During our discussion on child labor I brought up many major points. One of those points was how my outlook was on child labor before I researched the topic. In the discussion I said how I thought that child labor wasn't really existing anymore. I just figured it was a thing of the past. As I began to research I found out that it is not common but still very popular in today's world. Another point I brought up was that I didn't think child labor happened in America, and as I was researching I found out that it did happen in many agricultural fields. In these fields the children were being exposed to pesticides which would then make their skin burn after being exposed to the sun for long hours. When the question was asked would you buy products if you knew they were produced by child labor was asked I answered, that i know finding products without child labor will be hard, but I am going to give it my best effort. I just don't see how any product could be worth more than the lives of children. I don't want to be apart of nor support the act of child labor.
While listening to others in the group I was forced to really think about some things. Someone brought up the question, if your family was really poor and needed the money would you volunteer yourself for child labor. This made me really think because I know my family would not want me putting myself in danger for them, but I don't think it would be much of a decision if my family needed the money I absolutely would volunteer myself. Someone also brought up a good point and said that children should have a say in child labor. Many of those rely on child labor to get money and food on the table, so maybe they want it to continue and then their are others who are being harmed and want it to stop but can not say anything because they are just children. I thought this was a good point because the adults aren't the ones having to do the labor so they should let the kids decide if it is something they want to continue. Lastly, I was just shocked when someone started talking about how that in many part of the west children are forced to go under water and shake up the reefs and scare the fish out with the potential of getting eaten by sharks, bitten by poisonous snakes or barracuda, or dying because of the low water temperatures or lack of oxygen to the brian. This made me really put into view how awful child labor really is. I could just think about how terrified those children were each time they entered the water.
Overall I think my group did a really good job. Everyone was staying engaged in the conversation and bringing up many different points of views for each topic. I also think that we were very well prepared for the discussion by having to read the articles and having summaries on each one. I also really liked that we were able to have time to ask our own questions because it brought up a lot of debate. For example the question if you would buy products if you knew they were produced by child labor. Half of the group said they would while the other group said they wouldn't. Hearing everyones opinions really made you think and reconsider the question. One thing I wish that happened was that the discussion get more into depth. It was mostly people giving points, but I wanted to really get into the conversation and I don't think we quit did that I think we were getting there. I also wish we had more time to discuss each topic. It would have given us more time to get into depth. Lastly I feel as though if we had more people in each group it would have made the conversations more interesting because there would be more opinions.
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