It's not just conflict diamonds. Or plastic surgery deaths. Or the monumental waste of destination weddings.
In Kenya and Colombia, two of the world's largest flower-exporting countries, the mostly female flower industry workers face criminally long hours, repetitive stress injuries, mandatory pregnancy tests and other forms of blatant gender discrimination, and pesticide-related illnesses, all so the inarticulate global elite can reinforce heteronormativity and subjugate their partners and crushes (see Derrida on the gift economy) by saying it with flowers.
Click here for the campaign to stop Dole Fresh Flowers from crushing unions formed by their workers at their Flores la Fragrancia, who formed the Untrafragrancia union in response to repeated labor violations and the horrible working conditions sketched above.
Here's another petition in support of Colombian flower workers and their right to organize.
Also, has Obama begun to dissent from the neoliberal agenda? In a recent speech in Wisconsin, he questioned the benefits of "trade deals like NAFTA," at least for U.S. workers. So now will he rethink stances like his recent support of the Peru Free Trade Agreement? Will he abandon the creepy patriotic rhetoric and expand his framework to include a conception of global labor rights? Like the plaintive signholder braving the pouring rain in Central Square all day Super Tuesday, "I HOPE[,] OBAMA."
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