Poorly Made in China

Earlier this year I got an email from Paul Midler.  His book Poorly Made in China was about to be released by Wiley (my publisher). He’s a first-time author as well and we’ve become quick friends talking about first-time author experiences — things like how to best fight off mad hoards of groupies. (If you must know, I prefer to let my wife do the bouncing and Paul prefers to play dead.)

And then I read Paul’s book.

Sometimes when people say that a book changed their life, they’re just blowing smoke. In the case of Paul’s book, I mean it.

I was at the grocery charged with buying ingredients to make homemade pizza. I found the dough, the sauce, and then I was searching for canned mushrooms. I found them. They were made in China. I wasn’t buying them.

The same goes for Juicy Juice.  Annie bought some for Harper and when I saw that it was “Made in China” I told Annie that we weren’t giving it to Harper.

It’s one thing to wear clothes from China, but it’s a whole other thing to consume something from a Chinese factory. Paul worked as a liaison between an American shampoo company and the Chinese factory.  By the end of his liaisoning, he wouldn’t even use shampoo that was Made in China!

Paul’s book is definitely on my list of best books of 2009.  It didn’t only take me behind the scenes of the shenanigans that I suspected were going on in Chinese manufacturing, but it was also a lot of fun and funny.  So, I was absolutely thrilled when I  heard that Poorly Made in China was selected by the Economist as one of the top books of 2009.

I was almost as thrilled as when Annie found some canned mushrooms that were made in the USA. I love me some mushrooms on my pizza!

It just so happens that I have an extra copy of Poorly Made in China. The first person to leave a comment stating why or why not they don’t buy stuff made in China wins it!

Update: @tvspike1 was the first to respond via Twitter for the win.

And if you haven’t decided how you feel about “Made in China” here’s a commercial that has run on CNN:

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MINYux3mPUI[/youtube]

 
8 comments
Joe says:

We try to never buy Chinese when there is a choice. And sometimes when there is no choice, we don’t buy.

I know people’s livelihoods are at stake, but somehow it just doesn’t seem right for someone to be in a situation close to slavery for me to have some tacky consumerable. It is a short term strategy and I know it doesn’t help provide an alternative, but quite honestly I’d rather go without than buy them.

Kyle says:

No! Not Juicy Juice! “Soylent Green is people!”

Joel says:

Kelsey! Long time no write (sorry!). We were busy having babies and stuff (and I see we weren’t the only ones).

Anyway, just thought I’d drop in to say you’re blog is still not blocked in China. I just re-subbed (my old feed-reader got blocked), so i’ll be keeping tabs on you again. Nice redesign.

Let your voice be heard!

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