Posted on 04/10/2007 7:19:01 PM PDT by JmyBryan
'Many big ideas have struggled over the centuries to dominate the planet,' begins the argument by Jonathon Porritt, government adviser and all-round environmental guru. 'Fascism. Communism. Democracy. Religion. But only one has achieved total supremacy. Its compulsive attractions rob its followers of reason and good sense. It has created unsustainable inequalities and threatened to tear apart the very fabric of our society. More powerful than any cause or even religion, it has reached into every corner of the globe. It is consumerism.' According to Porritt, the most senior adviser to the government on sustainability, we have become a generation of shopaholics. We are bombarded by advertising from every medium which persuades us that the more we consume, the better our lives will be. Shopping is equated with fun, fulfilment and self-identity. It is also, Porritt warns, killing the planet. He argues, in an interview with The Observer, that merely switching to 'ethical' shopping is not enough. We must shop less.
(Excerpt) Read more at observer.guardian.co.uk ...
These clowns are insane.
Now I am confused... The cave men and dirt farmers were the peak of civilization and we have been going down hill since?
So these idiots had to BUY a COMPUTER before they could seek a simpler lifestyle?!?!?
If we divided the world into consumerist and nonconsumerist nations, which would have the best environment?
Don’t ask trick questions....
Better question: How would sellers sell their goods, by direct delivery?
I think you misunderstand what they’re saying.
They aren’t anti-technology and development per se. What they’re against is pointless consumption for status, i.e. buying things just to show off of to fulfill a psychological need.
This outrage and alarm over “consumerism” is just another in the long list of leftist schemes to kill capitalism. In the nineteen hundreds and early twentieth century the lefties were all upset about the rich getting fat while poor people were starving. Then when the poor started getting fatter than the rich (as has been well documented in America), the lefties had to find a new club to bludgeon capitalism. They hit on “consumerism” which at it’s core is an essential part of the free-market system. Oh horror of horrors, people actually buy and consume things!!! Isn’t that awful. I guess the Unabomber shack in the mountains life-style is what they all want us to have.
They have a pointless argument. How exactly does one determine that some people buy stuff just to show off? And so what if they do? Are they going to propose some sort of government body to determine which people have bought things just to show off and then confiscate them? Of course not. Most religions have been preaching this stuff anyway for thousands of years. Why do these would-be wealth deniers think that this preaching against consumption for consumption sake is something new? They need to get a life.
>Then they shouldn’t do it. The rest of us can do as we >like. I’ve seen their argument before and I think it’s >nuts. They can go live with the Amish if they’d like, I >won’t.
Many of them don’t and they’re better for it. There’s something to be said for austerity and self-denial. If more Americans were capable of it, America would be a better place.
>Why do these would-be wealth deniers think that this >preaching against consumption for consumption sake is >something new? They need to get a life.
I can’t speak for them, but from my experience they don’t think it’s something new per se.
There are two really good books about measuring your consumption that you might want to take a look at. Check out:
http://www.yourmoneyoryourlife.org/resource.asp?sku=bymoyl
and
http://www.amazon.com/Millionaire-Next-Door-Surprising-Americas/dp/0743420373
Note that even the simple living people are not *anti-wealth* they’re about avoiding frivolous consumption and preserving your wealth rather than squandering on consumer goods.
Thank you, I’ve already read “The Millionaire Next Door”, and guess what, I’m against frivolous consumption too. So is anyone with half a brain, and therein lies the rub. People who don’t half even half a brain will not be affected in the slightest by admonishments to consume things they don’t need. There are a whole manure-load of things that are bad for people, but that doesn’t stop many of them from using and abusing them. People who consume things they don’t need will be taught a valuable (and probably costly) lesson...as long as the government doesn’t step in to “help” them.
Not in this household. Shopping is viewed as a necessary evil.
Count me in that group, not that I have any wealth to preserve, but the principle is the same :)
“So in a way we don’t have a choice about this: we’ve got to rethink the basic premise behind capitalism to make it deliver the goods. In the long run, when you really look at what happens on a planet with nine billion people and really serious constraints on the amount of carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases that we can emit, it’s almost inevitable we will learn to have more elegant, satisfying lives, consuming less. I can’t see any way out of that in the long run.”
Well, it WAS only a matter of time before they tied Global Warming to a trip to the mall!
I’d better just sit in a dark corner, breath shallowly lest I pump out too much CO2 and think about how I’M responsible for destroying the Earth. I’ll punch myself in the face for good measure. ;)
On second thought...why don’t any of these lunatics ever volunteer to off themselves to save the planet? ;)
I can live with my choices. I shop little and normally on the second hand market if I really need something like “new to me” clothing...or canning jars, LOL!
And continue to use up electricity and pay for the server etc...
Also “froogle” has to rape the earth to get their crap as well, plus use all kinds of electricity, plus needs to ship all that crap to the environmental earth worshipers so they can feel “superior” and go on some sort of power trip.
Man, I guess when mother accidentally drops the baby and baby hits their head it really does cause long term mental problems.
I just knew you would appreciate this article.
I do need to make one correction in regard to shopping being a necessary evil, it is, except when it comes to the garden centers and nurseries :)
In a nutshell: socialism. All else is convenient cover and rationalization.
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