Workers at maquiladora factories in Mexico told recent visitors from Texas that they are sometimes asked to undo their work entirely or spend long hours in isolated spaces.

“These tactics are a new level in the psychological game, to get people used to the idea that they are kind of owned and really don’t have any worth apart from the company,” says Howard Hawhee, who helped to coordinate a listening tour in late May.

“These kinds of stories are very bizarre,” says Judith Rosenberg, who has been organizing tours across the border since 1999. “These are management techniques that someone compared to Hitler.”

For example, Hawhee and Rosenberg say women in maquiladoras report that they are sometimes asked to prove they are not pregnant by showing proof of menstruation.

“They are very distasteful management techniques,” says Rosenberg. “And you have to call them that because they are used very methodically. This business with the sanitary napkins is outrageous, and people feel the attack on their dignity, the women do. And the men do too.”
counterpunch.org

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