After Georgia’s new immigration law chased away many of its farm laborers, the state launched a dubious plan to fill the void with probationers, who lack the experience needed to do harvesting work, especially in the current heat wave. The program drew limited participants.
It’s just a bump in the road toward “normalizing labor exploitation,” however, as the article below argues. Georgia’s labor policymakers can look to Wisconsin, where Gov. Scott Walker’s recent trashing of collective-bargaining rights for union workers could give previously compensated work to prisoners in exchange for reduced sentences, rather than pay. —ARK
Black Agenda Report:
In the state of Georgia, a recently enacted law targeting undocumented workers was deemed insufficiently evil and needed the addition of greater exploitation of people of color. The new legislation allows police to profile brown skinned people and also makes it illegal for the undocumented to work, to be housed, or even to be transported. But as in the rest of the country, Georgia’s agricultural work force is comprised almost completely of undocumented migrant workers. Having chased these people away, the state was at a loss as to how to keep its farms afloat after their labor force fled.
The solution to the conundrum was simple but leads to a slippery slope which invites further abuse in an already inherently abusive situation. The state offered to pay probationers to do the farm work instead. The experiment drew a few desperate people, who did not have the wherewithal, knowledge or training needed to harvest crops in the midst of a heat wave.
The plan may have initially failed, but the setback is surely only temporary and the trend towards normalizing labor exploitation is being perfected and honed to make it more successful in many parts of the country. In Racine county, Wisconsin, the evisceration of public employee union rights has spawned an effort to give jobs that were once reserved for union employees to prisoners instead. These prisoners would not be paid with money, they would only earn the right to reduce their sentences. The public union collective bargaining contracts that are now null and void had barred the state from this practice. The right wing have figured out how to kill two birds with one stone. In one fell swoop, public unions were decimated and prisoners will be subject to greater exploitation.
We are launching a major overhaul of our comments section.
In addition to more robust spam filtering and moderation, new features include the ability to rate other comments, sort how they are displayed and respond directly via e-mail or in a thread.
Unfortunately, commenters will lose their existing Truthdig identities. It's a pain, we know, but on the plus side you will now be able to log in with a plethora of options, including Google, Twitter, Facebook and Disqus accounts.
Before launching this system we spent months in discussion with our top commenters. We listened to the feedback and we hope you like what we've come up with.
Please direct any problems or concerns to us via our contact page.
“Normalizing” exploitation is in a sense a hopeful phrase. It means exploitation is not normal, by nature. it must be “made” normal deliberately (by someone, some people)—or made to seem normal.
This process requires some kind of “force” exerted by some people on others..
The element of “choice” enters into such a process: Someone chooses to do the forcing; someone else chooses to tolerate being forced (usually because no alternative is evident).
People who exert force on others usually become tyrants in the sense of allowing themselves to pressure others over time. They lose whatever self-discipline they may once have had.
People who choose to be forced usually find themselves abused. They lose whatever freedom thay may once have had. After a “sufficient” amount of abuse, they will turn and exert force against the forcer.
Physical force eventually leads to counter-force, up to and including murder and war. Spiritual force leads to less bloody conclusions.
Physical force seems easy at first, but becomes more and more difficult. Spiritual force seems hard at first but becomes less difficult with practice.
How am I to convince my daughter that she still lives in the greatest country on
earth? The same way Dolly Madison sells packaged death? just a spoonful of
sugar? Just another Faux News lie.
God, it has all gone completely and irrevocably full blown bat-shit nutso.
Nothing new here. It’s been a long-standing practice, especially in the South, for sheriffs to rent-out convict labor to supplement their (the sheriff’s) income. Now the sheriffs are getting pushed aside by a national political party and grafters much higher up the food chain, governors, etc.
When they start using cadres of convicted sex offenders/prisoners to do the grunt work on pig farms, and sheep and cattle ranches, it will be a great incentive for everyone to cut down on their intake of red meat. Especially lamb and veal.
In an economic system whose sole aim is profits at any price, exploitation is a given—exploitation of human beings as a “resource” no different from iron or oil. And as time passes, the exploitaton is made ever more acceptable by manipulations of power as it moves against the people. Democratic governments were created and sustained mainly as an alternative to out-of-ocntrol exploitation.
