A lot of my posts here pertain to corporate responsibility– most specifically and most often, with the halting attempts of America’s largest retailer to fully grasp and embrace the meaning of that term, especially as it pertains to its employees, here in Missouri and around the country.
This is because of my association with Wake-Up Wal-Mart and my dedication to the group’s agenda.
Generally in this pursuit, I oscillate between a tone of detached snark and one of outraged derision toward the company, so I’ve been fairly described as having “an axe to grind.”
But I’ve been speechless since Black Friday. No snark, and it’s hard to even muster outrage. There was a great thread on Daily Kos on the events of that day, and since that point we’ve learned that the name of the brave deceased worker is Jdimytai Damour.
It’s been a week, and I still don’t know what to say, but Meghan Scott of Wake-Up Wal-Mart has issued the following statement:
“While this is not the time for pointing fingers, it is critical that we examine what caused this tragedy, and how we prevent more families from suffering such a loss. It appears that Mr. Damour’s senseless death resulted from Wal-Mart’s negligence and need for huge sales on Black Friday.
“The retail giant had a responsibility to ensure its workers were safe, but instead, Wal-Mart once again placed profit ahead of people. This is an incredibly sad and extreme example of Wal-Mart’s ongoing mistreatment of the people who work in the stores. From poverty-level wages to healthcare that is priced out of reach, to 1.6 million women forced to sue for equal pay, America’s largest private employer continues to fail its workers at the holidays and throughout the year. Wal-Mart’s low prices should not come at such a high cost to the people who work in the stores. Last Friday, Mr. Damour paid the ultimate price.”
What’s going on in America?
Please share your thoughts in the comment thread.
and I never shop there. But I don’t really see how they are responsible for the trampling.
When you consider the myriad bailouts to the investor class and yet still no health care, job constitution is degrading, economy tanking, foreclosures, etc.
What’s going on is the fight for the soul of America, is it too late?
Has the enlightened and humanist philosophy of the globe’s oldest democratic republic been irreparably distorted; forever perverted?
Have our vaunted principles and values for workers and even our bill of rights essentially been sold to the highest corporate bidder?
David Sirota presented a good Lincoln quote on the bailout:
I hope we can still work to get things turned around. Many of our greatest most respected political leaders have taken up this task — T. Roosevelt in taking on the robber barons and monopoly busting, Jackson the founder of the modern Democratic Party, taking on Biddle’s central bank which of course soon eventually morphed into our current Fed mess.
We’ve been living in the sunshine and summer of seemingly Cornucopian and endless consumption, and to paraphrase Paine, tyranny, like hell, is not easily conquered; indeed, these are the times that will try the soul of America.