大侠行天下日记 我见我闻我思 05/05

今天美国社会的奴工

美国南卡罗纳州法院判决一家餐厅的老板爱德武十年有期徒刑，因為他不但长期不发薪资给一名黑人员工，并对他不断虐待，法院并裁定要这家餐厅向斯密士加倍发还五十四万元所欠的薪水。

这名黑人员工从十二岁开始就以童工身份在餐厅从事洗碗工，在过去十九年他是得到薪水，但从二OO九年开始，他被迫每星期工作一百小时以上而没有薪资，并且经常虐待他。

这宗奴工事件，居然发生在二十一世纪的美国，真是令人不耻和难予置信的大笑话。

当地的非裔政治联盟人士表示，我们简直又回到了奴隷时代了！

老实说，我们的社会底层存在着太多令人痛苦和悲伤，许多人因為自己无一技之长，长期生活在挣扎之边缘，因此受到顾主们之压榨，迫於糊口生活，只有长期忍受下去。

今天我们生活在美国的华亚裔族群，可能对窍苦阶层长期想得到政府之救济表示不满，请你们也不要忘记许多民权都是他们為大家争取来的，不是吗？ 如今你坐享其成， 反而怪罪他们，这是应该有的态度吗？

Horrible Enslavement Story

A restaurant manager named Bobby Edwards forced a black man, John Smith, to work for over 100 hours every week for years without pay. The South Carolina court ruled that the man should receive more than $546,000 in restitution after his former manager pleaded guilty. 

A U.S. District Court Judge in 2019 ordered Edwards who is white to pay Smith around $273,000 in restitution which represented Smith’s unpaid wages and overtime. But the court said in failing to include liquidated damages that this falls under the Fair Labor Standards Act and that the amount owed and to be paid to Smith needs to be doubled.  

Smith started working at the cafeteria as a part-time dishwasher. For his first nineteen years, he was paid for his work. But when Edwards took over the restaurant in 2009, Smith was moved into an apartment next to the restaurant and forced to work more than 100 hours per week. Edwards was taking advantage of Smith’s intellectual disability and keeping him isolated from his family and threatened to have him arrested and routinely verbally abused him.

Local NAACP charter president Abdullah Mustafa said, “We are talking about enslavement here.”

This is really a big joke that this should happen in our modern society. It is really unbelievable. This is America. This is also very shameful. Local politicians did not speak out.

When we are talking about the civil rights around the world, where are the rights for the people at the bottom of our society?