Sweatshops pay higher than average wages. There are alternatives, the alternatives are worse.

Sweatshops don't represent a deviation to the worse. They represent a deviation for the better. We look at them and see how bad people have things and get upset - and completely ignore how much worse things would be without them. You say these people are invisible, but the really invisible people are the people who the West never interacts with at all, and are significantly worse off for it. People who complain about sweatshops tick me off, because they never offer a real solution; their solutions are always "fair trade", which is always about protectionist policies that ensure these people never get a fighting chance at those scraps from the West's table.

</rant>

Yes. My comments were addressing specifically Western concerns, because that is where fubarobfusco's comment seemed to be coming from.