This makes me feel sad :(

[MonkeyPie]

This is kind of like the whole blood diamond issue...what can we do to make these people believe that letting their 4 year olds pan for gold is a bad idea?

 

[nclrgirl]

That is so sad.

The mercury thing is what really got me...and the fact that these children pretty much have to do this in order for them/their families to eat. We have so much to be thankful for...

 

[Cleo]

Thankyou for sharing this article - although it was very sad reading.

Child exploitation of any sort is very upsetting, and the mercury part was terrible to read.

It''s amazing that so much mention is made of blood diamonds, but so little about child labour in gold production.

x x x

 

[MonkeyPie]

Date: 8/12/2008 3:47:07 AM
Author: Cleo
Thankyou for sharing this article - although it was very sad reading.

Child exploitation of any sort is very upsetting, and the mercury part was terrible to read.

It''s amazing that so much mention is made of blood diamonds, but so little about child labour in gold production.

x x x

I wonder if it''s because they don''t have any proof of deaths or maiming like they do with blood diamonds? I dunno...I feel so bad for being mad about my small paychecks when at least if I have kids, they won''t have to work their whole lives to help me.

 

[Bliss]

Oh my... I just read the article, too.

More and more as I get older, I am starting to accept my own responsibility in the world -- both great and small. Every little action can have big consequences through a ripple effect and that could be positive or negative... As consumers, I guess we must be more careful in what we support. But it''s so difficult. How do we know what comes from where and by what means? Diamonds...gold... Gosh, this is very very sad.

But I think the world is changing and soon these practices hopefully will no longer be tolerated. But financially, so long as there is demand, there will always be people willing to work small children in deplorable conditions to meet it. If even Tiffany has gold from these mines, where can we find gold that has been mined responsibly???

 

[MonkeyPie]

Do we mine gold in the US? Or canada? At least then we know there would be an EFFORT to mine it responsibly.