Which is more important to protect - labor or the environment? Is it better to be blue, in solidarity with workers, or green, in tune with the environment? 

 

Unfortunately, this is a question that socially conscious consumers often need to ask themselves. Why? Because an organic or locally-made product often comes with no legitimate guarantees for workers, and because a Union Made or Fair Trade product often comes with no specific environmental protections.

 

This is unfortunate because both people and the environment require equal protection. No company should rest on its laurels just because it offers a people-friendly OR eco-friendly product. After all, these two ethical criteria are ultimately interdependent.

 

A sweatshop free product that damages the environment also harms workers, whose own lives and whose children's lives will be among those affected by environmental catastrophes. Those catastrophes can be local - involving toxic agents in raw materials that workers unwittingly work with - and global - contributing to phenomena like global warming.

 

At the same time, an eco-friendly product with no protection for workers also harms the human environment. Put simply, it should matter if workers producing environmentally-friendly products are exploited in their workplace.

 

Socially-conscious consumerism need not be an either-or proposition. This is just common sense, and because it is common sense, manufacturers of eco-friendly products often casually declare themselves to be "sweatshop free," even while offering no democratic voice to their workers, and without facilitating the independent, transparent monitoring of working conditions. These suppliers are engaging in what might be called "bluewashing." They are trying to convince the consumer that all is well within the four walls of their companies - that happy workers are producing, without duress, for the environment.

 

Likewise, "worker friendly" manufacturers, who do offer bona fide guarantees of basic rights, sometimes enage in "greenwashing" tactics to mask the negative environmental impact of their manufacturing process.

 

One of our main goals at Ethix Merch is to promote ethical product lines that embody respect for both people and the environment. At the same time, however, the scope of these product lines is limited. They can't yet meet the full range of needs of the socially-conscious marketplace.

 

That's why we offer as much candid information as we can about a wide variety of products. Where applicable, our product pages point out the independent organizations who certify products as "Union Made," "Employee / Worker Owned," "USA Made," "Fair-Trade," "Organic," etc. To the extent that producers and consumers make use of these independent certifications, and rally around the certifying bodies with the most independence and transparency, we can move toward a business climate in which environmental and basic worker protections are finally the rule, rather than the exception.