Somewhere along the line this, like green consumerism, does not really compute, does it now?
By Michael Smith (Veshengro)
Recently the term “ethical consumerism” arrived in some places in the media and I just cannot get my head around that oxymoron, which is a little in the league with “green consumerism.”
What is ethical on consumption though I know very well where they are coming from and that is with regards to buying ethical goods, like buying green goods, but the point is to buy less stuff rather than to keep buying more and more and more.
We are not doing anything to get out of the recession buy shopping till we drop, whether it is green and ethical goods or ordinary goods? All we are doing is to put money, more money, into the pockets of the multi-nationals who also now are on the ethical and green bandwagon.
While, certainly, if we have to buy things we should make ethic and green an issue. We should never, however, go out to buy this or that ethical or green product simply because we are being told that we need this or that to be good ethical or green people.
There is nothing ethical or green about buying anything just for the sake of it being considered green or ethical when you don't need to buy any product of that nature.
You also do not have to buy green cleaners, for instance; you can make them yourself from simple household ingredients at a fraction of the cost of bought products. That is being green and ethical, not shopping.
When you repurpose a glass produce jar for a storage or even canning jar or a tin can for a pencil bin then that is being green. It is not green going out and buying a set of recycled glass storage jars, however, or a recycled steel pencil bin. That is just want and consumerism.
Before you buy anything ask whether you haven't got it already either as a product as it is, as something you can repurpose or upcycle or whether it is not something that, for little effort and expense, you could easily make for yourself.
That is being green and ethical, not partaking in consumerism whether it is claimed to be green and/or ethical or not. Whatever title consumerism is being given here, be it “ethical”, “green”, “eco”, etc., it is and remains consumerism and does not become anything benign.
We have to change the way that we think and relearn the ways of our great-grandparents, grandparents and parents, depending on our age. Some are too young to have parents who, in the main, know the old ways of making do and of mending rather than of buying [new].
© 2011
