out if given minerals are conflict minerals?

Force them to figure it out or start impounding goods? Impound their goods if you can't, for any reason, gain access to inspect any part of their declared supply chain for occasional surprise inspections to verify it is as they say it is, until such time as they switch to recently-inspected suppliers or gain you access?

I don't really get how this is much harder or less practical for the state or states implementing the law than most laws governing corporate behavior, and particularly laws governing imports. Yes a law would have to be drafted, passed, and enforced. I don't think any part of that's particularly less reasonable or more unlikely than in the case of any similar law.

In short, you punish companies for either using conflict minerals or if you're unable to determine to a reasonable level of satisfaction that they are not using conflict minerals. Likely they'll want to make sure you can determine such, and will pressure their suppliers to make it happen, in the usual ways markets do things (suppliers that make it easy and do it right and develop a reputation for having few fine-inducing screw-ups can charge more, those that fail miserably at it may just go out of business and be replaced by others who aren't terrible at their job, pretty soon everything's a little more expensive but we have a decent idea of what comes from where)

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