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Can we really consider canning consumerism?
For those of you who have an adverse reaction to clicking on the “Comments” links, I wanted to quote a little bit of the exchange that I’ve been having with “Deri” (not Gerry’s real name…. oops) on my “The Greatest Show I’ve Ever Seen” post.
Deri said:
Since Bono is an anti-poverty campaigner, why does he get people to part with lots of dollars to watch U2 perform? Isn’t it ironic that his success depends in part upon the consumerist system of the west? How many truly useful gifts from the TEAR christmas catalogue could have been bought if all attendees at the concert didn’t go but spent their ticket money on those instead?Geoff said:
Gerry (Deri, Merry, whatever you would like to be called
) your comment is fair to a degree, but I do wonder how many occupations in today’s society fail the test of having their “success depend in part upon the consumerist system of the west”.
The man was a rock star well before he was a poverty advocate, and has since found a way to utilize the currency of celebrity to make a difference (and make no mistake – it is making a difference)
Deri said:
So if even only say 50% of us have occupations that depend on the consumer system, then we may be trapped, (because if the system is altered then 50% maybe unemployed and that would impact the remainder of us). The personal cost may too high to radically alter the system, e.g. without a thriving economy we could not afford to reach the MDG aid budget targets, and our own internal needs may be too costly e.g. supporting the unemployed. Maybe we should try to make the system as just as possible without collapsing it. To get a vision of a non-consumerist society just go to the Pacific – minimal choice of goods (not necesarily bad), absolute dependence on susbsistence agriculture (good if you have a good climate and soil (some Pacific countries) bad if you have dry climate and poor soils (many African countries), minimal IT (you’re out of a job Geoff), average annual income $800, etc.
and because I didn’t have anything else intelligent to say, the conversation stopped right there. But it’s been mulling around my head, and I’m desperate to hear from the people who have the answers (or perhaps even just some ideas), about what the ultimate goal of transforming our society really is. Is a non-consumeristic society doomed to turn everywhere without great land and wonderful nutrient filled soil into a wasteland?
And to what extent can someone like myself, whose occupation depends on the very consumeristic mentality for survival; putting me in a basket with easily half of Australia; actually do something about the rampant consumerism. Will anything I do only be window dressing unless I’m willing to throw away career and lifestyle to become a social justice advocate?
If it was earlier in the evening I’d post more thoughts, and I might re-visit this, but I’m very very keen to get some feedback on how you rectify that imbalance in thought and action. And whether or not it’s possible to support breaking up the system that’s holding it all together.
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11 Comments
Most anti-consumerism advocates say that the only way to defeat consumerism is to stop consuming.
They try and make people feel bad for having money, so they should give away their money.
The ‘culture’ love this because they are able to say “choose to have all this good stuff, or give it up to help those poor people”.
Of course noone wants to give up their nice car, house and overseas holidays just to help those poor people over there. (wherever ‘there’ is.)
Anti-poverty (as well as other anti- group) campaigners are starting to realise that you have to bring people along in steps.
Bono is the face of the One campaign. It encourages businesses to donate one percent of their sales to aid development in poverty stricken companies. It uses the culture (lets buy stuff) to help those in need.
In Victoria at the moment there is a bunch of ads encouraging people to use less water. The narrator stands infront of a tower of water and says “this is how much water an average household used in 1995″ he moves over to a tower about 3/4 the size and says “this is how much water an average household uses today. We have done well, but….” he walks over to another tower of water, about 1/3 of the size of the first tower and says “this is how much water an average European household uses. We can use less water without sacrificing our lifestyle”
The point is, if you want people to change you have to do it in baby steps or else people will think it is too hard.
Demi mentioned the TEAR catalogue, great example of getting people to begin to think about how Christmas is driven by consumerism.
Does it go far enough? Of course it doesn’t, but it gets people starting to think about the issue (as well as providing the majority of the funding for TEAR’s work each year).
Bono is a campaigner who is using the dominant culture (rock star) to bring change to that culture.
