All about "Welcome to the dark side..."

If you talk with me for more than 5 minutes, you'll quickly become aware of my passion and drive for social justice. But I haven't always been this concerned about how my choices impact others. There are blog posts to come about my journey to this passion, but that is for another day. Today, I wanted to give a little background into the series I've titled "Welcome to the dark side..."


It's easy to be caught up in our own little bubble of life. All too easy. It's so simple to ignore the world around us. It doesn't take much effort to forget about the global impact our choices as consumers make. We want what's easy, convenient, and comes at the cheapest price. After all, in this economy, we need to be frugal with our hard earned money that never seems to be quite enough.

I am eternally grateful to the amazing people who opened my eyes to the world around me, and helped me to bring my life into focus. With knowledge comes responsibility. This is one of my favorite and most challenging phrases. What good is knowledge without action? We've all heard it said that knowledge is power, but I wholeheartedly disagree with that. Knowledge that leads to action is power.

You know what else is power? For those of us living in Western societies, the way we spend our money is power. Don't agree? Think about it. What is the best way to send a company a message? Simply don't buy from them.

So these next few weeks or months or however long I feel compelled to keep up with this series, I am going to be opening your eyes to areas that I, too, was once completely oblivious to. And it's not going to be pretty. Trust me. A lot of the things that I'm going to be talking about are dark. Things we would rather not think about. Things that we want to keep out of our bubbles. Hence the title "Welcome to the Dark Side."

The truth is, this world is a scary place. It's a place where bad people do bad things. It's a place of exploitation, of dishonesty, of selfishness. But we can be a part of something better. We can be a part of the light. There's a Chinese Proverb that says "Better to light a candle than to curse the darkness." And that is my desire. That we will all light candles in the darkness of exploitation that is rampant in this world.

Let me leave you with one more thought. A lot, if not all, of what I'm going to be sharing has to do with slave labor. And the only way to the light the candle in the darkness is for us to change. Which means more thought going into our choices, and it means more money being spent on products that result in fair wages being paid. You see, the products we buy cheaply, we get most of the time because of slavery. It costs more to actually pay workers a fair wage. And it's going to be hard for us to change our ways. Especially when it comes to shelling out more money for similar products that we're used to getting so cheaply.

And I totally understand. I struggled (and still struggle) with the same thoughts. But think about your own kids. Your grandkids. For me, it's my nieces and nephews (I will never understand why there isn't a collective word like "siblings" for nieces and nephews. Seriously.) Picture them in your mind right now. Now picture them working as forced child laborers. And you are too poor to do anything about it. Think about the torn and dirty clothes that they are wearing, the lack of shoes on their feet. The dangerous work environment they are forced to endure. Wouldn't you pray, earnestly, to whatever god you believe in for someone to help you?

We can be that help. We can be that shining light in the darkness. It only takes 1 candle to produce light in a dark room. And the more you add, the less darkness there is. Our candles can be as simple as refusing to buy from products notoriously derived from slave labor until the executives are forced to change their ways.

Let's use our spending power to stop slave labor, instead of perpetuating it. Are you ready to light your candle with me?

-A.A.

If you missed the first post in this series, check it out: Welcome to the Dark Side of Chocolate. Halloween is right around the corner. Start shining your light now. Purchase your Halloween candy from fairly traded companies!