41–50 of 343 posts
See also the Banana Massacre instigated by the United Fruit Company against plantation workers making outrageous demands like limiting the work week to 6 days. 100 years later, that company operates under the name Chiquita. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Banana_Massacre
Documented in the famous Neruda poem
The banana republic jokes just write themselves!
They have been fined $38m for killing 8 people, which amounts to a tad over 1% of their 2023 revenue. I'm very happy that an example is being made of them to warn other corporations that committing murder to protect your profits may cause a slight dip in your next earnings report.
Of course it’s not nearly as much as it should be, but it is certainly a step in the right direction.
Imagine, by contrast, the impact that executing one Chiquita executive would have.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Minor_Cooper_Keith
https://westisliphistoricalsociety.org/index.php/archives/ma...
[1] https://www.law.cornell.edu/wex/alien_tort_statute
[2] https://www.courtlistener.com/docket/4232180/in-re-chiquita-...
Earlier quoted context omitted.
Of course it’s not nearly as much as it should be, but it is certainly a step in the right direction.
Incrementalism normalizes dystopia, in my view; this becomes just another contingency that can be budgeted for. Imagine, by contrast, the impact that executing one Chiquita executive would have.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/sf/investigative/2013/12/21/co...
I'm curious about why nobody from Chiquita went to prison for financing a terrorist group. Random Afghans and Iraqis were kidnapped for Guantanamo or outright murdered for less.
This was a civil case, seeking damages for actions that occurred over 2 decades ago, it's unlikely anyone currently with the company was sufficiently high ranking then to be considered personally responsible. For the 2007 criminal case, the company came to the department of justice and disclosed the payments, saying they had been made under threat of violence. Specifically the AUC was threatening physical harm to emp…
It’s also strongly analogous to an issue faced in tech: whether to pay the demands or ransomware gangs.
If the ransomeware gang has ties to terrorism, it’s a crime to pay the ransom.
My family home is built on the former estate of Minor Cooper Keith, a founder and former VP of United Fruit, who did many similar horrible things to people in Central and South America. I learned this while researching the name of the waterway behind our house, called "Keith Canal". You can see the history of the development in historic maps from 1829 thru 1976. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Minor_Cooper_Keith https:…
Through at least two administrations, Republican and Democrat, Bush and Obama, the U.S. has funded anti-leftist militarism in Colombia, to the military and to paramilitary groups like AUC. It's not just a fruit company and it's not just a relic from the past. http://www.washingtonpost.com/sf/investigative/2013/12/21/co...