Taking classes in America

Someone told me in shocked awe today that the men building the roads for the commonwealth games in India earn just 120 rupees ($2.70) a day and the women earn only 110R and that some children have been seen to be working on the projects. Perhaps I've grown cold in the last few weeks, but, I could not bring myself to shock.

There are millions who live on less than a dollar a day. The system and the world we live in tacitly agrees to such wages, so why are we shocked? Why are we outraged? And why do we pretend to be disgusted? Because, the Commonwealth Games is an excuse to make us see what any small amount of research would tell us - that most of the world lives on nothing, so that us the rich 10 percent can thrive on everything our hearts desire. And where should we begin our battle for justice? The Commonwealth Games? A law in the North-East India that allows the military to kill with impunity? Should we begin with the worst of crimes against humanity? Or with what is happening close to us? Right now, I cannot bring myself to feel outrage about the wages of the workers on the Commonwealth Games... what astounds me is not that it happens, but that the woman who told me about it can be so shocked about it. In Myanmar $2 is the average wage for a day laborer - and yes, it's appalling, but it's not any worse than the majority of the world's lives all the time.

I don't want us to be shocked for a one off article about child labor, which we then forget in favor of other stories and articles. I want us to change the system so that it really IS a shock that children are working and exploitation happens.