Stop Walking on Little Children

Going green means many different things. It means using less energy, decreasing toxins, and of course, lowering your carbon footprint. In order to protect the future of our planet, we need to also preserve our greatest human resource, our children.

Have you ever taken the time to look at the kind of human footprint you make when you walk on the rugs in your home?

Did you know that hundreds of thousands of children throughout the far east have been forced into labor in rug factories for generations? Many of those children were found to be victims of debt bondage or forced labor, which are contemporary forms of slavery. If you have never wondered who slaved over the loom for fifteen hours a day to produce that brightly colored hand woven carpet you selected , now is the time to take note. Stop buying carpets for looks alone. The sad truth is that your decorative carpet may very well have been at the expense of an innocent child laborer.

But there is some good news.

There's a way to make sure that no child labor was used in the manufacture of your rug. Only purchase rugs that carry the RugMark Label. RugMark is a non-profit organization that was founded to rid the rug industry of child labor. Companies who join RugMark allow inspectors to come in and check to see who is manning the looms. If children are found there, they are rescued and sent to RugMark's own academies where they are given a chance at a new life. So far, RugMark has nearly 3,000 children.

On the RugMark web site, you can learn which companies carry the label, meet children whose lives have been saved by this incredible program, and see some lovely rugs that you can purchase without a heavy heart.

Going green is about having passion for compassion, in big and small ways every day.

Comments

[quindy]

The unfortunate truth is that most of the children in rug industry support whole families with their work. Without them families would not make it. Every time you look for a high number of knots per square inch know that only small child's hand can knot it.

[mlaiuppa]

I know who slaved over my rugs.

I did.

I make my own rugs out of left over yarn or cloth from recycling my clothes. Just takes a really big crochet hook. They launder and wear really well, I can make them to any size, shape or to match my decor. Right now I'm working on a rug to replace the old bathroom rug I bought when I first moved in. Rubber is gone from underneath and I'm tired of purchased rugs not lasting worth spit.

One by one, they'll all be replaced.

The kitchen rug is an Amish rug made from recycled fabric. It's coming to the end of it's life so I'll be making my own replacement there too.

[WASanford]

Wait, wait! Please tell us were we can learn to make our own rugs. You're on to something, share it.

[JohnBlack]

I think of the major countries the United States has about the cleanest air quality in the world and to burden the people of this country with a cap and trade bill that will cost each household up to 3000 dollars a year is outrageous.We need to talk to China and India and all the other countries that pollute the world much more than us.Raising the cost of living with every bill Obama wants will put everyone in poverty.

[mlaiuppa]

And the reason we have such clean air and water is that we outsource our pollution. Our manufactured goods that produce pollution are made in other countries that don't have our tough regulations because they can be made cheaper there.....because they don't have to meet strict U.S. pollution regulations. So in essence the U.S. is polluting other countries. We're using our neighbors as outhouses.

We have no business talking to China and India about their pollution as long as we're buying cheap goods at Walmart and Target made in India and China because we're too cheap to pay the price to produce them in our own country.

$3,000 is a pretty cheap price to pay for our hypocrisy.

[Sumocat]

Unless you're ranking on a per capita basis. See, compared to China and India, we have a lot of space and few people, so we can pollute more per capita and still have lower pollution levels when you measure by area. Factor out our vast expanses of unpopulated space and we have no claim to air quality superiority.