Let's Flex Our Non-Consumer Muscles

Go unshopping the week of April 15 to 22. Shake up the CEOs.

Stay away from the corporate retailers. Skip Starbucks,
Home Depot, Safeway, and the Mediaplex.

Support your local economy, go to the library, shop at
the thrift store. Spread the word.

http://www.wearenotbuyingit.org/

if you haven't used it in the last month, you can probably stand to sell or donate it!

I'm in. :hi:
k&r!

:)

but feels good when I find a substitute. I still hit Safeway sometimes. That's about it. :)

Even so, I can participate by staying out of Safeway and
the 7-11 store, minimizing driving, and paying slightly
higher prices at the mom and pop hardware store instead
of going to Home Depot.

Also by taking the opportunity to encourage people in general
to shop at thrift stores and garage sales and to repair
things instead of buying new.

I think the real key is to change over as much of your life as possible, rather than trying to make a brief statement.

I try not to buy anything new that I can get used (unless there is a really good reason to buy new), we donate all of our usable old things, try to shop at small, local businesses whenever possible, or at least the less abhorrent big ones.

but I can stop shopping for everything non-essential.

Not to mention that anything not purchased then will probably be purchased at some later date anyway.

Appreciate the intent, but in my opinion it's just inconsequential. I know you mean well though.

a week. By depressing the numbers one week, we make a statement.

Your claim that it doesn't matter is like saying a demonstratrion on
March 17 doesn't matter because we're not going to demonstrate on
March 20.

and personally the only "shopping" I've done lately has been at the grocery store and one local shop that I visit once every week or two.

But it is too hard to coordinate enough people to do this for it to make a difference. On the local level, maybe, but not on the national level.

People run out of milk, they need gas, someone's birthday comes up, there are always reasons.

I went to Target once to do some Christmas shopping this past December. Other than that, the only spending I've done has been groceries -- at my local family-owned grocery store -- and at the gas station about every two weeks.

"Unshopping" has been my personal lifestyle for most of my adult life. I'm a longtime non-consumer old hippie. I don't even own a credit card.

So, sorry, I can't really be of any help.

sw

you could get more than half the population to do this , unfortunately they won't .

Everyone like minded can do their part but that's about all .

There are very few if any food markets anywhere near me anymore , everything is a super store .

They took over and designed this on purpose .

I do agree with you .

Spring's been cancelled this year on account of apathy. :)

(which bypasses the middleman and puts money directly into foreign coffee grower's hands instead so that they don't starve like those growing coffee for other companies down there like Maxwell House, etc.). Either that or get "shade grown" coffee, which certifies that coffee was grown in more natural rain forest conditions, which better preserves the balance of nature down south, and is actually better quality coffee too.

Starbucks is testing this now (according to the documentary on Link TV this week called "Birdsong and Coffee"), so not all of their coffee is this way. But if we make a point of all buying it, it should send them a message where we want our business going if they want the progressive community (which as a "blue" company in many respects they try to cater to).

They still don't have their expresso beans fair traded yet, so the next time I'll have to avoid getting expresso there.

After watching this documentary I was trying to come up with an idea of how perhaps we might persuade our companies to buy fair traded coffee instead of the "cheap stuff" since it is one of the few staples that many companies buy for employees and basically tell you "to take what you get". Perhaps if we started groups up in companies where we work that would get our donations that perhaps could be matched by the company that would make up any difference in price that buying "fair trade" coffee instead might incur, we can help send a big message to the coffee companies if we could affect the big bulk purchases of certain companies. The documentary noted that coffee beans were about the second highest traded commodity next to oil in the world economy, so we COULD make a big difference if we were to come up with a good strategy. I'm told that there's not a big amount of difference between fair trade certified coffee versus other coffee either, so it wouldn't be that big a hit for us to absorb. I think it would be a good challenge to make of our companies to increase worker satisfaction.

We must have been typing away at the same time. And with the same thought in mind. I saw that documentary, and it changed the way I look at consuming and corporations.

And it's off to bed. Smiling, I might add!

It's more complex than it used to be, with different costs of living, different areas of specialization and resources, etc., but up until recently, the corporations, with the aid of the WTO, IMF, etc. along with many corrupt governments have helped corporations mask the true effects of what are REAL prices and REAL inflation that have happened, with their race to the bottom where they try to use slave or severely artificially cheap labor to artificially lower their labor costs so that they can fatten the execs wallets at the top and not cause the investors or board members to suffer in the process.

The wingnuts have been trying to force us into division by blaming "illegal immigrants" for the problem, which some of their poorer xenophobic followers swallow without really thinking through the real problems. I do think that allowing unbridled immigration to come in without dealing with the problems at the source country where they are coming from isn't solving the problem, but we need to be careful not to blame the immigrants themselves, but find ways to work together to force the multi-nationals to pay a fair wage EVERY PLACE and fair working conditions as well. We may have to have multi-national strikes at some point in the spirit of globalization too.

It's a facet of this same concept of consumer power.

I think the main problem with our consumer situation is that there is a disconnect between those who make the products and those who buy them. And that is, those who make the products are often not receiving proper payment. We're more concerned about the price we pay than the lives of the people who supply us with the "stuff". A good example is coffee. The second largest commodity next to oil. The big corporations have stiffed the workers who farm and process the coffee. And we don't really know it. Thanks to places like freetrade.org we can do somthing about it now. If we pay a little more, and find a way to get the workers their fair share, instead of making Maxwell House super rich, these people can go to high school, and have housing, and medical care.

Let's use our consumer power for good. I think we're just beginning to see how damaging these big corporations have been for us and the planet. Our consumption has killed everything in it's path. We're in Iraq because we want our oil at an artificially low price. And that price includes war and global warming. But to bomb a country to death because of our addiction to it is a crime. We've enabled Bush to do it in our name. Whether people want to agree with that or not, it's what is happening. If nobody used oil Bush wouldn't be there. Maybe we can kick the oil monopoly in the ass. But it would require paying the true cost for gas. That is what we should be doing. Ten bucks a gallon? I doubt anyone is ready and willing for that! But we owe it to the Iraqi people, and the planet.

Let's help each other out. Let's create a system whereby there are no victims. We might even be able to decrease our military spending if we played nice. There's plenty of room for boycotting. It's a great tool. Let's also look at the opposing facet- let's set up a new game. Those corporations that are screwing the world into poverty should be eliminated. And we should be willing to pay true prices. Not just one sided prices that benefit consumers only. It's one planet. And we all live here. Let's not take advantage of anyone. Then we're all truly happy people. And that is the name of the game. That would make this a world of happy and proud people. I don't want this to be just a dream. I want people in Somalia and Baghdad and Costa Rica to be as happy as people in San Francisco and New York.

Only thing I buy new is food and an article of clothing or two.

buy a new one, it's easier." They fail to recognize that it takes
time to go to the bank, go to the store, shop around, schlep stuff home,
maybe your item doesn't work and has to be returned, you have to recycle
the packaging.

You've got nothing to lose by trying to repair something if the alternative
is to throw it away. And you might learn something.

It seems like the easiest thing in the world to do.

It seems like a worthwhile thing to impress upon the
economic decision-makers the power of the American people.