Every time you eat a Chiquita banana, you are eating a little piece of history. "Banana Republic" is not just a clothing chain; it's a pejorative term for when corporations took on the mantle of overthrowing legitimate governments in order to protect corporate interests. The United Fruit Company (now Chiquita Brands International, though you won't find this piece of corporate history on their website) worked in tandem with the CIA and launched a coup against a democratically elected leftist government in order to protect its own interests. Tens of thousands were killed. That was 1954.
Every time you pop a Bayer aspirin, you are reminded of a little piece of history. Back in the 1980s, Bayer realized that blood-derived products for hemophiliacs were contaminated with HIV, yet after discontinuing such sales in the United States, Bayer nevertheless continued to push sales of these same contaminated products in foreign countries. Bayer was sued and eventually paid out hundreds of millions of dollars in settlements.
Every day, huge corporations make possible modern life through conveniences not thought possible even a hundred years ago. Our cell phone networks, the cell phones themselves, the miners who extract the resources to make the screen you are reading this on... the list goes on and on. Modern society would simply cease to exist without these corporations. However, sometimes, when blood gets on the balance sheets, when treating humans as mere "resources" and when the law is treated as an annoying speed bump on the path to profit, a corporation becomes more than "an ingenious device for obtaining individual profit without individual responsibility" -- it becomes evil.
And so after reviewing the various vile conduct publicized in or around 2016, from Apple making customers overpay for "unauthorized" repairs, to Chipotle forcing its employees to perform unpaid labor, to Wells Fargo ripping off customers by forcing them to pay for fake accounts, the one giant corporation which really wins the 2016 MOST EVIL CORPORATION AWARD is...
Every time you pop a Bayer aspirin, you are reminded of a little piece of history. Back in the 1980s, Bayer realized that blood-derived products for hemophiliacs were contaminated with HIV, yet after discontinuing such sales in the United States, Bayer nevertheless continued to push sales of these same contaminated products in foreign countries. Bayer was sued and eventually paid out hundreds of millions of dollars in settlements.
Every day, huge corporations make possible modern life through conveniences not thought possible even a hundred years ago. Our cell phone networks, the cell phones themselves, the miners who extract the resources to make the screen you are reading this on... the list goes on and on. Modern society would simply cease to exist without these corporations. However, sometimes, when blood gets on the balance sheets, when treating humans as mere "resources" and when the law is treated as an annoying speed bump on the path to profit, a corporation becomes more than "an ingenious device for obtaining individual profit without individual responsibility" -- it becomes evil.
And so after reviewing the various vile conduct publicized in or around 2016, from Apple making customers overpay for "unauthorized" repairs, to Chipotle forcing its employees to perform unpaid labor, to Wells Fargo ripping off customers by forcing them to pay for fake accounts, the one giant corporation which really wins the 2016 MOST EVIL CORPORATION AWARD is...
...DuPont! First, DuPont dumped a cancer-causing chemical, Perfluorooctanoic acid, also known as PFOA or C8, into the dirt around Parkersburg, WV. PFOA is used in teflon and other products in which water and oil resistance was desired. Then, DuPont realized that PFOA causes cancer. It decided that a cover-up was the best way to deal with this annoyance: |
...3M and DuPont had been conducting secret medical studies on PFOA for more than four decades. In 1961, DuPont researchers found that the chemical could increase the size of the liver in rats and rabbits. A year later, they replicated these results in studies with dogs. PFOA’s peculiar chemical structure made it uncannily resistant to degradation. It also bound to plasma proteins in the blood, circulating through each organ in the body. In the 1970s, DuPont discovered that there were high concentrations of PFOA in the blood of factory workers at Washington Works. They did not tell the E.P.A. at the time. In 1981, 3M — which continued to serve as the supplier of PFOA to DuPont and other corporations — found that ingestion of the substance caused birth defects in rats. After 3M shared this information, DuPont tested the children of pregnant employees in their Teflon division. Of seven births, two had eye defects. DuPont did not make this information public.
But that wasn't enough. What if the government eventually catches on? No worries. Regulatory capture was decided to be a good solution:
Within two years, three lawyers regularly used by DuPont were hired by the state [Department of Environmental Protection] in leadership positions. One of them was placed in charge of the entire agency.
PFOA lawsuits are now grinding their way slowly through the courts with no end in sight. PFOA is not just a problem in the United States, it is a worldwide problem. And while other companies continue to offend by manufacturing products with PFOA, it all started with DuPont. Instead of going public with its information on the dangers of PFOA decades earlier, it chose to write its profits in blood.
Congratulations, DuPont!
You are MOST EVIL CORPORATION of 2016!
Congratulations, DuPont!
You are MOST EVIL CORPORATION of 2016!