Working at an international human rights organization like UUSC makes me no stranger to the daily injustice that takes place at home and abroad. I know there are disasters large and small that happen every day — and many we never hear about. And yet, for me this past month has felt particularly fraught with tragedy. First, the Boston Marathon bombings; then the fertilizer plant fire and explosion in West, Texas, that killed 14. Now, the latest: a garment factory collapse in Dhaka, Bangladesh, that killed at least 446 people, with the death toll expected to rise.

As the New York Times is reporting, this factory collapse is "considered the deadliest accident in the history of the garment industry." And the worst part: the loss of so many precious lives was entirely preventable. Cracks had been discovered in the building, and factory employers were apparently ordered to halt work until further inspection could be done. Yet more than 3,000 employees were at work when it collapsed the next day. "'I wouldn't call it an accident,' the government's information minister, Hasanul Haque Inu, told Bangladeshi journalists. 'I would say it's a murder.'"

Accidents like this aren't new. But they shouldn't be this old. In the United States, the Triangle Shirtwaist Factory Fire in 1911 exposed the dangers that garment workers faced — and this problem hasn't gone away, even if factory locations have changed over the years. As our collaborator the International Labor Rights Forum (ILRF) outlines, unsafe working conditions in Bangladesh garment factories — resulting in fires and building collapses like that of last week — have existed and persisted for years. In November, 112 people were killed in a Bangladesh factory fire, and more than 600 workers have died in preventable sweatshop fires since 2006.

These conditions are the result of a global economy that bolsters corporate profits at the expense of workers' lives. As consumers, we are part of that economy — which means we have the responsibility and the power to change it. In the ruins of the Rana Plaza building, activists found labels for clothes made for J.C. Penney, Cato Fashions, and other clothing brands. In this time of tragedy lies the opportunity for action and the seed for change. Let's get to work — by choosing compassionate consumption, by calling on clothing companies to proactively improve safety at suppliers' factories, and by supporting labor rights and organizing throughout the world.  

What you can do

• Sign ILRF's petition calling on Walmart, Gap, and H&M to take proactive steps to improve safety at their suppliers' factories. These brands are the largest buyers of the garments that are manufactured in Bangladesh.

• Deliver ILRF's statement to Gap calling for the company to participate in a comprehensive factory safety program. Print and deliver it to Gap store managers either individually or in groups.

• Learn more about the ongoing issues in Bangladesh and emerging news and commentary on the building collapse:
  • "Bangladesh Needs Strong Unions, Not Outside Pressure," New York Times op-ed
  • "Sweatshop Fires in Bangladesh," ILRF
  • "Bangladesh Factory Disaster: Benetton Paper Trail Discovered in Rana Plaza Rubble," International Business Times
  • "Another Preventable Tragedy in Bangladesh," New York Times editorial

• Make use of the SweatFree Communities' "Shop with a Conscience Consumer Guide."

I am so grateful for UUSC supporters like you who are dedicated to economic justice. At each stop on my national book tour for Behind the Kitchen Door, Unitarian Universalists have shown up and expressed their commitment to restaurant workers’ rights. Hundreds of UUSC supporters have bought the book, and many are organizing related activities in congregations around the country. Because of you, the book is a national bestseller, having made it to #1 on Powell’s online bookstore bestseller list and the top of several categories in Amazon.

Now let’s take our message to Congress! 

Step 1: Call your senators.

You can reach their offices by calling the U.S. Capitol Switchboard at 202-224-3121.

Talking points:

• Tell your senators' offices that you care about restaurant workers’ rights.
• Ask that your senators support the Fair Minimum Wage Act of 2013, which would increase the federal minimum wage, including the base wage for millions of tipped workers.
• Explain that tipped workers are often paid as little as $2.13 per hour, a wage that hasn't been raised in more than 20 years!
• Optional: Mention that although the current law requires employers to make up the difference between the tipped minimum wage and the regular minimum wage if tips fail to cover the gap, the reality is that employers often don’t.

Step 2: Please take one moment more to let UUSC know that you called. When you tell us which senators you called and how their offices responded, we can further hone our strategy.

