From a western perspective, the notion of child labour sounds appalling. In the West, we coddle our children. We like to regard them as simpering, helpless little things that require the utmost care and diligence. In truth, they’re not nearly so fragile.

When we read about children being treated as small adults elsewhere in the world, it feels messed up and the hair on our neck bristles. We are Pavlov’s dogs, thoughtfully drooling. Our cultural admonishment over the condition of children is the point that is out of whack. We like to look to the east and howl disapproval.

Meanwhile, right here in North Carolina, you still find young people helping out around a family farm. Even Al Gore, in his Inconvenient Truth movie reminisces nostalgically about working on a tobacco farm. For Al, his story represents happy memories. Today, I reckon Al Gore’s mother and father would have a sit-down with child protective services to defend themselves about why their precious little boy was working in the tobacco fields.

The history of the west is filled with stories about working children, and children who left the household to work apprentice jobs at a very early age. It wasn’t until the industrial revolution that the idea of child labor came under scrutiny. The reason child labor came under scrutiny had very little to do with the age of the worker. The primary concern was working conditions where children were put in harm’s way. The age issue came into play because young children lack the fine motor skills of a mature individual, a deficiency that could result in serious injury.

It may sound like I’m making light of the child labor issues in China. I’m not. I’m well aware that children are *sold* to factories. I’m also well aware that children are *kidnapped* to work at factories. In both examples, the real issue isn’t age. It’s slavery. What I’m saying is the west needs to get off their self-righteous pedestals and quit howling about child labor like it’s a special area of concern. The issues of slavery/forced service and safe work conditions are far more compelling. If a worker loses an arm or dies from poisonous fumes, why does the age of the worker matter?

I’m inclined to agree with Friedrich Nietzsche’s way of looking at the world, that any worthwhile achievement in life comes from the experience and overcoming of hardship; that any existence that is too comfortable is worthless; that suffering and failure should be welcomed by anyone seeking happiness; that we feel pain because of the gap between who we are at the moment and who we could ideally be. And finally, in Nietzsche’s “Beyond Good and Evil” he provides a working definition, that good is “that which makes us stronger” and evil is “that which makes us weaker.”

Although Blecher’s Hegemony suggests that the workers in China lack the unity and organization to rise up against the state, I would argue that the working class in China already possesses the means to make themselves stronger, to improve their lot in life, to make themselves stronger. At the end of the day, the fight isn’t our fight. It is up to the downtrodden masses in China to face their own demons and find their own solutions. Even if we had the means to fix their lives right away, we would be wrong to do so. We don’t have the right to steal away the empowerment they will earn for themselves when they are victorious with their own struggles.

Sources:
http://library.thinkquest.org/03oct/01908/800/chinarussia.htm
http://www.china-labour.org.hk/en/node/15889