2. China’s Counterfeit Economy and Not-So-Swashbuckling Pirates
What springs to mind when you hear the words Louis Vuitton? But, of course, classic styling, tradition married to modernity, and the result—a unique, one of a kind Louis Vuitton handbag. You can buy a Louis Vuitton replica handbag for each day of the week for the price of one Louis Vuitton handbag. Apart from you and Basicreplica.com, no one else will know that your Louis Vuitton replica handbag was manufactured in China.
—Basicreplica.com
A lot of consumers may find it hard to feel sorry for big, fat cat corporations like Louis Vuitton or Disney when Chinese pirates and counterfeiters knock off their luxury handbags or first-run movies and then sell them for pennies on the dollar. There are, however, at least two big problems with this Robin Hood attitude.
First, Chinese counterfeiting and piracy are hardly limited to upscale baubles and Hollywood entertainment. Today, if America, Europe, or Japan are making it, China is faking it. Indeed, the list of counterfeit and pirated goods that China dumps on world markets quite literally runs the gamut from A to Z—from auto parts, batteries, condoms, and elevators to prescription drugs, semiconductors, shampoo, and even fake Zippo lighters that can explode in your face.
That’s the second big reason why no one should take Chinese counterfeiting and piracy lightly. It exposes each and every one of us to quite often extreme health and safety risks. To understand the very real dangers, consider these fictional scenarios—which are all based on real-world events:
Your scalp develops a severe rash because your knockoff “Head and Shoulders” shampoo from China contains toxic chemical residue.
A small pebble shoots up from the tire of a truck in front of you and hits your windshield. The counterfeit Chinese “safety” glass does not crack but shatters, and shards of glass fly everywhere.
Your prized Himalayan “lap cat” succumbs to liver failure because the tick medicine she was taking turned out to contain poison.
In the dead of night, the counterfeit power strip that you bought in the bargain bin of the local hardware store starts an electrical fire. Your smoke detector does not work because your fake “Duracell” batteries leaked acid all over the alarm system. Did you get out of the house before it burned down?
Your brother orders what turns out to be fake Viagra over the Internet because he is too embarrassed to ask his doctor for a regular prescription. After a nice candlelight dinner with his spouse, he winds up in a hospital bed with a wild heartbeat. The very next week, your mother winds up in the same hospital with a broken hip because her phony “Evista” medication for osteoporosis was nothing more than molded chalk.
On a sultry summer night, two of your co-workers—a 22-year old gay man and a 24-year old heterosexual woman—buy fake “Durex Extra Safe” condoms at the same pharmacy. Later that night, in separate encounters, the condoms burst. The gay man gets HIV, and the woman contracts chlamydia, which renders her sterile.