The Fair Minimum Wage Act of 2013 (bill number S. 460) was introduced by Senator Tom Harkin (D-IA) and Rep. George Miller (D-CA) in a packed hearing room on Capitol Hill last week. Now we need to show that there is a groundswell of support!

I know you can create a buzz. I’ve seen how UUSC supporters are already generating enthusiasm for restaurant workers’ rights in your congregations and communities — now let’s change the conversation in Congress!

Raising the minimum wage for millions of workers — including tipped workers — is the fair and right thing to do.

But this won’t be an easy win. And it won’t be quick. The National Restaurant Association is a powerful opponent, and they spend millions of dollars each year to keep the tipped minimum wage low. We’re going to need your support every step of the way — starting this very moment and continuing in the months ahead. 

Thanks to you and other UUSC supporters, the change we seek is possible!

Over the past month, we've asked you to help us make the release of Behind the Kitchen Door: What Every Diner Should Know About the People Who Feed Us a success — and UUs across the country answered the call!

What You Can Do to Support Restaurant Workers

• Buy the book! And tell us you bought it.
• Review the book on Amazon, where new audiences will be exposed to it. 
• Organize a book group with your friends.
• Speak up for restaurant workers' rights when you dine out by using the 2013 ROC National Diners' Guide to Ethical Eating.
• Order stickers to help send a message to restaurant managers. 
• Let policy makers know that you support a raise in the minimum wage that includes tipped workers. 

To recap: we're aiming to get this new book by our partner the Restaurant Opportunities Centers (ROC) United on the bestseller lists. Why? To help build a movement to improve conditions for millions of restaurant workers who earn poverty wages and lack basic benefits like earned sick leave.

It has been an exciting couple weeks as we've worked with you to get the word out, generate a buzz on social media, and team up with our allies at Standing on the Side of Love to honor compassionate consumption.

We're well on our way to changing the national conversation about restaurant workers!

• Approximately 625 UUSC members (over 100 more than our goal!) told us that they purchased Behind the Kitchen Door — if you did and haven't told us yet, please do!
• Behind the Kitchen Door was the #1 bestseller on Powell's for the critical 10 days after its release.
• The book was ranked #1 on Amazon in three categories and was in the top 400 books sold on Amazon.
• ROC-United's cofounder and codirector Saru Jayaraman was interviewed on Moyers & Company, CNN's Starting Point with Soledad O'Brien, and MSNBC's Up with Chris Hayes.

We want to thank the hundreds of UUSC members and supporters who have helped by buying the book; passing information to their friends, congregations, and social circles; sharing videos, infographics, and reviews on social media; and purchasing a copy for their local library or their congregation's lending library.  

Behind the Kitchen Door is a bestseller — and you helped make that happen! 

All of this was done to help bring restaurant workers' rights the national attention they deserve — and we are gaining momentum! A few more ways you and fellow UUs are helping to do this:

• The Unitarian Universalist Pennsylvania Legislative Advocacy Network (UUPLAN) is working with ROC-Philly to organize UUs, including mobilizing for earned sick days.
• The UU Church of Sarasota is coordinating community-wide Choose Compassionate Consumption activities linking national issues with local community partners.
• Unitarian Society of New Haven's Kid's Service Team are teaching youth about issues facing restaurant workers by creating a board game about how youth can use their consumer power as well as teach adults in their community. To celebrate their work, they will head to a restaurant using the ROC National Diners' Guide.
• First Parish in Plymouth is forming a study action group.
• In Michigan, Ethical and Mindful Eating groups from a number of congregations are coming together with ROC-Michigan to support their local campaigns.

I have also heard from many of you who are organizing book groups, making presentations, coordinating Justice Sunday services about labor rights in the food system, using UUSC's "Paying Customer, Paying Attention" stickers when you eat out, and much more.

We joined with ROC United on this campaign because we know that Behind the Kitchen Door is not just a book — it's an opportunity for Unitarian Universalists to change the national conversation about how to create a truly sustainable food system.

