146 women workers died in the Triangle fire, some from asphyxiation and others after they jumped from the upper floors where they had been locked in.
Before the diet, I used to ignore the sources of my clothing. It was hard enough to find things that fit my plus-size, pear-shaped body and looked good on me, without checking the labels.
In the time that I’ve been on the diet, I’ve become more of an activist in my community (there’s a video on YouTube of me leading a rally supporting my state’s workers), and also done some thinking about what I want to buy when the diet is over.
I still go window-shopping online sometimes, and I’ve given myself permission to buy if something is exactly right, but it never is.
Today is the 100th anniversary of the horrific Triangle Shirtwaist Factory fire. An article from The Boston Globe describes how we haven’t stopped putting garment workers in danger — we’ve just sent our sweatshops offshore. Sociologist Robert Ross:
I’ve been studying Bangladeshi garment factory fires. There’s a horrific crescendo, years after year, of garment factory fires there, and they resemble the Triangle fire of 100 years ago in terrible ways. … That the Triangle fire is in the past is comforting because that was then, this is now. I wish that were true. More than 90 percent of our clothing is imported from a market that’s mostly unregulated. What happens in each country is that the employers and the governments are worried that if they increase their standards and conditions, another country will beat them to the market.
I would love to buy clothes that fit me, look good on me, and are made in this country by people who were getting paid properly to do so. I may have to compromise once the diet is over, but I’m going to start my shopping on sites like these:
Sweatshop-made clothes are a fact of life, unfortunately — try finding ethically made bras or underwear! — but whether they are in New York or Bangladesh, the people who make my clothing deserve my respect.
Footnote: OK, I have to be a little bit political here. On the day of the Triangle fire, a young woman named Frances Perkins was having tea nearby and arrived at the scene in time to see women jumping from 10th-story windows to their deaths, because their employers had locked them in to prevent unauthorized breaks. Moved by this, she went on to work for reform in working conditions and eventually became Secretary of Labor under Franklin D. Roosevelt, the first woman appointed to the U.S. Cabinet. Today, the governor of Maine, where her parents were born and where I now live, is trying to dishonor her work by taking her name off a conference room and removing a mural honoring her. If you agree with me that this is a lousy way to behave, call 207-287-3531 and make your feelings known.
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Women will spend more than eight years of their lives shopping, says a study.
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