Boycott China :: It Begins

I officially have a 2008 New Year's Resolution:
I'm going to attempt to avoid buying anything "Made in China" this year.

Why?

Mostly because China censors their Internetz, poisons children, forces women to get abortions, takes US jobs and beats up their own citizens for filming them beat up other citizens. Also - because I like a challenge.

Thankfully, I've already purchased my Chumby and my XO Laptop; both made in China. I agree that it's going to be difficult to justify abstaining from some of these purchases, especially a product like the XO that, theoretically, is going to be doing so much good for the children of the world. There are certainly some very complex equations to solve in the global marketplace. But - for now - at least I will feel like I'm doing something to make the world a better place.

My First Non-Purchase

My first substitution was at Target. I wanted to buy a new beard trimmer after my previous one died on me. Like I normally do, I shopped around online for a while and settled on a model from Remington that had received good reviews. Notice that the country of manufacture is not listed in the product information. However, I had already decided to purchase this locally due to shipping costs, so no problem there. Off to the store... and... yep... Made in China. So, instead, I looked at the rest of the products on the rack and ended up with a model from Wahl that proudly declared "Assembled in the USA." It works fine, but yesterday I noticed on one of the plastic trimmer guides, stamped in tiny letters: CHINA.