There have been exposes of modern slavery in this country going back ages. There was a ground-breaking tv documentary by CBS on Florida's sugar cane workers back in the 1960's, called "Havest of Shame," I believe.
Have read repeated articles in the last 10 years of slavery practised by the Fanjuls at their sugar cane plantation in Florida, of slavery by the commercial fern growers in Florida, on, and on, and on.
Took a quick google look immediately saw this one:
http://img.coxnewsweb.com.nyud.net:8090/B/08/53/93/image_293538.jpgAbout the Series
For nine months, The Palm Beach Post explored the roots of modern-day slavery. Reporters and photographers traveled to destitute Mexican villages, crossed the desert with a smuggler, rode across the U.S. with illegal immigrants, found new claims of slavery, uncovered rampant Social Security fraud, and found that Florida's famous orange juice comes with hidden costs.
http://www.palmbeachpost.com/hp/content/moderndayslavery/index.html~~~~~Slavery among Florida's tomato pickers
Cory Doctorow at 11:40 AM February 26, 2009
Colleen sez, "Gourmet magazine goes political? In this interesting and horrible piece, the author investigates modern slavery among immigrant workers in Florida."
http://craphound.com.nyud.net:8090/images/maar-tomatoslaves608.jpgFor two and a half years, beginning in April 2005, Mariano Lucas Domingo, along with several other men, was held as a slave at that address. At first, the deal must have seemed reasonable. Lucas, a Guatemalan in his thirties, had slipped across the border to make money to send home for the care of an ailing parent. He expected to earn about $200 a week in the fields. Cesar Navarrete, then a 23-year-old illegal immigrant from Mexico, agreed to provide room and board at his family’s home on South Seventh Street and extend credit to cover the periods when there were no tomatoes to pick.
Lucas’s “room” turned out to be the back of a box truck in the junk-strewn yard, shared with two or three other workers. It lacked running water and a toilet, so occupants urinated and defecated in a corner. For that, Navarrete docked Lucas’s pay by $20 a week. According to court papers, he also charged Lucas for two meager meals a day: eggs, beans, rice, tortillas, and, occasionally, some sort of meat. Cold showers from a garden hose in the backyard were $5 each. Everything had a price. Lucas was soon $300 in debt. After a month of ten-hour workdays, he figured he should have paid that debt off.
But when Lucas—slightly built and standing less than five and a half feet tall—inquired about the balance, Navarrete threatened to beat him should he ever try to leave. Instead of providing an accounting, Navarrete took Lucas’s paychecks, cashed them, and randomly doled out pocket money, $20 some weeks, other weeks $50. Over the years, Navarrete and members of his extended family deprived Lucas of $55,000.
Taking a day off was not an option. If Lucas became ill or was too exhausted to work, he was kicked in the head, beaten, and locked in the back of the truck. Other members of Navarrete’s dozen-man crew were slashed with knives, tied to posts, and shackled in chains. On November 18, 2007, Lucas was again locked inside the truck. As dawn broke, he noticed a faint light shining through a hole in the roof. Jumping up, he secured a hand hold and punched himself through. He was free.
http://boingboing.net/2009/02/26/slavery-among-florid.html~~~~~The Nation: Florida's Modern Slavery...The Museum
by Katrina vanden Heuvel
March 29, 2010
In textbooks across the country, students are still taught that slavery in the US ended with the adoption of the 13th Amendment in 1865.
But the Coalition of Immokalee Workers (CIW) knows better, and its Modern-Day Slavery Museum is traveling throughout Florida to drive that point home — that slavery persists in the agriculture fields of the state right up through this very day.
The Village Voice recently described the significance of the museum this way: "Though it's unlikely to compete for crowds with Disneyworld, the Modern-Day Slavery Museum may be Florida's most important new attraction."
The bulk of the museum is housed inside of a 24-foot box truck — a replica of the one used by the Navarrete family in Immokalee to hold twelve farmworkers captive from 2005 to 2007. The workers were beaten, chained and imprisoned inside of the truck, and forced to urinate and defecate in the corners. US Attorney Doug Molloy called the operation "slavery, plain and simple."
Inside of the truck visitors learn about seven cases of farm labor servitude in Florida successfully prosecuted by the US Department of Justice over the past 15 years. Workers were held against their will through threats, drugs, beatings, shootings, and pistol-whippings. These cases meet the high standard of proof and definition of slavery under federal laws and resulted in the liberation of over 1000 farmworkers — CIW worked with federal and local authorities during the investigation and prosecution of six of the seven cases.
Barry Eastabrook described his experience in the truck for The Atlantic: "Inside, the vehicle was stacked high with cardboard tomato cartons. The floor was chipped and scuffed. There was a plywood sorting table — which doubled as a 'bed' for the workers. But what stays with me was the heat. Outside, the day was chilly and overcast, but inside the truck, even with the cargo door all the way open, the temperature became borderline unbearable. The stale air was uncomfortable to breathe. Sweat soaked the back of my shirt. And I was in there for less than five minutes, not two and a half years."
But it's not just the contemporary slavery examples one finds inside the box truck that educates the visitors. The museum is designed to look at the history of slavery and forced labor — the evolution of it — and the fact
that there has never been a period in Florida agriculture when there wasn't some form of forced labor. The exhibit was vetted by historians, slavery experts, economists and other academics, including Nation editorial board member Eric Foner who said, "A century and a half after the Civil War, forms of slavery continue to exist in the world, including in the United States. This Mobile Museum brings to light this modern tragedy and should inspire us to take action against it."
More:
http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=125296794~~~~~ Once you go south, to the banana plantations owned by US-based corporations, the "rules" completely go out the window, and you run into far worse conditions, and the inclusion of child labor. Some of our more mentally challenged US Americans are often furious at what they perceive to be the political attitude of other people in the Americas. Too bad they don't have the intelligence and will to find out for themselves instead of living in ignorance!
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