Mr. Daisey and the Apple Factory

The above This American Life piece on how Apple products are manufactured in Shenzhen, China, floored me, for the following reasons:

Mike Daisey, the storyteller to whom the bulk of the episode is dedicated, performs a piece of theatrical alchemy that’s absolutely amazing. He doesn’t justtell us about the bizarre, often awful working conditions under which our electronic devices are made, he places us there, mentally and emotionally. He makes the truly alien understandable, and gives us the ability to truly empathize with people we can barely imagine. That’s not only great storytelling — it also provides us with an intimate understanding his subject of a sort that journalism is often unable to provide, despite the fact that “intimate understanding” is so often the point of journalism.

Other shows — most other shows on NPR, even — would be content to broadcast Daisey’s story and leave it at that. But when the story is over, Ira Glass does something remarkable — he fact-checks it. The result? Most of it’s true, but a few details are unverifiable or were, perhaps, isolated incidents. But yes, the thrust of Mike’s story checks out. And finally,

Other shows would be content to say, “Hey, isn’t this horrifying?” and leave it at that. Instead, Glass goes on to interview a range of writers and activists, and gets a range of opinions on the issue — notably, Nicholas Kristof points out that factories like these contribute enormously to ending poverty in third-world countries. Finally, Glass notes in the close of the show that the entire episode you just heard was produced entirely on Apple computers. Which is to acknowledge, tacitly, how difficult and complex this problem is, because, after all, if it weren’t for the amazing yet troubling Apple products that brought you this program, you wouldn’t know how troubling nearly every piece of electronics you own is.

All of which is to say that the synthesis of storytelling and journalism that This American Life has developed and recently perfected is totally unique in American media, and immensely effective. I can’t think of another outlet that combines the intimate, empathetic aspects of storytelling with the rigorous chops of journalism, and to such great effect. Ira Glass and his contributors have been doing some amazing, historic work.

All of which is to say, go listen to this with the lights off.

Supplemental materials: Here’s what Apple’s done in response to this piece. It’s pretty good, but they still have a long ways to go. And Mike Daisey is a fascinating performer who I’m currently fascinated with. Here’s his account of how he adapted the piece from his live stage show; here’s a comprehensive list of his work; and here’s an unbelievable video of eighty-seven Christian protesters walking out of one of his shows because he said “fuck.” And here’s his unbelievable followup to that incident.

A number of his monologues are available, ironically, in the iTunes store.