Together we are raising our voices to let policy makers know that we care about the people who feed us and that restaurant workers should be able to afford putting food on their own tables. In February, UUSC helped ROC-United make a big splash to highlight the deplorably low federal tipped minimum wage, which has been stuck at $2.13 per hour for more than 21 years. We participated in a restaurant-worker rally with earned-sick-leave proponent Rep. Rosa DeLauro, accompanied workers to visit their legislators on Capitol Hill, and witnessed the official announcement of the reintroduction of the WAGES Act (H.R. 650) by tipped-minimum-wage champion Rep. Donna Edwards. Stay tuned for legislative action you can take.

While this is only the beginning and it will take a concerted effort, we truly believe that we can win and make a real difference — to not only restaurant workers, but all minimum-wage earners. Thank you to all of you who are joining the movement!

I'll admit that sometimes I can be selfish; it can be a natural human impulse, a tendency toward self-preservation. Don't get me wrong, I'm also pretty empathetic, and I'm dedicated to advancing human rights — but I need to be healthy to do that. And in the case of dining out, a little bit of selfishness can be the extra incentive that consumers need to take action on a serious workers' rights issue: lack of paid sick days for restaurant workers.

A few weeks ago, prompted by the rounds of flu that were circling through offices and schools and public transportation in New England, I watched the movie Contagion (I like to freak myself out sometimes). It's a fictional movie, but nevertheless distressing. Images of a person coughing cut to scenes minutes later of seizures and death — then it's another person, then it's millions more. 

I think what I found most distressing about it is that it's not altogether that crazy of a concept, especially given the ways that the U.S. restaurant industry has set itself up to be a petri dish for food-borne illness. What am I talking about? As Saru Jayaraman writes in Behind the Kitchen Door, "In ROC's survey of more than 4,000 restaurant workers, we found that 90 percent did not have access to paid sick days, and, with a median wage nationally of $9.02, most cannot afford to take a day off from work. The result? Two-thirds of all restaurant workers reported preparing, cooking, and serving our meals while sick. Two-thirds!"

Jayaraman tells us how in 2011, nearly 3,000 people in Fayetteville, N.C., had to be vaccinated against hepatitis after they were exposed to it at a restaurant where a server couldn't take a day off work without losing his job. And she reminds us that Mary Mallon (also known as "Typhoid Mary"), who was identified as the first carrier of typhoid in the United States, was a cook who likely infected 53 people between 1900 and 1907.

As Jayaraman wrote in a CNN op-ed, "One in six Americans gets sick from a food-borne illness every year, and when those instances can be traced to a single cause, in more than half of cases it's a restaurant. Specifically, research shows that somewhere between 48% to 93% of all food-borne norovirus outbreaks may be tracked back to sick food service workers."

Of all the egregious practices of the restaurant industry — ridiculously low wages, blatant discrimination, little respect — the lack of paid sick days is one that consumers can't simply ignore and pretend to be immune to its effects. If you go out to eat and get sick because the chef or the server is working with a cold or worse, it's going to affect you — and probably your family and coworkers and friends, too.

So it's time to get paid sick days for restaurant workers on the books. For the sake of workers who deserve to take care of themselves and for the sake of our own health. The Restaurant Opportunities Centers United, a UUSC partner organization cofounded by Jayaraman, is working at the local, state, and federal levels to get laws that ensure paid sick days passed.

You can take action on this issue and help change the national conversation about restaurant workers' rights. Start here:

1. Buy and read Behind the Kitchen Door. In it, you'll find compelling stories about what happens when restaurant workers don't have access to paid sick days.
2. Tell us you bought the book. We're working to get Behind the Kitchen Door on the bestseller lists so that this issue gets the national attention it deserves and vital discussion and action follow.

The following blog post was written by Rev. John Gibb Millspaugh, editor of the forthcoming anthology The Joy of Just Eating: Food for Personal, Public, and Planetary Well-Being.

Do you eat? If so, this blog post is for you!

Unitarian Universalists have always united behind our responsibility to build a more decent society. In 2011 and 2012, Unitarian Universalists chose to make one aspect of that responsibility — our role in the food chain — explicit. Representatives of our congregations at General Assembly adopted a national “Statement of Conscience” called “Ethical Eating: Food and Environmental Justice,” and the Unitarian Universalist Service Committee (UUSC) launched its Choose Compassionate Consumption campaign.