The strength of democracy is also its weakness in that it depends upon ordinary people to keep the reins of power in their own hands and not release that power to any other entity—church or state—both of which have proven historically to be uninterested in the will of the people, both of which see people as utilities, followers, submitters.
To the degree that people give up their rights to rule themselves, they will inevitably be ruled over by the power structures of either church or state or both. Simple—yet the most complicated problem we face today and always. Democracy? Use it or lose it, as they say.
Truthdiggers of the Week: 400,000 Canadians Launching the ‘Maple Spring’
Email
Print
Share
Digg
Facebook
TwitThis
StumbleUpon
Reddit
YahooBuzz
Email
BlinkList
del.icio.us
Fark
Furl
Google
LinkedIn
Mixx
MyShare
NewsVine
Propeller
SphereIt
Technorati
YahooMyWeb
Newsletter 
Become a Fan
Follow Us
Subscribe
By gerard, July 26, 2011 at 1:28 pm Link to this comment
“Normalizing” exploitation is in a sense a hopeful phrase. It means exploitation is not normal, by nature. it must be “made” normal deliberately (by someone, some people)—or made to seem normal.
This process requires some kind of “force” exerted by some people on others..
The element of “choice” enters into such a process: Someone chooses to do the forcing; someone else chooses to tolerate being forced (usually because no alternative is evident).
People who exert force on others usually become tyrants in the sense of allowing themselves to pressure others over time. They lose whatever self-discipline they may once have had.
People who choose to be forced usually find themselves abused. They lose whatever freedom thay may once have had. After a “sufficient” amount of abuse, they will turn and exert force against the forcer.
Physical force eventually leads to counter-force, up to and including murder and war. Spiritual force leads to less bloody conclusions.
Physical force seems easy at first, but becomes more and more difficult. Spiritual force seems hard at first but becomes less difficult with practice.
All generalities are ........ generalities.
Report thisBy TLeeJr, July 25, 2011 at 9:49 pm Link to this comment
How am I to convince my daughter that she still lives in the greatest country on
Report thisearth? The same way Dolly Madison sells packaged death? just a spoonful of
sugar? Just another Faux News lie.
God, it has all gone completely and irrevocably full blown bat-shit nutso.
By TDoff, July 25, 2011 at 5:00 pm Link to this comment
Nothing new here. It’s been a long-standing practice, especially in the South, for sheriffs to rent-out convict labor to supplement their (the sheriff’s) income. Now the sheriffs are getting pushed aside by a national political party and grafters much higher up the food chain, governors, etc.
Report thisBy TDoff, July 25, 2011 at 4:44 pm Link to this comment
When they start using cadres of convicted sex offenders/prisoners to do the grunt work on pig farms, and sheep and cattle ranches, it will be a great incentive for everyone to cut down on their intake of red meat. Especially lamb and veal.
Report thisBy FRTothus, July 25, 2011 at 3:31 pm Link to this comment
Prison scab labor, state supported. Isn’t that what
Report thisfascists do?
By kerryrose, July 25, 2011 at 2:54 pm Link to this comment
Exploitation is a given in a Capitalist system. It is the hub that spins the spokes.
The applicable word for this is ‘Slavery.’
Report thisBy gerard, July 25, 2011 at 2:16 pm Link to this comment
In an economic system whose sole aim is profits at any price, exploitation is a given—exploitation of human beings as a “resource” no different from iron or oil. And as time passes, the exploitaton is made ever more acceptable by manipulations of power as it moves against the people. Democratic governments were created and sustained mainly as an alternative to out-of-ocntrol exploitation.
The strength of democracy is also its weakness in that it depends upon ordinary people to keep the reins of power in their own hands and not release that power to any other entity—church or state—both of which have proven historically to be uninterested in the will of the people, both of which see people as utilities, followers, submitters.
To the degree that people give up their rights to rule themselves, they will inevitably be ruled over by the power structures of either church or state or both. Simple—yet the most complicated problem we face today and always. Democracy? Use it or lose it, as they say.
Report thisBy culheath, July 25, 2011 at 11:16 am Link to this comment
Just more Jim Crow
Report thisBy EmileZ, July 25, 2011 at 10:01 am Link to this comment
Thanks for posting this article. We are not who most of us want to believe ourselves to be.
Thanks again.
Report thisBy California Ray, July 25, 2011 at 9:41 am Link to this comment
The Dixie apple doesn’t fall far from the plantation tree.
Report this