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This isn’t new, but it’s good to continue to report on it. I remember even back in 2005 it was generally well known that the gold farmers in World of Warcraft w

This isn’t new, but it’s good to continue to report on it. I remember even back in 2005 it was generally well known that the gold farmers in World of Warcraft were likely Chinese prison labor. There were even a few articles about it: https://blogs.scientificamerican.com/observations/chinese-prison-inmates-forced-to-moonlight-as-world-of-warcraft-gold-farmers-for-guards/ https://blogs.scientificamerican.com/observations/chinese-pr...

logicchains 3y ago
There's a big difference between prisoners (who at least in theory are locked up as punishment for committing a crime) and people who've been trafficked into slavery. Even the US uses prison labour, but it's people who committed crimes. What's happening in SEA is kidnappping innocent people, locking them in guarded compounds and forcing them to scam people, and they get raped or beaten if they refuse.
- jacquesm 3y ago
  That's true in principle but the laws and legal system are set up in such a way that a very large percentage of particular demographics will end up in this situation and from an outsiders perspective it doesn't look all that different.
  - logicchains 3y ago
    Even if you see it as China enslaving its own citizens under false pretences of criminality, that's still quite different from private entities in one country luring people from another country under the false pretences of high-paying jobs and then enslaving them.
    - jacquesm 3y ago
      Yes, there are differences. But there are also some pretty worrisome similarities. And the numbers in the US are far higher than those mentioned in TFA, especially when taken over the decades that this has been happening.
      - logicchains 3y ago
        The difference is that the US is a democracy and people voted for the politicians who created those laws (and the attorney generals who enforce them), so by democratic logic the people convicted by the system "deserve" to be imprisoned to some degree.
        hnfong 3y ago
        Tyranny of the majority is a thing. Sometimes it's not even the majority. Politicians are elected for their main policies that usually involve a couple things, but there are thousands of laws and it doesn't follow that every one of them has majority support. It's also a matter of inertia to "overthrow" the government in power. In democracies there's a peaceful way to do this, and in autocracies there isn't. The fact that autocratic governments aren't yet toppled does mean something, though obviously not much. But then, the fact that the government is democratically elected doesn't necessarily mean much either. (You sure Americans like Trump?)
        logicchains 3y ago
        >Tyranny of the majority is a thing. While that may be true, surely philosophically speaking there's a significant, qualitative difference between saying "this is moral because people voted for it" and saying "this is moral because the stupid victims deserved it". Many people would accept the former, accept that prison labour is morally justified, but very few people would accept that it's morally okay for private criminal gangs to kidnap and enslave people.
        jacquesm 3y ago
        Philosophically speaking, from the perspective of a victim it's all the same. They don't have the luxury of being able to philosophize about it, they are too busy dealing with the reality of it.
        jacquesm 3y ago
        Fortunately politicians are never influenced by money or ideology and 100% represent the choices of the voters.
  - zirgs 3y ago
    You can simply not deal drugs. It's not that difficult.
    - r2_pilot 3y ago
      I'm glad you've never been framed for a crime you didn't commit.
- iterminate 3y ago
  "Even" the US isn't much of a moral barometer for prisoner treatment. The US uses prison labor because the US is one of the worst countries for prisoner (mis)treatment, certainly the worst in the west. > There's a big difference between prisoners (who at least in theory are locked up as punishment for committing a crime) and people who've been trafficked into slavery[...] What's happening in SEA is kidnappping innocent people Lots of people in prison are innocent, especially in the US. Prisoners are no less deserving of rights and fair treatment than victims of trafficking. Likewise, I'm sure many trafficking victims are guilty of committing crimes (as are most people).
  - logicchains 3y ago
    >Prisoners are no less deserving of rights and fair treatment than victims of trafficking Everywhere in the world it's accepted that prisoners lose the rights to freedom of movement and association; that's what being a prisoner means. In that sense trafficking victims are absolutely more deserving of those rights than convicted criminals.
    - the_other 3y ago
      Might is right, huh?
      - logicchains 3y ago
