Your response perfectly illustrates the flawed attitude the author was describing. Can you not hear yourself? You are calling another human being a "perk"!!!
Enough with the semantic arguments:
1. Calling a servant an "au pair" or a "perk" doesn't make her less of a human being.
2. ALL human beings have rights, and in the US those rights include employment protections, such as a minimum wage.
3. It doesn't matter what "perks" the diplomat was promised. She cannot violate another's legal rights because she feels entitled to a servant (excuse me, an "au pair").
4. Shipping a human being overseas to be a servant with the expectation that they will be underpaid doesn't make this okay. On the contrary, that's ominously close to human trafficking.
5. Asking to be released from unjust and illegal labor conditions and proposing a settlement for back-pay and damages IS NOT BLACKMAIL! (If it were blackmail, why is the servant not being prosecuted for extortion? Answer: because it's not blackmail!)
6. The arrest really isn't about the servant (Ms. Richard). Ms. Khobragade is being prosecuted by the federal government for a crime committed against the federal government. She lied on a federal form, which is a felony right there. She also did so to cover up that she violated the minimum wage law. That's why she was arrested.
7. All the talk about servants that has arisen in Western media and online is due to India's response and how stunned we in the West are that there are still people on this planet who can be this inhumane (as your comment sadly illustrates).
uh, no ... CEOs get assistants as perks (our CEO has three - maybe one is 'necessary' but the others are certainly perks) and no one bats an eye. That's because they're paid a salary and are employed at-will: they can leave whenever they want. It's not "another human being as a perk," it's a position benefiting the CEO that the company is willing to pay for.
About #7: I'm a USian and I'd absolutely have servants if I could afford them. Not slaves, but servants with a paycheck. Why not? I'm happen to "spread the wealth" but I'm not just going to give it away- you need to earn it ... how about keeping my lawn looking nice? Here's your paycheck. Maybe do my laundry? Here's your paycheck. Keep the place tidy, please... and here's your paycheck.
The elephant in the room with all this is that America has its own big problems in this area. The illegal immigrant workers from Mexico and other places seem to have issues with wages, employment rights and other things. Let's not even talk about the big daddy of them all on the corporate side, Walmart with its wage issues.
So, before Americans start feeling smug about how they set the standards for the rest of the world, please look in your own back yard. It's not that much prettier.
"So, before Americans start feeling smug about how they set the standards for the rest of the world, please look in your own back yard."
That's a very tired criticism/complaint. The points made were fair and if you don't think so then argue those points. Making generalizations that Americans should not share their thoughts on injustices outside the ones our government, corporations, and/or citizens create is absurd. Which nation is without problems of their own? Does that disqualify then anyone from making any statements on human rights (as in this case)?
That is probably true, but it is totally unrealistic. Should we all remain silent in the face of such abuses until we have made our own "backyards" clean?
"...only those without sin should cast the first stone. [This] is so relativistic and "nonjudgmental" that it would not allow the prosecution of Charles Manson. Our few notions of justice have had to evolve despite these absurd codes of ultra vindictiveness and ultracompassion." - Christopher Hitchens
#2 - also the ones the US randomly decides are terorrists and bombs "humanely" from Drones? Get off your fricking high horse and look in your own backyard mate. The hypocrisy of this is bordering on hilarious. She may be earning below minimum wage in the US - but its in no way inhumane or exploitative - at 4$ an hour - she's earning more than any maid or servant in India.
why are you so stunned that people can be inhumane? Have you looked into how all those clothes you rushed so madly to buy on black friday are so dirt cheap? Or that iphone? There are people in the west who are equally or even more inhumane - being distant from the inhumanity is just washing your hands off it. Make statements like those - if you're someone who only buys things produced fairly and the makers of which pay minimum wages to their employees - otherwise you're as inhumane as the next guy - but just have the luxury of being able to ignore it and feel good for yourself because you're not directly involved.
Enough with the semantic arguments:
1. Calling a servant an "au pair" or a "perk" doesn't make her less of a human being.
2. ALL human beings have rights, and in the US those rights include employment protections, such as a minimum wage.
3. It doesn't matter what "perks" the diplomat was promised. She cannot violate another's legal rights because she feels entitled to a servant (excuse me, an "au pair").
4. Shipping a human being overseas to be a servant with the expectation that they will be underpaid doesn't make this okay. On the contrary, that's ominously close to human trafficking.
5. Asking to be released from unjust and illegal labor conditions and proposing a settlement for back-pay and damages IS NOT BLACKMAIL! (If it were blackmail, why is the servant not being prosecuted for extortion? Answer: because it's not blackmail!)
6. The arrest really isn't about the servant (Ms. Richard). Ms. Khobragade is being prosecuted by the federal government for a crime committed against the federal government. She lied on a federal form, which is a felony right there. She also did so to cover up that she violated the minimum wage law. That's why she was arrested.
7. All the talk about servants that has arisen in Western media and online is due to India's response and how stunned we in the West are that there are still people on this planet who can be this inhumane (as your comment sadly illustrates).
Edit: Grammar fixes.