Consumerism

We consume. Constantly….

We have money to buy stuff. Stuff we need, stuff we think we need and even stuff we know we really don’t need. But we do have a choice. We are in control of what we buy and where we buy it so think before you consume..

  • Do you need it?
  • Can I buy it second hand?
  • Can I donate my old stuff instead of throwing it away?

Ebay is great for 2nd hand items.

www.ilovefreegle.org is an amazing 2nd hand resource. If you need something or want to get rid of something – Freegle it!

Stuff.

Yes, of course we need to eat, wear clothes and put a roof over our heads. A bed is pretty important too but do we need 4 different duvet covers?

A sofa is useful but do we need 5 scatter cushions that serve no purpose other than adding a splash of colour a room?

Do we really need that new coffee table, sofa or denim jacket? Do we need a 5th pair of shoes or yet another handbag? What about a newer bigger TV because it can show movies in 4K as opposed to just HD? Are we all guilty of wanting more when what we actually need is less?

We are led to believe we need the latest things or just more of the same things because it will make us happier… but do you ever stop and think of the story behind the item?

Do you ever think what went into making that IphoneX? The labour, the parts, the mining of precious metals, the shipping, the packaging, the machines, the energy to produce it and then the waste of throwing your old phone away once the new one arrives.

 

“Oh but that’s ok because a phone is only small, so it’s not really a big deal”

 

If you take into account all the raw materials, the waste, the energy and the packaging then a phone is actually the size of a horse. 

So actually how big is that new TV you wanted to buy? That new bread maker, bike or drone…. What we end up with in our house is just a small piece of what it actually it.

A phone is a horse.

So a bread maker must be about the size of a whale?

and a car must be…….?

 

Things break so easily and then what happens to them? They end up in the bin. If they are lucky (not for the person involved though) they get recycled and shipped off to another country where some poor person spends their time and diminishing health on stripping the electrics, melting out the plastics and selling the bits for pittance.

We need to break this cycle. Completely. It is all wrong.

 

We need less. We need to know that.

 

Ignore adverts that spout shit telling us we need more to be happy. We need to consider what we buy. Every single thing has a history and a shadow. A product shadow if you like (I might try and do a graphic on that – just imagine a iPhone with a horse shadow for now!). And we need to repair what we have (check out repair cafe’s).

 

Stuff breaks – I get that. But if you buy some cheap plastic tacky thing from a market stall – you know as well as anyone else it will break in a few days. Those rubbish spinny LED kids things at fairs – you can’t even change the batteries in many of them. Think before you buy.

 

DON’T BUY RUBBISH – Just don’t buy that crap.

Buy the best you can afford – it will last longer.

Our cooker recently broke – we got an engineer out. He said Hotpoint often broke and they stop selling replacement parts within just a year or so. The engineer told me it wasn’t worth repairing. So I found a copy part for £90 and ordered one. (Our Bosch washing machine is still going strong after 15 years…)

 


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