Claudia, of Dragonfly Dreaming, sent me a link to The Story of Stuff, a riveting, 20-minute video that illustrates the chain of production/consumption and its worldwide impact. I learned from the video that 99% of the materials North Americans consume is discarded within six months…
That just won’t do.
I’ve touched on consumption several times before in this blog (here, for example). It’s an issue that haunts me more and more. Over the years, I’ve become increasingly conscious of just how unconsciously people buy stuff. Americans are the worst, as we all know. You have to have some pity on them, though; they were manipulated into becoming the consuming machines they are today. But they, and citizens of other wealthy nations need to wake up now. There’s no excuse for continuing their mindless consumption.
As they say in all of those 12-step programs, the first step is acknowledging that you have a problem. I’ve developed a simple two-step program for those with a stuff habit:
- Acknowledge that you have been brainwashed into thinking you need all that stuff and that your consumption contributes to the planet’s destruction.
- Get a hold of yourself.
Some people are becoming aware that need and want aren’t synonyms. Adbusters ran the Buy Nothing Day campaign in November of 2007. It’s a nice idea, but it probably served about as much purpose and got about as much attention as those worldwide “turn off your lights for 10 minutes” things. The powers that be basically say “Yeah, whatever.”
However, the Buy Nothing Day campaign inspired some very serious people to pledge to buy nothing that was not an absolute necessity for a whole year.
I’m a serious person too. My birthday was this month, and I’ve decided that I’m not going to buy a single new personal article until my next birthday unless it’s an absolute necessity. Just to be clear, I will have no problem buying used things. And I confess that at some point this year I’ll be getting a desk. For nearly two years, I’ve been working on a tiny café table that somebody left on the sidewalk. I need a little more space; the table’s barely bigger than my laptop and I keep banging my knees on the bar in the middle.
It won’t be hard for me to eschew shopping. Last year I bought a purse. I didn’t need it. I just coveted it and indulged myself. I got a few articles of clothing, more than half of them at thrift stores.
Maybe you’re thinking that it’s a good thing not everybody’s some kind of commie wack job who won’t shop because otherwise the economy would never grow… There you’ve been brainwashed again, I’m afraid. We’re at a place, in our world, where we need balance, not growth.
I admire the way Claudia is raising her daughter. In her post Wisdom in a child’s eyes, she talks about the monthly thrift store treasure hunts she goes on with her little girl. On these outings, they only allow themselves to come home with one thing:
Sometimes no matter how hard we look, there is nothing there, nothing meant to come home with us. Sometimes, we find more than one thing and we have to leave the store, take a walk, talk about the choices and come back, retrieving our prize, cherishing it even more, because it won out over all the other ‘treasures’.
Imagine how much more slowly our landfills would fill, how much longer our forests would last, how much more people would cherish the things they do have if everybody took a walk away from the cash register before deciding to walk towards it…
* blushes * Thank you for the kudos, it’s little things, but it’s nice to know they make a difference and someone noticed the effort. I LOVE to window shop, I won’t deny spending an hour or more on-line drooling, but I’ve learned to give in to the craving and then walk away. I get over it pretty quick, and now looking is just as much fun as buying. Last month’s thrift store purchase by the way, were .50 cent matching necklaces that Zsa & I absolutely ADORE. We feel wealthy beyond our means when we wear them out and the sun catches the crystal (glass, surely) and makes rainbows on our skin. :)
How lovely! I agree, window shopping is just as much fun! I enjoy looking, maybe I picture where things would fit in my little world, and I move along to the next fantasy.
I’m afraid I must confess I’ve become a victim of my uncontrollable urges (no no, not those :-)
I drove a gas-guzzling old timer that polluted like a steamtrain, so I dumped my old wreck and got myself a super eco-friendly car. OK, I may have stopped my CO2 footprint, but producing this new car will take years to compensate.
I noticed that the best remedy for uncontrollable spending is having no space to put your stuff.
This place is way too small to buy anything new ;-)
Hi Peter. Trust me, I know about the space issue. The average Parisian lives in a MUCH smaller space than the average American. It’s been an adjustment for me. And, like you, I couldn’t fit anything else into this apartment either. It will definitely make it easier not to buy stuff!
I like the idea in the TSOS video but doubt some of her facts. E.g.:
- 99% for waste at 6 months
- 4.5 lbs. per day of garbage
- The 3000 CMs per day
We just don’t produce that much garbage in the U.S., nor are there enough hours in a week to see so many ads. But I’d like ot know where she got her numbers. Maybe they make sense in some way.
One more thought about consumption. But buy second-hand, pre-owned, or otherwise used items where possible. This keeps stuff out of dumps and landfill.
-R
I don’t know Roger… I lived in California suburbia for three years, in an environmentally oblivious town (inland…). You should have seen the overflowing trash bins my neighbors rolled out. Ours was a third full and it was our recycling that overflowed, if anything. If you think about the way most other Americans live (not like you and me), eating packaged foods, not recycling everything they should (if anything at all) and buying STUFF constantly, 4.5 lbs a day doesn’t seem like a stretch to me at all.
As for the 99% waste, I’m sure that includes the packaging that things come in.