Why food and why now? We are beginning to understand that when it comes to food, our society is speeding along various tracks, each heading toward a different future. Some of those futures further degrade people who are already carrying more than their share of social burdens, multiply the suffering of animals that are already living in misery, and further exploit natural resources that are already destabilized. Other futures build the world we dream about, where rights are respected and creation is honored.

In 2013, UUSC is teaming up with UUs across the country who are committed to ethical eating and to promoting the human rights of workers in the food system. Join us.

Remember how Michael Pollan’s Omnivore’s Dilemma and Eric Schlosser’s Fast Food Nation (made into the movie Food, Inc.) created a sea change of public interest in healthier eating? You can do that for the human rights of workers throughout the food chain with Behind the Kitchen Door: What Every Diner Should Know About the People Who Feed Us, a new book written by Saru Jayaraman. In it, Jayaraman shows us that food sustainability depends not only on the sourcing of the ingredients, but also on how workers are treated!

Behind the Kitchen Door is not just a book — it’s an opportunity for Unitarian Universalists to change the national conversation about how to create a truly sustainable food system.

Our immediate goal: get the book on the bestseller lists.

Our bigger goal: bring restaurant workers’ rights the national attention they deserve.

Will you commit to buying Behind the Kitchen Door in the critical first two weeks of its release, so we can make sure that millions of Americans read this book and join the conversation? Sign up right now to buy the book between February 11 and February 23, and please invite others as well. Together we can put it on the New York Times bestseller list! We’ll send you a reminder in February, along with information about how to buy the book.

This book will put an essential issue of economic justice on the map — but only with your help. Uniting for this cause is a golden opportunity not only for our faith, but also for the values we hold most dear. Will you take this one simple act to help build the world we dream about?

One more reason to participate: all proceeds from the book support the work of a UUSC partner organization to advance restaurant workers’ rights! Sign up today to help put Behind the Kitchen Door on the bestseller list.

With the holidays behind us, I finally have time to report a bit on my recent trip to Kenya for UUSC in which we visited four partner groups: the Kakamega Grassroots Initiative, the SoilFarm Multi-Culture Group (which runs the renowned Hope in Crops program), the Kenya National Alliance of Street Vendors and Informal Traders (KENASVIT), and Rock Women.

We met with leaders of Kenyan civil society concerning the recently adopted new constitution and the upcoming April national elections. I delivered a lecture on human rights and terrorism at the University of Nairobi. And Martha Thompson, manager of UUSC's Rights in Humanitarian Crises Program, and I even managed to slip in a visit to Karen Blixen's home at the foot of the Ngong Hills made famous in Out of Africa.

The breadth of impact we and our Kenyan partner groups are having is remarkable. The Kakamega Grassroots Initiative (KGI), for example, is supporting women widowed and displaced by the 2007 election-related violence, offering them trauma support and seeding their small businesses. With another election on the horizon, KGI is similarly investing in and training youth to run their own small market businesses on the theory that, since young people are often bribed to cause tribal mayhem in marketplaces in connection with elections, they will be less motivated to do so if they have businesses of their own that would be vulnerable to disruption in the event of violence.

Or take KENASVIT, which UUSC helped launch a number of years ago. The "informal sector" accounts for an astonishing 80 percent of Kenya's gross domestic product, but before KENASVIT came into existence, street vendors and hawkers were utterly at the mercy of the authorities who often had little sympathy for their needs. Beginning with 200 vendors, KENASVIT has grown to represent 15,000, winning numerous concessions regarding such things as working conditions, harassment by police, basic sanitation, etc.

And this is to say nothing about the SoilFarm Multi-Culture Group's planting of 80,000 trees, including in schools where they serve to educate the students about the value of rain forest and counter the illegal harvesting of trees in the Kakamega National Forest. And there is also Rock Women's efforts to end trafficking of girls or stop discrimination against Somali refugees whom the authorities stereotypically assume, given the conflict between Kenya and Somalia, are active in the al Qaeda-affiliated al-Shabaab.

A rewarding, if exhausting trip — but one that made me even prouder to be part of UUSC!

Behind the Kitchen Door is not just a book — it is the key to reaching a broad audience and changing the national conversation about how to create a truly sustainable food system.

