My 30 Days of Consumer Celibacy (OnEarth Mag., via AlterNet)

My 30 Days of Consumer Celibacy

By Wendee Holtcamp, OnEarth Magazine. Posted June 18, 2007.



For a whole month, one writer practiced a kind of abstinence so she could better understand her own complicity in our throwaway culture. It wasn't easy.

A few days into a vow of shopping celibacy, I visit a Hallmark store with my kids. The 75-percent-off rack draws me in. I've forgotten that I'm supposed to be living according to the Compact, an agreement to avoid all new purchases in favor of used goods in an attempt to reduce my impact on the environment.

"Look at these cute penguins," I say, showing them to my kids.

My 10-year-old son, Sam, picks one up. "Cool. They poop candy."

I pay and leave the store before realizing what I've done. I stop short. "I am not supposed to buy anything new!" I yelp. My kids glare at me. "Well," I say, taking a deep breath, "I will just have to start again tomorrow."

The original Compacters, who formed their group in early 2006, did not intend to start a movement. It was just 10 San Francisco friends trying to reduce their consumption by not buying new stuff for a year. The group's manifesto was simple: to counteract the negative global environmental and socioeconomic impacts of U.S. consumer culture. Named after the Pilgrims' revolutionary Mayflower Compact, the small idea led to a Yahoo Web site that has attracted more than 8,000 adherents and spawned some 50 groups in spots as far-flung as Hong Kong and Iceland.

...(snip)...

The average American generates about 4.5 pounds of trash a day -- a figure that, according to the Environmental Protection Agency, includes paper, food, yard trimmings, furniture, and everything else you toss out at home and on the job. That makes the United States the trashiest country in the industrialized world, followed by Canada at 3.75 pounds a day and the Netherlands at 3 pounds a day. In part, we can thank the corporations that spend billions to convince us that the newest, shiniest widgets will make us happy and attract friends and lovers.

What's more, each new widget is designed to wear out or otherwise fade into obsolescence, so we'll have almost no choice but to buy more and more. In the words of Dr. Seuss's Once-ler in The Lorax, "A Thneed's a Fine-Something-That-All-People-Need!!" The old Thneed -- often in working condition -- goes out with the trash. And in the process of making thneeds, the Swomee-Swans get smog in their throats and the Super-Axe-Hacker whacks all the Truffala-Trees, and the gills of the Humming-Fish get gummed up with Gluppity-Glup. .....(more)

The complete piece is at: http://www.alternet.org/environment/54215/

the elements, food and water.

The rest is Madison Avenue.

Since I inherited, I really haven't gone on a spree. I've replaced a few things that have broken down with upgrades, but that's about it. I no longer feel entitled to shop at thrift shops, although I look through them when I donate, because too many people are still as poor as I was and need to shop at thrift shops. I have alternatives now that others don't have.

Packaging is something else. I hate the stuff. I buy staples in bulk at the food co-op. I reuse plastic food bags. I use canvas shopping bags. I recycle everything I can, including those nasty plastic shopping bags some stores insist you take.

Needless to say, I haven't produced my trash quota in years.

Voluntary simplicity and not buying anything but food for a month is a good exercise in seeing where your money really goes. I'm very conflicted about the thrift shop idea, though, because once needing to shop there, I'm all too aware that competing with people who still need to is a bad idea.

It really sucks when the simplicity is involuntary.

indulge in your thrift stores. There is plenty for everyone. What the thrift stores don't sell ends up in a land fill so you aren't stopping someone else from getting what they need, you are saving the land fills from getting more stuff.

*AND* you are reusing instead of buying new and that's always good. Are the thrift stores in your town almost empty of goods? Is there a very small amount of used goods available in your area? If the answer to these questions is "No" then go for it! If the answer is "yes" then go to the bigger town near you. What you spend in gas to get there is more than made up by the lack of production resources for new products (most of which will use several times the amount of fuel you would)

and I don't. My needs are few and very simple. For a while I salved my conscience at the beginning of last year by donating much more than I was taking away. No more.

The shops are full, but the better quality goods I'd be interested in are few and far between. That's what I'm giving people who are still as poor as I was a crack at.

used up

there is very very little available in the used goods market.

the only place to find better quality goods used is at estate sales of folks who's kids live out of state.

The folks down here don't throw much away that's for sure.

My office lamp story: I bought these swing arm lamps for our office -- you know the type with the clamp. They were $20 each, but within one year the switches on all of them had stopped working, so you couldn't turn them on/off. It took quite a search to find an old German man who still repaired small electronic appliances. He charged me $8 a lamp for new switches & they have worked perfectly now for years.

"I keep pretty busy," he told us. "There are lots of folks who don't want to just throw something away over a small switch or wiring problem." We asked who else did this type of work & he said no one. A few places that do larger items, but no toaster type repair shops. "When I'm gone, a lot more stuff will get thrown out."

k&r