OVER THE LINE? It is disappointing to see Willamette Week perpetuate the myth that "In the past 20 years...Portland's [urbanized area] has remained unchanged" ("Holding the Line," 500 Words, WW, Oct. 29, 1997). In fact, all that remained unchanged was the urban growth boundary. When the boundary was established in 1979, much of the land inside of it was undeveloped. Since then, nearly all of the developable land has been developed. According to the Census Bureau, Portland's urbanized area has grown faster, relative to population growth, than the urbanized areas of Phoenix, Las Vegas, Los Angeles, Denver, or even Vancouver, Wash. Land-use planning did nothing to curb that growth until recently, when it forced land prices to shoot out of sight. All that the urban growth boundary has really done has been to artificially increase land prices inside the boundary and artificially reduce them outside. Now that Metro has decided to use the boundary to increase the area's population density, we will also see: * More congestion,
* More air pollution,
* More violent crime, and
* Less urban open space. These are all features characteristic of America's higher-density cities, especially Los Angeles, which has the highest density of any U.S. metropolitan area. So why does Metro say that Los Angeles "represents the investment pattern we desire to replicate"? And why does Willamette Week laud Metro's effort to turn Portland into Los Angeles? Randal O'Toole, Southeast Laurie Avenue
SOME THINGS AREN'T FOR SALE Josh Feit's article on Nike ("Alas, Poor Nike," WW, Nov. 5, 1997) hits the nail on the head when he says the corporation's ubiquitous presence has contributed to its global image problems. By putting their logo in high schools and college campuses, Nike Inc. is introducing aggressive commercialism to our children. This is self-defeating in the long term. Learning, like art and justice, must be pursued for itself. When this and other ideals are hijacked in the name of personal, political or financial ambition, they vanish. Education becomes trade schooling, political corruption flourishes, and art becomes advertising. It is little wonder that the triumph of corporations worldwide is combined with the decline of our schools. Ironically, this decline will hurt research and development as fewer scientists will graduate from our universities. When Jesus warned us to give our money to the State (to Caesar), he cautioned us to reserve the rest of ourselves for much higher purposes. Commerce has its limits: Not everything is for sale, nor should it be. Jason Reynolds, executive director, Oregon Consumer League
NIKE DIGEST? One of the ostensible advantages of an "alternative" newsweekly is the opportunity for readers to find a viewpoint which is indeed alternative to the pro-corporate dogma presented by the "mainstream" (i.e. corporate-owned, -controlled and -maintained) media. After Josh Feit's recent article "Alas, Poor Nike" [WW, Nov. 5, 1997], I can only hope that the Willamette Week will relinquish any and all sanctimonious rhetoric about being alternative and assume its place with The Oregonian, Newsweek, USA Today and the rest of the bunch. No matter how many times I read the article, I can't figure out whether Mr. Feit is completely indoctrinated by the corporate culture in which we live or just genuinely ignorant. Either way, his piece is a true model of unthinking rhetoric based upon unexamined assumptions. In brief, Feit lists a litany of offenses committed by other multinational corporations (Disney, Gerber and Mitsubishi, among others) which are just as bad (if not worse, assuming injustice is relative) than those committed by Nike in the Pacific Rim. Holding the banner of investigative journalism high, Mr. Feit goes on to ask, gosh, why is it that people (or "fashionable" Nike-bashers, or whatever else Feit chooses to call activists in his efforts to de-legitimize them) protest Nike exclusively if so many corporations are doing so many terrible things? That is indeed a good question, and a legitimate piece of journalism might have followed it up. In fact, such an article might have realized that, by holding Nike to a standard of providing real human rights and economic justice for its workers and the consumers it brainwashes through massive, exploitative advertising and public relations campaigns, we might actually make a stand against the cutthroat maneuvering of "the global marketplace" and the multinational corporations which benefit from it at the expense of the rest of the world. Indeed, such an article might have gone on to suggest that maybe we should actually think about applying these same standards of justice to other multinational corporations; perhaps it might have even suggested that we critically examine the political economy of our euphemistic "global village" and ask ourselves what sectors of society it actually serves. Alas, Feit does none of these things. Instead, he suggests that the criticism Nike has received is really just a necessary by-product of its "successful" advertising and marketing campaigns. Just as it is fashionable to wear Nike, Feit reasons, it is "fashionable" to criticize Nike. To prove his point of how silly and conspiratorial the public's perspective of Nike has become, he cites a conversation in which "high school boys describe Nike as a 'big, huge company that owns everybody and is everywhere.'" Golly, where would they ever get that idea from? Certainly not from the unnamed "Nike marketing director" who sat behind a "one-way glass partition" and monitored the boys' conversation! As the above example demonstrates, it seems as if Feit's capacity to think critically just conks out whenever he begins talking about corporate America. Indeed, he never even raises a question of ethics regarding Nike's focus group in which the boys participated (is it a good thing, Mr. Feit, to have minors give Nike ideas about how it can sell them overpriced athletic wear?), yet has no problem in suggesting the