Reviews with content warning for Suicidal thoughts - Cobalt Red: How the Blood of the Congo Powers Our Lives

Reviews tagging 'Suicidal thoughts'

Cobalt Red: How the Blood of the Congo Powers Our Lives by Siddharth Kara

9 reviews

ethana's review

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challenging dark emotional informative reflective sad medium-paced

5.0

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lizziaha's review

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4.75

Crazy how so many of the world’s problems come back to capitalism. It’s a system that allows the privileged to exploit and mistreat their fellow humans while simultaneously eschewing any and all accountability for the exploitation and human rights violations that they have built their fortunes on.
I think that before reading this book, I wasn’t really sure how to engage with the human rights violations in the Congo because the way I had seen it explained made me think that the problem was farther down the chain, at a local level. But this is something that the book addresses—at every point in the supply chain, there is someone who profits from exploitation and at every point, they point the finger at someone else.
It was frankly horrifying to read about these people who risk their lives daily for a few dollars. It’s sickening to know that children die in tunnel collapses, that women grow sick from metal poisoning from tainted water, that men get shot by greedy entrepreneurs for trying to bypass the middleman. All so that I can sit here and type this on my rechargeable phone. It’s a tale as old as time and I’m so disgusted by it.
But I think that this is something that I have a moral obligation to witness. They say that history moves in circles, but that’s only possible because we don’t engage with it in a meaningful way.
This book makes this situation accessible—I felt like I got a broad view of the overarching system of exploitation and oppression, but also felt an emotional connection to the people whose individual stories were shared.

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albernikolauras's review against another edition

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challenging informative sad tense medium-paced

4.5

An excellent non-fiction book following the cobalt miners (& minors) that fuel the battery revolution happening throughout the world. Kara visits different mining towns, some of the mines themselves, and the places where the cobalt that is "illegally mined" is introduced into the cobalt supply in a systematic matter. He describes the systems that trap these miners in an endless cycle of poverty and disproves the claims that companies make for "child labor free cobalt" and "funding of schools in mining areas." Kara balances fact and statistic with human story as he gives names and faces to those harmed by our desire for progress at no thought of cost.

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anna_wa's review against another edition

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challenging dark informative sad

5.0

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haleybird's review against another edition

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challenging dark emotional informative reflective sad slow-paced

4.0

This book was incredibly thought provoking and informative, it’s just really dense and was personally hard for me to get through, but I’m glad I did! It’s difficult for me to keep up with so many acronyms, company names, so much data and stats, etc.

Regardless of that, however, I do believe this is a book that anyone who uses rechargeable electronics or electric vehicles should read. The more people know about the atrocities that continue to be committed in the Congo for the sole purpose of exploiting their resources, the better.

I will surely be much more conscious about my consumption of products that use rechargeable batteries moving forward, as I can’t in good conscience keep blindly consuming while children, women, and men in the Congo continue to die indiscriminately. We all need to do better!

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