“Roger & Me” is a documentary by Michael Moore about his hometown Flint, MI. Flint, MI is an automobile town where the existence of the inhabitants depended on the General Motors plants. Logos plays a great role in this movie. Michael Moore and his film crew took a camera trying to shed light to the developments in his hometown after the GM plants closed and consequently laying off the majority of Flint inhabitants. Mainly people left Flint looking for jobs elsewhere. However, there were some people desperately trying to make a living, either of fast food jobs or, like the one lady interviewed, by raising rabbits and dogs she later sold to afford food and to pay bills. Some of the former automobile workers even got sick and ended up in mental health facilities. To get a grasp on why the Flint plants were closed, Moore tried to talk to the responsible people, in particular to Roger Smith. He followed Smith around the country to finally receive his thoughts and more importantly to receive an answer of why the GM plants were closed and so many workers got laid off. But every time Moore came close to Roger Smith, Moore is held back by security protecting Smith from so-called intruders like Roger Moore. Even the governor of Michigan, seemed quite helpless when interviewed about the situation in Flint and appealed to their spirit to not give up. One might think that he as the governor must come up with a feasible solution but far wrong! While the gap between the rich and the poor begins to widen in Flint, MI, and no one seems to really care the crime rate and the rate of evictions skyrocketed. This created a need for a new prison which was soon to be constructed and referred to as a success story with regards to the creation of new and desperately needed jobs. The last straw Flint attempts to catch is the “Tourism”. Consequently, millions of dollars were spent in this naïve dream which was seen as being the looked-for help. Hotels and amusement parks were built which were doomed to go out of business soon.
GM’s justification to the developments in Flint and elsewhere where they were forced to close plants and lay off workers, is that the company does not owe anything to a particular town which happens to depend on their plants and that economic premises can force corporations to act in an irreconcilable way.
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
5 comments:
How do you perceive the logic of GM saying they do not owe anything to a particular town? Do you think that makes sense? What is GM's obligation to the people of Flint? Is it logical for Moore to expect GM to feel obliged to support those people, even if doing so means that GM would keep losing money and eventually go out of business? How many people would GM let down if it went out of business entirely?
How do you perceive the logic of GM saying they do not owe anything to a particular town? Do you think that makes sense? What is GM's obligation to the people of Flint? Is it logical for Moore to expect GM to feel obliged to support those people, even if doing so means that GM would keep losing money and eventually go out of business? How many people would GM let down if it went out of business entirely?
I found Roger Smith's motives for closing the factories to be really selfish. Do you think GM should have given them alternative job offers elsewhere? Or created another business in Flint that could employ all those that were laid off?
Of course Roger Smith motives about closing the GM plant in Flint were definitely selfish and executed without even wasting A thought about the affected employees. Maybe GM shouldn't have closed the plants this fast, giving the employees a chance to look elsewhere for jobs,giving them sort of a transition period.But on the other hand, we are a free market economy in which many businesses decide to either lay off or fire people due to high labor costs and cheaper production costs in 3rd Wold countries. This is not fair but the reality.
The only thing Flint could have done to improve their situation, would have been to give incentives for other companies to open up new plants.
I also thought that Roger Smith's motives for closing down the factories in Flint were very selfish. He just doesn't realize what a big impact this change would have on the town of Flint. But then I also understand why he did it. The whole purpose of any business is to make money and they may do what they see fit to continue to make money. Some of the things they do may seem harsh and selfish, but that is just how things work. It's just the reality of business.
Post a Comment