        What would you consider an acceptable alternative? If criminals were not stripped of freedom of movement, then what would deter potential future criminals from committing crime? Prison is meant to act as a deterrent so that people with no moral compass have some incentive not to commit crimes.
        pmarreck 3y ago
        According to the data, prison is not a deterrent: https://www.vera.org/news/research-shows-that-long-prison-sentences-dont-actually-improve-safety https://www.vera.org/news/research-shows-that-long-prison-se... Instead of focusing on the penal system, which is fairly hopeless, we should focus on preventing people from entering the penal system in the first place by focusing on systematic improvements that reduce criminal behavior as an appealing option. Look up "rational choice theory" with regards to criminal behavior: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rational_choice_theory_(criminology) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rational_choice_theory_(crimin... But that all said, the fact that the penal system is not mutated based on sensible performance metrics such as recidivism rate etc. is a human failing. The thing is, the system has already failed them at that point and they made their decision to not cooperate with society, so of course the people who have chosen to cooperate with society (the same people who have not sufficiently contributed to the systematic improvements that would have prevented that behavior to begin with) will fail to care about them. My participation in this is to mentor young men (some are "at-risk", which basically means that their demographics are more likely to lead to criminal behavior), which I've done a few times and which is rewarding, because young men really need it right now. If I didn't have a 2 year old son who is keeping my hands quite full, I think I'd do it again.
- sidewndr46 3y ago
  I don't think "Even the US" is a valid way to justify slavery. I mean, even the US had slavery at one point right?
  - celtoid 3y ago
    "Slavery is still constitutionally legal in the United States."[0] [0] https://www.baltimoresun.com/opinion/editorial/bs-ed-1209-13th-amendment-slavery-20201208-rvdjpk462bc2hcfmj6oz2vs32i-story.html https://www.baltimoresun.com/opinion/editorial/bs-ed-1209-13...
- giraffe_lady 3y ago
  The difference is really not that large, if it exists at all which I don't find to be the case. What severity of crime justifies enslavement? You can have your sentence extended for refusing to labor, regardless of what you're originally in there for. Is that just? Is there "a big difference" between that and trafficked labor?
- gentleman11 3y ago
  The USA still uses slave labour, sorry to inform you. Bust somebody for pot possession, and to protect society, gotta force them to work for basically free? Give me a break. Your country is still a slave leasing one, if not a slave owning one The ancient Greeks often used crime or war as an excuse to capture slaves. At least they had the honesty to call them slaves afterwards
- steve1977 3y ago
  > There's a big difference between prisoners (who at least in theory are locked up as punishment for committing a crime) and people who've been trafficked into slavery. Considering what can probably get you in jail in a country like China, I’m not so sure about that.
  - cultofmetatron 3y ago
    its also a really big misalignment of incentives when prisons can use prisoners as a profit center though their labor. they take away jobs from free people who would have been able to do those jobs and get a (more)fair wage for it
mistrial9 3y ago
Labor historically in a lot of places, was built on peasant-serfs, indentured servitude with a duration, or in many cases slaves. I believe that many educated people in the West are not aware of the extent to which this is true throughout history.
- whimsicalism 3y ago
  I agree that this is true, however I also think that when we imagine slavery in the West we think of chattel slavery and the reality is that what we call slavery in these peasant-serf contexts was not the same thing, did not have the same mortality rates, etc.
whimsicalism 3y ago
Sorry, but that is insufficient evidence to me for something to be "generally well known." It is well known that there are flawed incentives to testify in Western contexts to things that did not happen in East Asia, this is known among South Korean defectors (not denying that NK is objectively terrible, one of the worst countries in the world - but defectors to SK have been known to say outright false things because this is how they get paid and get media attention and many of these publications will pay for stories). Something that is "generally well known" by contrast is that China almost certainly harvested organs from prisoners in the 90s and early 2000s.
jedmeyers 3y ago
My friend in Eastern Europe ran a bot farm in WoW. He ran bots on his computers that farmed resources, then sold resources for gold and then sold the gold to Chinese for end-user resale. The only labor involved was hiring some college students and paying them for each top-level character they progress that can be used for farming. He even bought my character for $50 when I stopped playing.

