Action Alert! OverLord & Taylor - May Department Stores Pushing Products of Oppression

This winter, help stop dictatorship in Burma: May Department Stores is helping support Burma's military regime by retailing huge quantities of "Made in Burma" products. Please take a minute to tell this company to end support for forced labor and stop the retail of products from Burma!

Write May's Director of Customer Service, James F. Harner, at james_harner (at) may-co.com, and cc your message to Sharon Bateman, May’s public relations person, at sharon_bateman (at) may-co.com.


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Send an Email Demanding That May Stop Supporting Slavery in Burma!

May Department Stores, owner of the chains Lord & Taylor, Foley's, Filene's, and Strawbridge's, retails garments from Burma - a Southeast Asian country ruled by a brutal military dictatorship. But the company should know better: the garment industry in Burma is closely tied to a modern form of slave labor.

Garment companies in Burma are controlled completely by the country’s dictators, whom have been criticized by the U.S. State Department, the United Nations, Amnesty International, and others for brutal violations of human rights -- killing, torture, a modern form of slave labor, and rape.

The money you spend in May Department Stores on clothes from Burma benefits Burma’s military dictators and means more suffering for the 50 million people living in the country.

Burma's dictatorship leads the world in child soldiers with over 70,000 - many of whom are literally kidnapped off city streets and forced into a life of beatings and dehumanizing treatment. As soldiers, these children are forced to take part in atrocities like torture, rape, and murder of civilians in Burma's rural areas. They are also treated as slaves - forced to toil for their officers' profit.

Write May's Director of Customer Service, James F. Harner, at james_harner (at) may-co.com and cc it to sharon_bateman (at) may-co.com.

Points to include in your email:

· Forced labor - including forced child labor - is used in the construction of Burma’s factories and infrastructure, as has been documented by the U.S. State Department and the International Labor Organization.

· Other companies have agreed to stop stocking products from Burma, including Federated Department Stores, Wal-Mart, Gart Sports, The Children's Place Retail Stores, IKEA, Williams Sonoma, Crate & Barrel, Costco, Burlington Coat Factory, and Family Dollar.

· May Department Stores perpetuates forced labor, the forced conscription of child soldiers, and other abuses in Burma by helping to create a demand for products made there and by providing currency for Burma's regime and its cronies.

· MOST IMPORTANT: YOU WILL NOT SHOP AT ANY MAY DEPARTMENT STORES (or its subsidiary chains Lord & Taylor, Famous-Barr, Filene's, Foley's, Hecht's, Kaufmann's, L.S. Ayres, Meier & Frank, Robinsons-May, Strawbridge's, The Jones Store, David's Bridal, After Hours, or Priscilla of Boston) UNTIL THE COMPANY STOPS SELLINGS GOODS FROM BURMA.

· DO NOT SIMPLY CUT AND PASTE THIS MESSAGE INTO YOUR EMAIL.

Please send a copy of your email to and any responses you get from the company to dbeeton (at) freeburmacoalition.org.


For more information on the boycott of products from Burma,
www.freeburmacoalition.org or call 202-547-5985.