Boycotting Chinese products

LETTER TO THE EDITOR

This letter appeared in the Advocate (Baton Rouge, Louisiana) on 9 April 1997.

This item may be cited as Maurice R. Franks, Letter to the Editor: Boycotting Chinese products, Baton Rouge Advocate, April 9, 1997, at 8B.

Dear Editor:

I write to call upon your readers to join me in the decision I have made to boycott all goods of Chinese manufacture and to urge others to do likewise.

I protested in these columns last June 6 while Congress was turning a blind eye to China's appalling human rights record: Intentional starvation of children in orphanages, forced abortions and sterilization for married women, rape of female political prisoners.

I could not at the time understand Congress' indifference to China's piracy of American literary and artistic property. I was puzzled when Congress rewarded China with most-favored-nation trade status after Deng Xiaoping's son-in-law smuggled 2,000 AK-47 machine guns into the United States, earmarked to enable street gangs the better to menace law-abiding Americans.

But last June I had no idea the reason for Congress' blind eye was its own outstretched hand, with money-laden arms smugglers being welcomed at the White House alongside drug dealers.

The failure of our elected representatives to bring their colleagues and the president to justice for this treason has caused me to take the decision into my own hands to boycott all goods made or assembled in China. I hope hundreds of thousands of other Americans will do likewise.

This means not only refusing to buy goods made by slave labor and child labor, but also complaining to store managers when Chinese goods are offered for sale and just walking out when no alternatives are offered made in America or in other countries that are both friendly and free.

This may mean the inconvenience of going to a second or third store to buy those tennis shoes. Spread the word, and consider this minor inconvenience as the least we can do for our country!

Maurice R. Franks
2 Swan St.
Baton Rouge

Click here to return to Maurice Franks's Writings