logicchains 3y ago

There's a big difference between prisoners (who at least in theory are locked up as punishment for committing a crime) and people who've been trafficked into slavery. Even the US uses prison labour, but it's people who committed crimes. What's happening in SEA is kidnappping innocent people, locking them in guarded compounds and forcing them to scam people, and they get raped or beaten if they refuse.

jacquesm 3y ago
That's true in principle but the laws and legal system are set up in such a way that a very large percentage of particular demographics will end up in this situation and from an outsiders perspective it doesn't look all that different.
- logicchains 3y ago
  Even if you see it as China enslaving its own citizens under false pretences of criminality, that's still quite different from private entities in one country luring people from another country under the false pretences of high-paying jobs and then enslaving them.
  - jacquesm 3y ago
    Yes, there are differences. But there are also some pretty worrisome similarities. And the numbers in the US are far higher than those mentioned in TFA, especially when taken over the decades that this has been happening.
    - logicchains 3y ago
      The difference is that the US is a democracy and people voted for the politicians who created those laws (and the attorney generals who enforce them), so by democratic logic the people convicted by the system "deserve" to be imprisoned to some degree.
      - hnfong 3y ago
        Tyranny of the majority is a thing. Sometimes it's not even the majority. Politicians are elected for their main policies that usually involve a couple things, but there are thousands of laws and it doesn't follow that every one of them has majority support. It's also a matter of inertia to "overthrow" the government in power. In democracies there's a peaceful way to do this, and in autocracies there isn't. The fact that autocratic governments aren't yet toppled does mean something, though obviously not much. But then, the fact that the government is democratically elected doesn't necessarily mean much either. (You sure Americans like Trump?)
        logicchains 3y ago
        >Tyranny of the majority is a thing. While that may be true, surely philosophically speaking there's a significant, qualitative difference between saying "this is moral because people voted for it" and saying "this is moral because the stupid victims deserved it". Many people would accept the former, accept that prison labour is morally justified, but very few people would accept that it's morally okay for private criminal gangs to kidnap and enslave people.
        jacquesm 3y ago
        Philosophically speaking, from the perspective of a victim it's all the same. They don't have the luxury of being able to philosophize about it, they are too busy dealing with the reality of it.
      - jacquesm 3y ago
        Fortunately politicians are never influenced by money or ideology and 100% represent the choices of the voters.
- zirgs 3y ago
  You can simply not deal drugs. It's not that difficult.
  - r2_pilot 3y ago
    I'm glad you've never been framed for a crime you didn't commit.
iterminate 3y ago
"Even" the US isn't much of a moral barometer for prisoner treatment. The US uses prison labor because the US is one of the worst countries for prisoner (mis)treatment, certainly the worst in the west. > There's a big difference between prisoners (who at least in theory are locked up as punishment for committing a crime) and people who've been trafficked into slavery[...] What's happening in SEA is kidnappping innocent people Lots of people in prison are innocent, especially in the US. Prisoners are no less deserving of rights and fair treatment than victims of trafficking. Likewise, I'm sure many trafficking victims are guilty of committing crimes (as are most people).
- logicchains 3y ago
  >Prisoners are no less deserving of rights and fair treatment than victims of trafficking Everywhere in the world it's accepted that prisoners lose the rights to freedom of movement and association; that's what being a prisoner means. In that sense trafficking victims are absolutely more deserving of those rights than convicted criminals.
  - the_other 3y ago
    Might is right, huh?
    - logicchains 3y ago
      What would you consider an acceptable alternative? If criminals were not stripped of freedom of movement, then what would deter potential future criminals from committing crime? Prison is meant to act as a deterrent so that people with no moral compass have some incentive not to commit crimes.
      - pmarreck 3y ago
