The Hidden Hands Behind Cheap Chinese Goods

Sun Yi holding the SOS letter he wrote, which made its way around the world and back to him. Courtesy Flying Cloud Productions

Commentary

In 2012, a woman in Oregon opened a box of Halloween decorations from Kmart. Tucked inside was a scrap of paper, scrawled in broken English with a desperate plea: “If you occasionally buy this product, please kindly resend this letter to the World Human Rights Organization.” It described long hours, beatings, a brutal Chinese labor camp. The writer, Sun Yi, an engineer and husband, had been jailed for practicing Falun Gong, a spiritual discipline outlawed by the Chinese Communist Party.

I told Sun Yi’s story in my documentary “Letter from Masanjia.” I still remember his gentle stoicism, a quiet strength that masked a steely perseverance, as if fear and hope wrestled in every line he wrote. Sun risked everything to smuggle that note out. He knew he might never be free, yet he believed that if we knew the truth, we would care. That someone, somewhere, would act.

Today, we are caught up in tariffs, trade wars, and supply chain fixes. It is all about inflation, market access, political leverage. But we are missing the heart of it. Behind those bargain-bin trinkets are lives. While Sun Yi found a way to speak out, most are trapped in factories behind walls, silenced by fear.

I do not mean to paint China with a broad brush. Not every item made in China is through forced labor. And most workers there are just trying to make a living, like anyone else. But the reality is grim. China runs one of the world’s largest forced labor systems. Uyghurs, Tibetans, Falun Gong practitioners, political dissidents, and religious minorities are detained without trial, subjected to reeducation, and forced into factories tied to global brands. In January 2025, the United States banned imports from Huafu Fashion and its subsidiaries for using Uyghur labor in Xinjiang’s cotton industry. Retailers like H&M once sourced from such mills, a reminder that this is not history. It is now.

I am no economist. Whether tariffs are sound trade policies is for others to debate. But I know this: tariffs will not fix what is broken in those camps. They are about numbers. Markets do not feel the prisoner’s pain. The threats. The silence. Justice is not a price adjustment.

The power is with us. Consumers, businesses, investors. We decide what is acceptable. When we ask where our stuff comes from, when companies demand clean supply chains, when investors value ethics alongside profit, things shift. That is not radical. It is responsible. It says values matter, even in a global economy.

Governments can help. The Uyghur Forced Labor Prevention Act, which blocks imports tied to forced labor, does more than tariffs. So do sanctions on complicit companies. These tools keep human dignity in focus, not just trade balances.

It is tempting to think cheaper is always better. But what is the real cost? In that labor camp, Sun Yi knew the risks of his defiance. He believed in us. His letter sparked headlines. His story lives on. Now that we know, the question is not what the market will do. It is what we will do.

Policies will shift. Politics will change. But acting with conscience does not need to wait. It starts here. With us.

Views expressed in this article are opinions of the author and do not necessarily reflect the views of The Epoch Times.