Reviews tagging 'Colonisation'

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

51 reviews

katharina90's review against another edition

challenging emotional informative reflective medium-paced

5.0

"Please tell the people in your country, a child in the Congo dies every day so that they can plug in their phones."

Whatever you think you know about mineral mining in the Congo, the reality is so much worse. 

Siddharth Kara paints a devastating picture of the dystopian world we live in and the cruelty most of us in the Global North are complicit in every day. 

"Nothing looks the same after a trip to the Congo. The world back home no longer makes sense. It is difficult to reconcile how it even inhabits the same planet. Neatly arranged mountains of vegetables at grocery stores seem vulgar. Bright lights and flushing toilets seem like sorcery. Clean air and water feel like a crime. The markers of wealth and consumption appear violent."

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Child abuse, Child death, Death, Genocide, Gun violence, Physical abuse, Racism, Slavery, Violence, Murder, Colonisation, and Injury/Injury detail

Moderate: Cancer, Chronic illness, Confinement, Miscarriage, Rape, Sexism, Terminal illness, Torture, and Trafficking

Minor: Alcoholism

ethana's review

challenging dark emotional informative reflective sad medium-paced

5.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Child death, Gun violence, Slavery, Suicidal thoughts, Grief, Colonisation, and Injury/Injury detail

Moderate: Rape, Sexual assault, and Sexual violence

sareidle's review

dark informative sad slow-paced

3.75

An extremely important book that highlights the human cost of cobalt in the Democratic Republic of Congo. The author did a pretty good job focusing on the Congolese and their experiences as artisanal miners. It was devastatingly sad to learn of the generational suffering in the country. My only critique is that the author needed to provide a better call to action towards the conclusion. Yes, it is important for the Congolese to tell their own stories, but what can the international community do to make that possible and improve their conditions in the meantime?

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Child death, Death, Grief, and Injury/Injury detail

Moderate: Chronic illness, Terminal illness, Pregnancy, and Colonisation

Minor: Alcoholism, Miscarriage, Sexual assault, Sexual harassment, and Pandemic/Epidemic

andeulea's review against another edition

challenging emotional informative slow-paced

4.5

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Child death, Death, Slavery, Violence, Medical trauma, Death of parent, Colonisation, and Injury/Injury detail

Moderate: Rape and Torture

Minor: War

rafacolog's review against another edition

O autor toma uma posição fatalista a respeito do povo congolês, o que me incomodou muito ao longo do texto. Muitas coisas me incomodaram sobre como era descrito, mesmo eu não sabendo dizer exatamente o que, mas ler a opinião de alguns artigos e reviews de pessoas do Congo me fez perceber que meu incomodo é correto e eu ainda não tinha percebido muitas coisas. Interrompi a leitura já que não acho que será tão boa quanto pensei e vou outras opções mais recomendadas pelas pessoas que apontaram os erros e defeitos desse livro.

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Content Warnings

Moderate: Child death, Genocide, Racism, Slavery, and Colonisation

skeltzer's review against another edition

challenging dark informative sad fast-paced

4.0

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Child death, Colonisation, and Injury/Injury detail

Moderate: Slavery

lizziaha's review

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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Content Warnings

Graphic: Child abuse, Child death, Death, Slavery, Grief, Colonisation, and Injury/Injury detail

Moderate: Alcoholism, Confinement, Genocide, Gun violence, Infertility, Miscarriage, Rape, Sexual assault, Suicidal thoughts, Pregnancy, and Alcohol

tey_lynn's review

challenging dark emotional informative reflective sad medium-paced

4.5

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Child death, Death, Genocide, Gun violence, Slavery, Torture, Violence, Trafficking, Grief, Medical trauma, Murder, Colonisation, and Injury/Injury detail

Moderate: Sexual assault, Sexual violence, and Pregnancy

dragongirl271's review

challenging dark informative sad medium-paced

4.75

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Child death and Injury/Injury detail

Moderate: Death, Genocide, Sexual assault, Slavery, Torture, Trafficking, Grief, Murder, and Colonisation

Minor: Police brutality and Pandemic/Epidemic

bookishmillennial's review

challenging dark emotional informative reflective sad slow-paced

disclaimer: I don’t really give starred reviews. I hope my reviews provide enough information to let you know if a book is for you or not. Find me here: https://linktr.ee/bookishmillennial

Audiobook was incredibly monotone, so I don't recommend that. However, I'm unsure reading the ebook or print copy will be better, as this book was really repetitive, and didn't particularly offer any big answer or question about this horrific issue in Congo. 

My takeaway is this: Do not buy new electronics that use cobalt; try to buy refurbished if accessible and use things until you simply *cannot* anymore. Like, until they no longer function. Until they cannot operate and it is slowing down anything you do on them. You do not need a new iPhone every single year, or the newest iteration of an Apple watch, or the newest iPad every time it's released. 

I will continue reading about Congo, and will write to my reps about the U.S. companies' complicity in this situation. It's not perfect, and I recognize it's not enough, but it is what I can do as a singular human. I encourage you to do what you can within your own capacity and to inform those in your own circles of influence. 

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Content Warnings

Graphic: Child abuse, Child death, Genocide, Violence, Murder, and Colonisation

Moderate: Sexual assault, Sexual violence, Slavery, and Alcohol