        According to the data, prison is not a deterrent: https://www.vera.org/news/research-shows-that-long-prison-sentences-dont-actually-improve-safety https://www.vera.org/news/research-shows-that-long-prison-se... Instead of focusing on the penal system, which is fairly hopeless, we should focus on preventing people from entering the penal system in the first place by focusing on systematic improvements that reduce criminal behavior as an appealing option. Look up "rational choice theory" with regards to criminal behavior: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rational_choice_theory_(criminology) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rational_choice_theory_(crimin... But that all said, the fact that the penal system is not mutated based on sensible performance metrics such as recidivism rate etc. is a human failing. The thing is, the system has already failed them at that point and they made their decision to not cooperate with society, so of course the people who have chosen to cooperate with society (the same people who have not sufficiently contributed to the systematic improvements that would have prevented that behavior to begin with) will fail to care about them. My participation in this is to mentor young men (some are "at-risk", which basically means that their demographics are more likely to lead to criminal behavior), which I've done a few times and which is rewarding, because young men really need it right now. If I didn't have a 2 year old son who is keeping my hands quite full, I think I'd do it again.
sidewndr46 3y ago
I don't think "Even the US" is a valid way to justify slavery. I mean, even the US had slavery at one point right?
- celtoid 3y ago
  "Slavery is still constitutionally legal in the United States."[0] [0] https://www.baltimoresun.com/opinion/editorial/bs-ed-1209-13th-amendment-slavery-20201208-rvdjpk462bc2hcfmj6oz2vs32i-story.html https://www.baltimoresun.com/opinion/editorial/bs-ed-1209-13...
giraffe_lady 3y ago
The difference is really not that large, if it exists at all which I don't find to be the case. What severity of crime justifies enslavement? You can have your sentence extended for refusing to labor, regardless of what you're originally in there for. Is that just? Is there "a big difference" between that and trafficked labor?
gentleman11 3y ago
The USA still uses slave labour, sorry to inform you. Bust somebody for pot possession, and to protect society, gotta force them to work for basically free? Give me a break. Your country is still a slave leasing one, if not a slave owning one The ancient Greeks often used crime or war as an excuse to capture slaves. At least they had the honesty to call them slaves afterwards
steve1977 3y ago
> There's a big difference between prisoners (who at least in theory are locked up as punishment for committing a crime) and people who've been trafficked into slavery. Considering what can probably get you in jail in a country like China, I’m not so sure about that.
- cultofmetatron 3y ago
  its also a really big misalignment of incentives when prisons can use prisoners as a profit center though their labor. they take away jobs from free people who would have been able to do those jobs and get a (more)fair wage for it

mistrial9 3y ago

Labor historically in a lot of places, was built on peasant-serfs, indentured servitude with a duration, or in many cases slaves. I believe that many educated people in the West are not aware of the extent to which this is true throughout history.

whimsicalism 3y ago
I agree that this is true, however I also think that when we imagine slavery in the West we think of chattel slavery and the reality is that what we call slavery in these peasant-serf contexts was not the same thing, did not have the same mortality rates, etc.

whimsicalism 3y ago

Sorry, but that is insufficient evidence to me for something to be "generally well known." It is well known that there are flawed incentives to testify in Western contexts to things that did not happen in East Asia, this is known among South Korean defectors (not denying that NK is objectively terrible, one of the worst countries in the world - but defectors to SK have been known to say outright false things because this is how they get paid and get media attention and many of these publications will pay for stories). Something that is "generally well known" by contrast is that China almost certainly harvested organs from prisoners in the 90s and early 2000s.

jedmeyers 3y ago

My friend in Eastern Europe ran a bot farm in WoW. He ran bots on his computers that farmed resources, then sold resources for gold and then sold the gold to Chinese for end-user resale. The only labor involved was hiring some college students and paying them for each top-level character they progress that can be used for farming. He even bought my character for $50 when I stopped playing.