Sweatshirts from Sweatshop
Part 1-Intellectual Standards 1. “According to Cromwell’s director of auxiliary services more that 90% of the logo merchandise is produced by Transterra Textiles…” -This example violates the Universal standards of Relevance and Significance. Why is the director of auxiliary services considered credible when speaking on the production of the school’s merchandise? Why is their opinion relevant? What significance does this fact have in the ultimate goal of changing the factory? To correct the problem the speaker should have gotten information from an administrator who purchases the merchandise from the textile factory, or omitted this entire statement.

2. “There are two things we can do to put an end to this exploitation. We can demand that Cromwell obtain its logo merchandise only from garment companies with socially responsible labor practices, and we can refuse to wear or purchase and Cromwell clothing until the college switches to an acceptable apparel supplier.” -This example violates the standards of Breadth and Logic. Being that all colleges are obtaining their logos from the same textile company, are the students even sure that another company could manufacture the logos? What other option could the school have? What will the workers do if they lose business and are forced to close? A more logical thing to do if they are going to protest would be to fight for the reform of the factory. This option, rather than shutting down, would keep a lot less workers out of work, the company gets better working conditions, and the school won’t lose money from sales of collegiate merchandise.

Part 2-Fallacies 1. “We can demand that Cromwell obtain its logo merchandise only from garment companies with socially responsible labor practices, and we can refuse to wear or purchase and Cromwell clothing until the college switches to an acceptable apparel supplier.” This statement uses the fallacy of false dilemma. The speaker presents to extremes of what can be done about solving the problems in the factories, which happen to both result to leaving the current factory. If they are going to demand that the school only purchases from responsible labor practices, they should give the school an alternative solution.

2. “Knowing what we know now, if we continue to wear and buy Cromwell logo apparel we become accomplices in the abusive employment practices of Transterra Textiles.” The speaker uses the fallacy of the Straw Man Effect in this statement. The speaker uses strong words like accomplices and abusive, which both happen to be crimes. It is as if he/she is saying to buy the logo apparel is like being a criminal. They cannot compare a person buying a product to the people forcing children to work in factories. The way to correct this statement would be to be a little less aggressive and appeal more to the reader’s emotions. It could be written more like “Knowing what we know now, if we continue to wear and buy Cromwell logo apparel we support the negative employment practices of Transterra Textiles.” This is something that makes the reader feel less guilty but willing to help.