The art of boycott

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Couldn't resist to post this article. Recently, I tried to boycott American products. But it seems like everything that has an American name either comes from Korea, China, Italy or Indonesia. Whereas a lot of European products are made by American owned companies.

 

I went to the annual peace march on palm sunday and one of the speakers there spoke on boycotting franchises and big corporations. Apparently, these corporations get 6% profit annualy, and if we boycot their products so that they lose their 6%, their prices will drop. It's not a matter of suppy and demand, more a matter of greedy business men.

 

I remember watching some right-winger on some random cable news show, and they were showing scenes from a French restaurant that was completely empty that might have to close, and they were commenting on how successful our boycott of everything French was, and how we were really making a statement.

Seeing this, I thought to myself, "Chirac surely might be an *******, but what the hell did the chefs, waiters, ect ever do to me? How the hell does ruining thier livelihood help us?".

The problem with boycotts on a global scale is that the average multi-national corporation has offices in 10 nations and shareholders in 100. Thier business is our business is the business of most of the rest of the developed world. Hurting them hurts us which hurts the rest of the world.

Even worse is the above example, where a purely American business suffers our wrath for something could not have possibly contributed to.

Now from what I've heard there are European counter-boycotts springing up, doing nothing but exacerbating the problem. We need to realize that any boycotts greater than a local scale will have bad ecomonic repercussions for everyone. Sure it feels great to say "We ain't drinking no French wine" as you pour it into a gutter, until you realize you just threw away several hundered dollars.

If you really want to boycott a deserving nation, how about China? They kill more of thier own citizens in a year than Saddam has done in his lifetime. They have conquered several of thier neighbors. They have a horrid human rights record. Of course this means you would have to throw out about all of your clothing and electronics, which depending on where you live may or may not be a good thing...

[Edit] When did the auto-censor come into play? I must have missed that update...

[Edit again] LOL, never noticed... just figured people were being more polite.

[ April 30, 2003, 06:25: Message edited by: Alex ]

 

Why would you wanna boycot American products ?

 

I boycott all movies and songs that have word "American" in the title. That has nothing to do with recent war as I've been like that for years. An example? Go rent the movie called "American Ninja". And check how many non-american rewards got movies with "American" in the title.
Linked to this is that I boycott all Scary Movie clones. I'm not the imbecile as authors of such things believe. And what a surprise, I couldn't find in any other country such movies. Yes, I do watch movies that are not from USA. What a blasphemy, right?

Please, don't get me wrong, this doesn't go only for "American" things. If your country produces crap**** that is an insult to human intelligence, I boycott that too.
And wherever Shralp was from, I couldn't boycott him, right?

 

To me, a boycott has to make sense. If a particular store has done something heinous, then boycotting that particular branch of the store is bound to get some attention. But screwing over a locally owned French restaurant? Chirac'll just laugh his bum off. I think boycott's have their place, but a person has to use his head -- "will what I'm doing get the message across to the people I want to get the message across to? Or will it unduly harm people with whom I have no problem?"

 

Extremist, does that mean you missed American Beauty? That movie really was quite good.

I must ask, why did the American government decide to boycott french products? They had an opinon that what they were doing was immoral and unethical? That has got to be the second most childish thing that the US have ever done. The first being getting payback over Pearl Harbour by killing millions of people with 2 bombs.

 

Actually it was more like SAVING millions of people with two bombs

 

Sorry, Morgoth. But I have to disagree again. At least I have partly do disagree.

This is off-topic, I know (I kidnapped my own thread !!!!!)

Other Reasoning for the use of the bombs.

1. Japanese. Americans were afraid of them. Okinawa was one of the bloodiest battles the Americans ever had expirienced. (But Japanese losses were even higher).. They estimated, that hundred of thousands American soldiers would die in mainland Japan. So, they preferred the Japanese to die. Alone.

2. A mighty signal, a Bomb-o-gram. Look what we got. Something that makes booooooooooooooom. China and Russia, did you get that ?

 

You must be joking. The war was practically over with Japan ready to discuss surrender with terms and Germany falling under the pressure of two fronts, the real reason of wipping these two cities out of the map was to show off their new toy nothing more nothing less.
And to get back to the topic to boycott something has meaning only when it concerns the products of a specific industry/ies. In this case it is childish behaviour and with no real meaning or at least profit for both sides.

 

When the A-bomb was dropped Germany had already surrendered but Japanese were ready to defend their islands to the last man. Americans dropped the A-bombs because they wanted to avoid the casualties of a possible invasion in Japan but the main reason was that they wanted to send a message to the Soviet leadership.

 

I don't understand Extremist, why would you Boycott everything with America in the title?

 

The American government isn't boycotting anything. It's that whole pesky free speech thing citizens have, love it when you agree with it and hate it when you don't.

I'm...frustrated at what I see as anti-Americanism on this site, even by moderators, and it may play into my decision of whether to get an Alien computer through this site or to go to Falcon. Perhaps that's stupid on my part, but it is often the only voice people have.

Also, I'd imagine some Americans probably wonder about who started what, I mean, the French have been on t.v. for years throwing brick through McDonalds windows, attacking Disney, etc.

I'm sure someone will respond that that is in some way qualitatively different but I'll just have to raise my eyebrow in advance and walk away wondering if it is really only different because you may agree with it in that case.

 

K, it's not my intention to pick up a fight. K, how would you define "anti-americanism", or "americaphobia" as I would call it. I just read you're article once again on the an-Americans-opinion-thread. It doesn't state a definiton. Now, I know the definiton of Anti-semitism. But what's you're definiton of Anti-americanism ?

(Btw, I started this thread, because I thaught the irony and difficulties of a boycott, would be a theme worth discussing. And of course, situation where boycott really works, like in the case of Mr. Boycott. I didn't want another "America-Bashing" thread.)

[ April 29, 2003, 19:51: Message edited by: Yago ]

 

I'm a mooch.

And it's kind of a tough similie to draw it to kids. In reality, there's no accurate similie. International affairs are just unique like that. There's no other kind of circumstances like them, either in scale or complexity.

The reality is, if this planet is ever invaded by aliens, and America needs some time to develop and research captured technology...we'll give them France's address.

 

You should boycott ID4, it was made by a German.

 

Just a side note on the whole a-bomb thing.The reason the second bomb was dropped is because even after the devastation of the first one,Japan was still not going to surrender!

They still did not want to surrender after the second bomb was dropped.The Emperor overuled his advisors and surrender later.

Now if the question is did we need to drop the bomb that seems like it needs a topic of its own.

[ April 30, 2003, 09:12: Message edited by: Dorion Blackstar ]