There's a book I really want you to read, only here's the catch: it's not in bookstores yet. So why am I telling you? Because this book will put an essential issue of economic justice on the map — but only with your help. Our immediate goal: get it on the bestseller lists. Our bigger goal: change the national conversation about the rights of restaurant workers.

Raising wages for millions of restaurant workers

For the past three years, UUSC has been working our partner the Restaurant Opportunities Centers United (ROC-United) to raise the federal tipped minimum wage. It's been frozen at a mere $2.13 per hour since 1991, leaving millions of workers — mostly women — in poverty and unable to feed their own families. We've advocated for legislation (the WAGES Act and the Fair Minimum Wage Act of 2012), but none of it has made it into law yet. We expect a similar bill to be reintroduced in 2013, and we need to show policymakers that there is widespread popular support for raising this minimum wage.

We have a plan to achieve this! It starts with you — and it continues with everyone you know. We believe that there are millions of people who eat out at restaurants and who care about how the people who make their meals possible are treated. To reach those millions, ROC-United's codirector and cofounder Saru Jayaraman has written a book, Behind the Kitchen Door: What Every Diner Should Know About the People Who Feed Us, that provides an inside look into the personal experiences of restaurant workers around the country.

Here's what Danny Glover, actor, producer, and cofounder of Louverture Films, has said about the book:

"With Behind the Kitchen Door, Saru Jayaraman has introduced a fresh and essential perspective on our culture's food obsessions and dining habits. By highlighting the lives and circumstances of workers who are often unseen and unheard, she has helped us see that labor is a key ingredient of authentic sustainability, and greatly enriched our understanding of those people who have — whether we have recognized it or not — been part of some of the most important celebrations of our lives."

Putting the "W" in SLOW

Behind the Kitchen Door is not just a book — it is the key to reaching a broad audience and a unique opportunity for Unitarian Universalists and other UUSC and ROC-United supporters to change the national conversation about how to create a truly sustainable food system. Since Unitarian Universalists are often at the leading edge of emerging justice issues, more than 400 congregations across the country have been involved in the Ethical Eating Congregational Study Action Issue, and in 2011 the UU General Assembly approved "Ethical Eating: Food and Environmental Justice" as a statement of conscience.

Building on that foundation, UUSC believes that UUs can continue to be at the forefront of this national movement to improve the restaurant industry. Just as diners changed the restaurant industry by asking for sustainable, locally sourced, and organic (SLO) options, we can shift restaurant practices from the bottom up by requesting respect for workers' rights in every dining establishment — putting the "W" in SLOW.

How you can help

We hope that you will help take the lead in sharing the book's message and that we can work together to help Behind the Kitchen Door make it onto the New York Times bestsellers list, thereby garnering vital national attention for restaurant workers and their call for better conditions.

We will be counting on you to buy Behind the Kitchen Door in the critical first two weeks of its release — February 11-23, 2013 — to get it on the bestseller lists, so we can make sure that millions of Americans read this book and join the conversation. UUSC will provide links to Powell's Books and other vendors where you will be able to purchase the book. We will also offer a discussion guide and other materials to help you take action in your own community. Let's make this a major turning point for the more than 10 million workers who chop, cook, and serve our food!

Claiming that the Affordable Care Act, a.k.a. "Obamacare," will cost them millions, Papa John's, Olive Garden, and other restaurant chains are announcing that they will begin instituting higher menu prices and huge cuts to employees' hours. One Denny's franchise owner suggested that if customers were upset about paying the surcharge, they could choose to reduce tips to their servers to offset the increase. Meanwhile, some corporate executives are matter-of-factly admitting that to avoid passing the cost onto consumers they will simply evade the obligation to insure their workers by shifting to a part-time workforce. While it is appalling that restaurant employers are pronouncing their intention to ensure that workers don't receive basic benefits, this practice is hardly new.

The restaurant industry has maintained this status quo — in which more than 90 percent of restaurant workers don't have health insurance or paid sick days — by intervening to defeat the passage of paid-sick-day laws. But that's not all. They've also lobbied Congress for decades — yes, more than 20 years — to keep the federal tipped minimum wage at just $2.13 per hour. (And despite laws saying that employers have to make up the difference to reach regular minimum wage when tips fall short, the hard reality is that many employers ignore the law.) The industry is determined to be exempted from any policy aimed at providing fair wages and benefits to its workers.