Thanks for the comment Liam – I think you might be right: maybe baby-steps is the only way. The revolution might have been postponed for a short while.
Revolutions always begin in baby steps. Behind every dramatic political coup is hundreds of years of rage, injustice, or discomfort.
Revolutions that occur on the basis of momentary impulses don’t ever really seem to last. Ones that reach a critical mass of people ready for a change that by that nature becomes inevetible, can never be reversed.
No one, looking for the middle of a stick, expects to find it near either end. Likewise the future will not likely ballance in the form of either exreme: pure bioregionalist subsistance, or global consumerism with an undertone of philanthropy.
The future begins now, and it can’t begin in anything except the global climate that dominates – that of consumerism… but neither consumerism nor subsistance will look much like they do now in 50 or 100 years time.
Wanting to have more stuff is human. Wanting non sustainable, non-recyclable, disposable, replaceable, shiny, arbitrary stuff is a phenomenon of our era.
With a change of lifestyle comes a change of vision. The generation that loses its perceived desires will greive them. The generation that follows will dream different dreams. The fastest way to change that would be to turn off the TV but thats another topic.
The two things that guarantee these changes in my mind are petrol and water.
But by far the biggest problem we face is our own biology and the desire to populate – to overpopulate our planet.
For all our medicines and our armies and our fire brigades and hospitals and imunisations and oh&s laws and traffic lights and kevlar bodysuits… we haven’t cheated our natural attrition rate… we’ve just put death in a savings account.
To all of us in our time falls the duty of fertilising the earth for future generations. Its only fair that we give back to the planet a litte of what we take.
I’m all for saving aids babies… but to give the ones we save a fair chance of having quality of life… we should be spending equal amounts on sponsoring contraception. I don’t see condoms anywhere in my pretty tear catalogue. Why is that?
Is a better world one where aids babies live in africa, and in melbourne kids can still buy a video I-pod and a pair of Chuck Taylors with their christmas money from nanna?
Our numbing luxury is the bright side of exactly the same curse that has its dark side in the hunger and povety of the third world. Its not comfort because its comfortable, its comfort because its famiar – its what we know. Our technology is isolating us… our comfort is dividing us… our possesions define and control us… our freedom to consume is our prison, our obligation, our lust.
So anyway to kinda link back to the topic of your blog post.. Bono should be free to do what he does well in the scene that he works in… and since he give heaps more to charity in a year than I have in a lifetime… how will I criticise? As you say Geoff… he’s a key voice in educating the masses, and does it brilliantly.
People will always spend money going to gigs… and if they hadn’t gone to the gig, all the money spent on tickets would have gone elswhere… but certainly not to aid work. Its a wonderfuly idea to think gee wouldn’t it be nice if we coulda just done a concert in the park, and donated the cash… but its just not a reality. In fact… its a bit like saying “that perfume should have been saved for his burial”. It was never gonna happen.
Tim
Humans are by design and nature consumers…
We also have capacity to be producers.
The heart of the issue and where Liam’s notion of “small steps” comes in is that it is the unjust consumption of the world’s resources by a few persons, corporations and countries that leads to the dire situations that we see before us.
The “small steps” are to be taken by all in recognising that my excessive water/energy/money/plant/etc comsumption for my needs and wants is denying others of basic access and amounts of water/energy/money/plant/etc. Then we are in a position to reduce our consumption and encourage others that it is doable.
If our understanding of production was for common good rather than selective profit (in order to fund our unjust consumption), then we, our organisations and corporations would be wiser consumers and probably better producers.
False guilt is a terrible thing.
what did Jesus mean when He said, “the poor you will always have with you?”
Enjoy your life, be generous to others.
Mark E:
Perhaps Jesus meant, if your church doesn’t have poor people in it then it isn’t really the church.
Timmeh:
I would be interested to know a bit more about what your view is on over population.
The tone I read in your post is that people in the two-thirds world shouldn’t have kids because they will be poor and have crap lives.
