THESE FORUMS NOW CLOSED (read only)
Fun Stuff => CHATTER => Topic started by: jhocking on 07 Jul 2009, 12:19
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I just went to the bakery down the street to pick up some rolls and the cutest little girl ever showed me where to get the tongs for picking out bread.
After I got over the OMG KYOOOT it occurred to me "man I hope she isn't here every day waiting on customers." I think her mom works there and she was just hanging around.
How would you react if you walked into a store and a little girl asked you if you needed any help?
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Little girls are the cutest and in most places in the first world they are likely just helping their parents.
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Yeah one of my managers at work has this little girl who really really loves to help us. We all love her to pieces and she's really really good at charming the shit out of people. The bosses don't let her work while they are around (because, well, that would be illegal and they don't want to get anybody in trouble, especially if it means that the poor kid has her heart broken) but when they leave the store in charge of that manager they kinda turn a blind eye to it because they know how well she loves it, and they know how well the customers love to see her. It's a really really sweet thing to see a little kid volunteer for something so thankless as working in fast food.
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Man, I'd really be concerned if I saw a little kid working fast food. I hope she isn't anywhere near dangerous stuff like the vat of fry cooking oil.
Upon reflection I wonder if my thinking about this is racist. After all, she was Hispanic.
Further related point: Do I over-think things?
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Maybe it is just an extended "Take your daughter to work" day (or week, or month).
Many years ago, at a hardware store in our town, the owner's children (ages 12 to 16, maybe) worked at the store. I never saw them do anything dangerous (cutting glass, for example) but they could locate the most obscure pieces of hardware in the store.
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Further related point: Do I over-think things?
Yes...
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@Joe: Nah man we don't let her anywhere near that thing, even if the fries have been in 20 minutes past their timer (this does not happen, but still, point made). We LIKE the kid, remember?
We never let her do anything dangerous, and she never asks us why. She only ever really takes orders from customers, and she asks us to tell her when the windows or stainless steel faces need to be polished. We're like "Nah they are fine" and we save it for later because the chemicals are not something I'd want to have anywhere near an 8-year-old kid. That and having a sweet little kid off polishing windows by herself would just plain look sad. We like keeping her out at the front counter helping our counter person take orders, and handing out condiments and drink cups and such as needed. She's got a hell of a lot of personality for such a tiny little person and people really love seeing her.
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Hey I was just thinking how long it had been since Joe had posted. Hey Joe!
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child labour is a lot more disturbing in the context of having to involuntarily do dangerous or mind-numbing work all day in order to assist in paying off debt which isn't even yours in the first place because you are a child. a child both voluntarily choosing to help out their parents at work and having a lot of fun doing it, on the other hand, would not lead anywhere close to the same sort of physical or emotional damage that forced labour would. i guess whether or not this constitutes exploitation could probably still be debated from a theoretical perspective, but i mean kids don't even understand or care about that stuff in the first place because they are kids and they have no attention span and they just want to do things that are fun, which probably occasionally includes things like working and pretending to be a grown-up, and i figure if i spent my time arguing about this they'd be like "wow tania seriously i am 7 years old i do not care about those things or know any of those big words, i just do what i want". so i just shrug and figure most of those kids are probably doing okay.
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Yeah, I see a very big difference between kids being forced into crap jobs for little pay and a kid helping out their parents, especially at a family business. There's a lot of places in Sydney where the business is obviously a family-run store or restaurant and a kid will be working the till or packing shelves or something. I mean, what is the difference between assigning a child chores at home or at a family-run business? It's all stuff that needs to be done.
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I am sorry if any bakers disagree with me here but how many bad things can there be about baking. I would imagine being a baker as a kick ass job.
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I can easily imagine how it would feel to have the ovens running in the kitchen when it is already 90+ degrees outside.
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Also bakers typically start work at 5am or earlier.
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Pretty sure that if you are a baker though, you want to be up that early baking shit. Its one of those career paths that you get into because you like to do it, or you like what comes from it.
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like masssive amphetamines abuse
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Not to mention, the heat isn't nearly as bad when you're cooking pre-dawn.
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Man early mornings pretty much suck no matter what. You could be getting up to go to your job as quality control a tester in the blowjob factory and the 5am start would still be a motherfucker.
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I dunno, that sort of start wouldn't be so bad. Timewise, I mean. If I'm waking up at night I am more likely to be awake.
Hey, it's 5 am and my roommate is going to work!
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At what point does it become exploitative? Not that it makes much practical difference, I'm just wondering for the sake of argument. I agree with the sentiments that some kid helping their parents putter around the front of their shop is just fine. But what is the dividing line after which the work becomes problematic? Is it to do with hours maybe? I would suggest maybe it's when the work is done with/for the parents, but I dunno. Also, est's comparison to chores reminds me that the child labor rules have special exceptions for kids working on a farm. I don't remember what exactly the exceptions are, but labor certainly doesn't get much harder than farm work.
Hey I was just thinking how long it had been since Joe had posted. Hey Joe!
Been really busy. Maybe I'll post pictures of my kick-ass new apartment. Besides that, I'll probably post in a few days to ask if anyone wants to help beta-test another thing that's been keeping me really busy.
You could be getting up to go to your job as quality control a tester in the blowjob factory
For some reason I suddenly imagined a t-shirt where the front says "My job sucks." and the back says "I work in the blowjob factory." That shirt is terrible, it's a good thing I'm not a t-shirt designer.
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Little girls are the cutest
For further evidence, I refer you to paragraph 11 of the following article:
http://www.guardian.co.uk/science/2009/may/19/ida-fossil-missing-link
Hurum chose Ida's nickname because the diminutive creature is at the equivalent stage of development as his six-year-old daughter. Hurum said Ida is very excited about her namesake. "She says, 'there are two Idas now, there's me I'm living and then there's the dead one.'"
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I think it becomes exploitative when the kids decide they want to go off and play with the crumbs and some birds outside and the parents tell them they have to get back to work.
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I went to the newsagents and there was a 2 year old kid sitting behind the counter. He tried to give me five dollars in change when I had paid for my newspaper with exact money. His mother (who was sitting behind the counter as well) took over from that point. He was a sweetie.
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When I was little, my dad owned a convenience store, and sometimes I'd ring up customers. Even at a young age (I was probably 5 or 6), I never messed up change or anything like that.
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I went into a Barbecue place that opened up at 6am, served ribs until 2pm at which point it closed so the connected tattoo parlour could open up. I was waited upon by a 10 year old kid while an older man made ribs in the back. It was ~12:30 on a school day.
good ribs, though. cheap, too. got a whole plate + a side, corn bread and a drink for $6. The potato salad was pretty rad too.