UUSC partners with the Restaurant Opportunities Centers United (ROC-United) to ensure the opposite. As part of our Choose Compassionate Consumption initiative, we're working to make sure that restaurant workers receive what every worker deserves: a living wage, access to standard benefits like paid sick days and health insurance, and a chance to advance. And we need you to join us! We've got a bunch of opportunities to get involved coming up as we help get the word out about Behind the Kitchen Door, a book by ROC-United cofounder Saru Jayaraman that explores these issues.

Besides being the right and moral thing to do, standing up for the rights of restaurant workers is in our best interests as consumers — who wants to go out to dinner to celebrate and be served a side of germs because the waiter or the chef is working while sick?

Last Halloween, UUSC members joined with over 150,000 consumers, union allies, and religious groups, as well as over 40 food co-ops and natural grocers calling on Hershey to "raise the bar" and address issues of child and forced labor in their supply chain. I'm excited to tell you that on October 3, the Hershey Company announced that it will source 100 percent of its cocoa from certified cocoa producers by 2020 and bolster its programs to eliminate child labor in West Africa.

UUSC joins with our allies — Green America, Global Exchange, and the International Labor Rights Forum — to congratulate Hershey on this historic step and urge them to release specifics on how they will realize this commitment. So far, it is unclear which certification system the company intends to utilize. This is a critically important question since not all certifications adequately address the worst forms of child labor (as defined by the International Labour Organization's Convention 182).

Hershey has made promises in the past. In 2001, they signed on to the Harkin-Engel Protocol,  also known as the Cocoa Protocol, a voluntary nonbinding agreement in which they joined other cocoa companies and governments in promising to end child labor in cocoa supply chains. Over 10 years later, we have seen few steps from Hershey to fulfill that pledge.

We are cautiously optimistic that Hershey may in fact keep their latest promise — if anything because it will affect their bottom line. Only a week before Hershey's announcement, Whole Foods Market announced it was removing Hershey's Scharffen Berger line from its stores until Hershey took steps to address child labor in its supply chain.

While there is reason to be hopeful, we must also remain vigilant. We join with our allies in asking Hershey to do the following:

1. Establish a system of established third-party certifiers or vendor assurance programs, who will certify that they are in fact changing their policies
2. Set out clear benchmarks for how they will meet their 2020 goal
3. Have an in-house certification team to implement the plan
4. Invest in certification capacity building — in order to meet its goal it must invest in supporting growth of certified products
5. Be transparent and report on the impacts of this program

Regardless of the next steps to ensure that Hershey keeps its promise, we should pause to congratulate all those who have made this happen — including our members who have sent letters to the Hershey Company demanding this change! Consumer pressure works; that is why we encourage you to choose compassionate consumption. If you're interested in more on this issue, I recommend reading the International Labor Rights Forum's statement.

Now, I feel like eating a Reese's Peanut Butter Cup to celebrate — on second thought, not quite yet!

A few weeks ago, we witnessed a major victory for restaurant workers organized by the Restaurant Opportunities Centers (ROC) United, a UUSC partner, in this case led by the New York affiliate (ROC-NY). After two years of organizing, restaurant workers in New York City signed a settlement agreement with Del Posto Restaurant, owned by celebrity chef Mario Batali.

The settlement agreement includes paid sick days, new human resource policies, and $1.15 million in back wages. Most importantly, Batali has agreed to join ROC's Restaurant Industry Roundtable as a "high road" partner. News on the settlement made headlines across the country, with coverage from the Associated Press, New York Times, Washington Post, and Wall Street Journal.

It's important to note that this victory does not just affect the 31 current Del Posto workers immediately involved in the settlement — it will indirectly affect the many other workers within Batali's restaurant group and will have ripple effects for restaurant workers across New York City and throughout the industry at large. This strategy of organizing campaigns targeting high-profile fine-dining companies is all about setting standards across the industry.

This is just another affirmation that ROC's model truly works — and we're working with them to make sure similar victories will emerge from future campaigns!

Learn more about ROC-United's strategy from cofounder Saru Jayaraman: