Perry, Georgia—For 10 years Dorothy McKenzie has worked in poultry processing factories in the South. She knows why unions are crucial in the industry. Two years ago she was working as many as 12 hours a day hanging 40 chickens a minute on the dissasembly line at a plant owned by Cagle’s Inc. Workers could go to the bathroom just… return to article
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Reader Comments (3)Page 1 of 1 pagesI know how hard this is. I tried hard in the plant I worked at trying to correct OSHA violations. I was fired and made an example of to shut everyone else up. I have seen Tyson do the same thing with regard to the unions - threatening to fire everybody and close the plant. That is always the first tactic they use, and the most effective, because these people are desperate to keep their jobs in order to survive. The greed of these corporations is criminal for what it does to the people.
You want to read more of my story of what I went through at the plant I worked at, it is all online at http://cyberactivist.blogspot.com/
Posted by Virgil Butler on Jan 30, 2004 at 2:10 PM the real crimes here are being committed against Poultry - not Poultry workers.
Human/animall liberation, not unionization!
Posted by E on Jan 30, 2004 at 7:08 PM If the US wasn’t deluged with cheap imported labor in the first place, no company could get away with such appalling conditions. They would have to compete for labor by offering good wages and conditions.
It seems a bit rich to me for migrants to complain about the conditions they are often expected to work under - the only reason they have jobs at all is so they can be exploited. If you cross the world to go to the US wearing a virtual T-shirt that says “Exploit me! Exploit me!” you can hardly expect to be treated decently.
It’s time progressives recognized that mass cheap labor and decent wages and conditions are mutually exclusive.
Posted by Carl Wernerhoff on Feb 1, 2004 at 5:51 PM Page 1 of 1 pages -
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