Date: Tue, 1 Oct 2002 12:42:09 -0700 (PDT)

Rat tales?

Irvine -- Is it really Rat Tales rather than Mouse Tales in Orange County's happiest place on earth? After all, in Ping Chong's play, Truth & Beauty (directed by Eric Eisenbrey), a Salvadoran worker is depicted talking about her quota of Disney shirts she had to sew at a pittance in wages compared with the price it fetches in the U.S. The play just finished its run from the Rude Guerrilla Theater Company (www.rudeguerrilla.org/index2.html).

It's not just nasty tales though...real rodents seem to have shown up locally in Disneyland, according to area activists. These labor activists suggest that Disney could do more to solve the problem of rats in its facilities. We talk with two of them, John Earl (former KUCI show host and a union reformer formerly with H.E.R.E., the hotel and restaurant workers' union) and Cindy Hanel, a former Disney employee who has since filed a workers' compensation claim against the corporation, claiming unsanitary conditions at a Disneyland restaurant.

Kicking off Subversity's 10th year of intriguing interviews, today's show airs from 4-5 p.m. on KUCI, 88.9 fm in Orange County, and is Web-cast simultaneously via kuci.org.

Resources

home1.gte.net/res0nage/
H.E.R.E. and Now! [John Earl's site]

www.ocweekly.com/ink/03/04/news-schou.php
Goofy Oversight by Nick Schou

www.ocweekly.com/ink/03/02/news-schou.php
'Rats and Rat Shit Everywhere' by Nick Schou

falco.kuci.uci.edu/~dtsang/subversity/Sv990105.ram
Disneyland: Mouse or Rodent [Jan 5, 1999 Subversity show with David Koenig (author, Mouse Tales) on Vietnamese American who's killed in an accident at Disneyland]

www.coopamerica.org/sweatshops/ssdisneystory.htm
Sweatshops Disney Action Campaign 2

www.google.com/search?q=sweatshops+disney&btnG=Google+Search&hl=en&lr=&ie=UTF-8&oe=UTF-8
Google search on: sweatshops disney

In addition, there is this upcoming event in Pasadena:

YOU ARE INVITED TO AN EYE-OPENING TALK BY DISNEY'S SWEATSHOP WORKERS

Are Disney's Winnie-the-Pooh dolls made in sweatshops? Come to All Saints
Church in Pasadena on Monday, October 7, at 7:30 pm to hear young women
who work at a Disney Company subsidiary in Dhaka, Bangladesh describe
their working conditions sewing Winnie the Pooh garments. Among them is
19-year-old Lisa Rahman, who was earning five cents for each $18 Winnie
the Pooh athletic cap that she made at the Shah Makhdum factory in Dhaka. 
These workers are on a national tour, asking that the Disney Corporation
do the right thing. The church is located at 132 North Euclid Ave. in
Pasadena. 

Sponsored by the group No More Sweatshops!, this event is part of a
national campaign to focus attention of Disney's violations of human and
worker rights -- including exploitation of child labor -- in the factories
that produce clothing, dolls, and other items sold in Disney stores and
elsewhere.

Is Disneyland really "the happiest place on earth?" You be the judge.
Join former state senator Tom Hayden, director of No More Sweatshops, as
he introduces the Bangladeshi workers, who are on a national speaking
tour.

This eye-opening event is free and open to the public, with free
parking.

Tour co-sponsors and supporters include: Mobilization for the Human
Family; United Steelworkers of America, Pastors for Peace, United
Students Against Sweatshops, United Methodist Church Women's Division;
People of Faith Network; United Nations Association-Pasadena; Clergy and
Laity United for Economic Justice; Neighborhood Unitarian Universalist
Church;  Progressive Jewish Alliance; Southern California  Americans for
Democratic Action; and Human Rights Committee-United Teachers Los Angeles. 

For more information call Ruby Gutierrez at All Saints Church: (626)
583-2734; or Erica Zeitlin at No More Sweatshops! (310) 559-9522, ext. 4.


dan

Daniel C. Tsang
Host, Subversity, now Tuesdays, 4-5 p.m.
KUCI, 88.9 FM and Web-cast live via http://kuci.org 
Subversity: http://kuci.org/~dtsang; E-mail: subversity@kuci.org
Daniel Tsang, KUCI, PO Box 4362, Irvine CA 92616
UCI Tel: (949) 824-4978; UCI Fax: (949) 824-2700
UCI Office: 380 Main Library
Member, National Writers Union (http://www.nwu.org)
WWW News Resource Page: http://sun3.lib.uci.edu/~dtsang/netnews1.htm
AWARE: http://sun3.lib.uci.edu/~dtsang/aware2.htm
Personal Homepage: http://sun3.lib.uci.edu/~dtsang/