I don’t think that is what you meant to say, but that is what I hear you saying.
Over population is a very contentious issue. Some areas are over populated, but on the whole our planet is not over populated. The planet is able to sustain all the people on it, we just need to distribute stuff better and not waste as much as we do.
Rohan, you need to unpack and prove your statement “Humans are by design and nature consumers”, otherwise it is a baseless assertion.
Deri, at it’s most basic, we eat, drink and breathe – consuming activities that then have the potential to produce other things.
Putting all the “higher level” consumer notions aside, I am suggesting that there is an injustice in distribution and consumption – in who has access to what amounts and qualities of food, drink and air.
Yes, this in part is geographical, cultural, historical, but I think that it has built up from our inherent consuming nature. We desire more than is immediately accessible to us and create the means to acquire it. _This_ is where the injustice begins.
I must confess I have not read carefully all the comments, so sorry if I repeat something already said.
On the nature of consumerism: my feeling is that consumerism is so closely tied with individualism that it is, by nature, selfish. I agree then, that we are, by nature, consumers because we are selfish. Those of us who aim to be transformed to the likeness of Christ, though, should be on a journey towards selflessness. Sharing, rather than consuming fits with this paradigm.
Is it easy? No. Can we can consumerism? Yes and No.
response to Mark E’s question.
when Jesus made that statement about the poor, he was, I suggest, quoting from Deuteronomy 15 (see v 11). The verse quoted is a pointer to the entire section. This is a significant piece of scripture in terms of systematically caring for the poor, being open and generous with them, releasing them from debt.
What I love about chp 15 of Deut is that it follows chps 14 which is about celebrating what God has blessed us with (and including the poor in our celebrations). This is perhaps where the U2 concert and Bono’s anti-poverty position intersect. I would suggest that the celebration of creativity, music and ideas that Bono and his U2 mates have is the reason it is valid to ‘do concerts’. As long as in the doing we include genuine care for the poor (there are many other place in Leviticus and Deuteronomy that limit a producer’s ability to take advantage of everything he makes). In fact consumerism is undone when we make the entire system caring, rather than favouring the wealthy.
response to Rohan:
At the very basic level of your definition of humans as consumers, I find that it applies to all living things. There is something about the way humans extend their consuming beyond what we need to exist. Comments about selfishness made by others are I think at the heart of the matter. I think it is what you are saying too.
In response to Liam
Yep, well if you want to solve the logistical problem of getting food around to all the different places next week… I might just send them a box of condoms this week.
I may have been being a little facetious, however I do think we need to ballance realistic pragmatic solutions against utopian fantasies.
The world is not over-populated you say. Okay. Look at the birth rate. If people want to keep having babies at the same rate… we already have too many people. If people want to hold up on the babies… no worries.
I dont realy care who stops having babies. Just stop them. Call me a psycho.
What will happen? Not the utopian fantasy. The practical reality. in 50/100 years time we will still be increasing increasingly… and we will be only marginally better at redistributing the food.
Personally I think if the AWB had to pay Saddam to get wheat into Iraq, BIG DEAL, at least the iraquis got to eat more bread… but it sounds like tonnes of the stuff just sat in silos anyway. It seems supply and demand is less than the whole issue of ‘global sustainability’.
What do I realy believe? I think we will cruise headlong into disaster, and that every measure we take is only to ease the pain for now. I still believe in taking every action we can… but I believe earth is an oil tanker doing 80 knots and headed for a reef a kilometer ahead. She ain’t gonna turn baby.
So ease the pain, and appease your conscience… but don’t dull your mind with dreams of sustainability, democracy, and sharing the food.
Gerry, you’ve shared a small island with quite a few people, and I’m sure you can either refute or reinforce the idea that while everyone can work together to solve a problem… in general, everyone won’t.
Similar things apply to christianity in politics. You can no more legislate sustainability than you can legislate the kingdom of God. Its not a question of ‘constitutional’ or ‘not-constitutional’ its just simply a fact of life. Gravity doesn’t go uphill.