irony in an FSU (the Princeton Review's "No. 1 party school," he smugly reminds us) student protest against Nike's contract with the university. (People who aren't long-haired "ecoterrorists," Marxist ideologues or otherwise easily dismissible leftist nuts protesting for social justice? Imagine that!) In one of the article's marginal notes, Feit cites a Harvard business professor who asserts that "It's fashionable on campus to be anti-Nike." I don't know if Mr. Feit has been on a college campus recently, but I'd suggest he visit one. I guarantee that he'll find far more people wearing Nike products than protesting them. But, then again, I suppose Mr. Feit wouldn't consider these people "pro-Nike" but rather just regular folks like you and me, doing our duty to consume anything corporate America tells us that we want and/or need. In the end, the only thing that might possibly make "Alas, Poor Nike" any more a showpiece of impotent journalism is if it were to be reprinted in Reader's Digest. Best of luck. Peter Henry, Southeast 34th Avenue
WE LIKE NIKE As a born and raised Oregonian, I am proud to work for the most successful homegrown company in our state's history, Nike. As a student at Lincoln High School in the 1970s, we all wore Nike's waffle trainer as soon as it hit the stores downtown. Returning to Oregon from San Francisco in 1992, there was only one company in this state for which I wanted to work: Nike. Yes, Nike has been successful. And when anyone gets to be No. 1 in this country, they become a target. It comes with the territory. No, we're not perfect. Like any athlete in training, we work hard each and every day to get better at what we do. But who we are is everyone in the tri-county area's next-door neighbors. We're 5,200 Oregonians and Washingtonians. You see us at Fred Meyer. You see us at your kid's soccer game. We're on the boards of directors of local charities and members of the PTA. We're shopping with you at Our Children's Store. When Josh Feit called to do a "story about all the negative press Nike's been getting" ["Alas, Poor Nike," WW, Nov. 5, 1997], my response was, "Isn't that a self-fulfilling prophecy, Josh?" Why not focus on the good things Nike does? Yes, Willamette Week did note that Working Mother recently picked us as one of the Top 100 companies for women to work for. But rather than focus on good news, you write stories about disgruntled employees who leave here and isolated incidences in factories overseas. I know, it's the cynical media, and bad news sells. Get used to it. But what Josh didn't write, Oregonians deserve to hear: * The Oct. 18 "International Day of Protest" against Nike was a bust. After seven months of planning only a couple dozen people showed up outside NikeTowns in NYC and Portland. It wasn't even a news item that day in either city. * Nike donated $10.5 million in cash and products to nonprofit organizations last year. * Nike recently contributed $750,000 to Self Enhancement Inc., which is providing critical mentoring services to inner city kids and families. At the press conference, SEI Executive Director Tony Hopson said, "Nike was our first corporate sponsor back in 1981 and together we have dedicated our relationship to helping the youth of Portland realize their potential." * Two weeks ago, Nike was the first contributor ($600,000) to former governor Neil Goldschmidt's SMART (Start Making a Reader Today) campaign to have 10,000 adults reading weekly to students across Oregon by the year 2000. * Nike just contributed $250,000 to the Oregon Ballet Theater. Nike creates jobs: 22,000 people are employed around the world by Nike. Additionally, 74,000 people are employed in retail jobs in the U.S. as a result of the sales of our footwear, apparel and equipment. In Oregon, 5,200 people receive paychecks from Nike every month. Our business creates jobs here for people at other companies and helps pay the wages of people employed in government and supports our schools. We paid $268 million in Oregon payroll last year--and almost a half BILLION dollars to local vendors for everything from printing to constructing the expansion of our campus. We paid over $44 million in local and state taxes last year alone. Our critics continue to target us in the media, regardless of the truth of what they fax you. For example, Global Exchange recently released a report that charged that Nike employs 13-year-old children, pays below the minimum wage and that workers have died in two Nike factories from inhaling toxic fumes. All of these charges are false. Nobody under the legal age works in Nike factories, workers earn above the minimum wage and no worker in these factories has died from inhaling fumes, or from any other reason. If this were a political campaign, the press would hold Global Exchange accountable for their inaccuracies, a media feeding frenzy would ensue, all their past mistruths aired, and Global Exchange would be forced out of the race before the end of the next news cycle. But, this isn't politics, and it's up to Nike to set the record straight. It's too bad Willamette Week could not meet with the students and faculty from Dartmouth College's Amos Tuck School of Business when they were here this week. A growing body of evidence demonstrates that Nike's contribution to Southeast Asian countries can be seen by the increase in wages, the decline in poverty and the dramatic rise in small businesses. The team from Dartmouth concluded that Nike pays workers a living wage. Nike has also begun a micro-loan program in two Vietnamese villages to further assist women's business opportunities away from the factory. I encourage my fellow Oregonians to learn more about this good Oregon company: For information about Nike's overseas manufacturing, visit www.nikeworkers.com. To find out more about our public affairs efforts, visit www.nike.com and go to the info.com area. I'm still proud of Nike. If I wasn't, I wouldn't be working here. Lee Weinstein, Director of Communications, Nike |
