Capitalist greed leads to Chinese man’s suicide

An employee at a factory in south China that produces iPhones for Apple committed suicide last week upon learning that he was suspected of leaking company secrets.

Sun Danyong began working for Foxconn International, a unit of  Taiwanese company Hon Hai that builds iPhones for the Apple Corporation, in 2008.

The 25-year-old product manager originally became upset after he noticed that one of the 16 prototypes of Apple’s new fourth-generation N90 iPhone had gone missing. The iPhone is Apple’s best selling product and the details of new versions are well guarded secrets.

After discovering that the prototype was missing, Sun frantically sent text messages to an ex-classmate and his girlfriend voicing his concern. He told them that he was doing all he could to try to find the missing device but was unsuccessful.

Apparently, officials from Foxconn’s security division believed Sun had stolen the missing phone and raided his home.

The next day, Sun jumped from his 12th floor apartment window to his death.

If society was organized in order to meet human need, instead of being organized to create profits for an elite group, this sort of thing would never happen. Inventions and improvements would pursued for the benefit of humanity as a whole and would be spread widely as soon as possible. They wouldn’t be kept secret so that a select few could benefit.

As long as the production of the things humans need and want remains under the control of the capitalists, these sorts of tragedies will continue.