She tried to respond but according to her, "He violently kicked [her], hard, in the stomach and [she] fell to the floor. [She] fainted." She worked until she was eight and a half months pregnant and tried to ask for a legal maternity leave but was told that there was no law for this in the factory.

She had to quit her job and take out a loan to cover costs for the delivery of her baby. Soon after the birth, she had to go back to work and begin paying off her debts.

Not only were there first-hand accounts by teenage workers given at the forum, but also a speech from Sk Nazma, the president of the Bangladesh Center for Worker Solidarity.

"[They] are not asking for a boycott. [They] need these jobs. In fact, [they] desperately need these jobs, since [they] are a very poor country," said Nazma. "But [they] also demand that the workers be treated as human beings, with their rights respected, and paid a fair wage. And [they] want the right to organize more than anything else."

There are about 1.3 million garment workers in Bangladesh but no union exists with a legal contract in any one of these factories. There are many established labor laws in Bangladesh, but none of them are applied in society because the local owners believe that they themselves are the law.

"These women can't win their rights in Bangladesh if they don't have a voice in North America and the biggest nightmare that corporations have are that we, the teenagers of America, become the voice of these workers," said Kernaghan when asked how BC's students could help with the workers' plight.

Kernaghan stated the difficulty in shopping smartly in order to avoid purchasing clothes manufactured in sweatshops. "There are no good companies where you are sure that what you are buying aren't child sweatshop-made clothes," he said.

He stated that a great way to help the plight of these abused workers is to build up the college's anti-sweatshop movement, currently undertaken by the Global Justice Movement.

Continued...

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