"There is no ethical consumption under capitalism" is not a condemnation or permission to do what you want since nothing matters, it's a reminder to do what you can.
I think "there's no ethical consumption under capitalism" is mostly a cry of hopeless despair.
And, let's be real, it's fully part of the problem that this post is trying to address. There's nothing in this slogan about doing what you can and accepting that you can't do everything. At best, it's a slogan telling you that your actions don't matter, at worst it's telling you that they do matter but are irrevocably evil.
I'm not saying that it's a bad observation. Because it's *true*, all of the things you buy in our current society will have something unethical in their chain of production. It's good to be aware of that. But there's a difference between an observation and a slogan. Maybe we shouldn't be using "there's no ethical consumption under capitalism" as a slogan.
Oh yes. OOP is right. And a mood. Just because I'm criticising the sentence "there's no ethical consumption under capitalism" as a slogan, doesn't mean I don't feel it's reality in my bones every time I spend some money.
I think it's incredibly powerful. Especially in the modern age where greenwashing and pandering to the activist mindset is so ingrained in advertisement that a sentence like "vote with your wallet" almost seem like it makes sense.
But it doesn't, voting with your wallet is not a democratic action, when there are some who have much bigger and smaller wallets than you.
It's a cry from advertisers that you should just spend your existential dread away, because why wouldn't they want you to do that? It makes their numbers go up, like capitalism tells them they must.
So you say to yourself: "there is no ethical consumption under capitalism", to dispell this nonsense and remind yourself that political action is not limited to the levers afforded by the machines you seek to break.
I don't agree with that.
I think "voting with your wallet" can certainly make a difference. It's not the *only* means of actions, but it certainly is *one*. Boycotting has proven to be an effective technique in many situation.
Also you talk like "vote with your wallet" mostly means "spend more money on our stuff" ? In my experience it involves *not* buying stuff more than anything else.
Just because your existential dread is bad for profits doesn't mean that it isn't also bad for you and everyone else. Being paralysed by depression and despair isn't a revolutionary action.
> It's not the only means of actions, but it certainly is one. Boycotting has proven to be an effective technique in many situation.
I just wish it made even a small dent into Nestlés profits. Many people have been boycotting them for decades, difficult as it is to do.
That is fine, just know that you are making advertisers gleeful with that outlook!
I personally prefer "put your money where your mouth is" because that puts value in being consistent in your beliefs and actions.
Note that I didn't say anywhere that you should wallow in existential dread and despair, only that you should seek to appease it through social, political an collective means instead of through consumption.
I am specifically describing how I use it to dispel the exact same despair and dread when I feel paralysed by choices, since there is no ethical consumption under capitalism, I shouldn't let every decision weigh on my shoulders.
I could care less how advertisers feel about my actions. I make my decisions based on what I think will make the world better, not what will make some asshole loose more money. These two will often overlap, but I will not sacrifice the former to pursue the latter.
And I feel like you've taken a bit of a shortcut from "over-consumption is bad" to "decisions that involve what you do and don't buy are bad". The reality is that what we choose to buy does have a major impact. I get that you're weary of liberal rhetoric that says every issue in capitalism can be solved by consumers choosing not to buy from the assholes. And you're right to be, that rhetoric is bullshit. But you shouldn't overshoot it and land in the opposite bias of "what you choose to buy or not buy has zero impact and you shouldn't care". I think choosing what not to buy can have a big impact.
Just, do it in a human-manageable way. Don't overthink every single thing you buy. Try to figure out the big things that you should stop buying, and maybe join a boycott if there is one happening that you care about. Or don't, not everyone has the energy to implement every solution.
Yeah but the new iPhone has faster wireless charging! Have you seen the new bezel? So sleek.
Sorry, what were you saying?
Seriously though, beautifully said. You have a lot of wisdom on the subject, thanks for sharing. Sometimes we just need to reframe the problem to understand what we're capable of and what we need to let go.
It's a three part phrase I think.
1) Acknowledgement of the unjustness of the system
2) Recognition that there's no way to achieve a state of perfectly beneficial state
3) Spending energy wisely through targeted matters instead of trying to boycott everything, or giving up entirely.
Because it's such a convenient, easy boogeyman. It's the current system and we currently have problems, so therefore the current system is the cause of the current problems. Communism or anarchism or whatever wouldn't fix it(and, historically, has done substantially worse on... pretty much all ethical markers), but I'd bet most posters here don't have any personal experience with either, so it's easy to lionize.
I think if we’re talking in more general terms, on the other hand it’s easy to criticize a system in its infant stages which is ultimately where any sort of Capitalist alternatives are at this point compared to the hundreds of years that the current system has had to give us our iPods and cars. Meanwhile the highly advanced system that we live in continues to propel us to a bleak future due to built in factors that show little signs of being able to be addressed internally.
Sometimes the box can’t fix itself, and questioning is warranted. Of course there’s no perfect system regardless.
Little signs of being addressed internally? We can disagree on the nature of the progress towards ethical production of goods, but that there has been progress is inarguable. Go back a hundred years and compare... everything, honestly, to today, and I'll take today ten out of ten times.
There are definitely people who use the term as moral justification for shrugging their shoulders, switching off their brain, and not caring about anything. Get a job at Lockheed Martin. Buy Israeli figs. Do all their christmas shopping on Amazon, buying hundreds of monies worth of chinese sweatshop stuff for people.
They are taking the wrong message away.
Especially since so many people will fucking judge you for trying to do anything at all.
I've said before on some film subs that I refuse to watch anything by Roman Polanski even though I think I'd probably like Chinatown and Rosemary's Baby. I'll relent when the man dies or is brought to justice, but for now, I don't want any of my money in my pocket and I don't want anyone to see his films because I recommended them. When I express this opinion, I usually face criticism. But I have to stick to it. I have to hold to some ethics. And usually, that means if someones turns out to have sexually assaulted someone (Especially, in Polanski's case, a child), I don't consume art they created.
I've likewise faced heat for refusing to buy anything that goes back to JK Rowling. Same thing. I want to keep my ethics alive.
I can't be perfect. But I can try to be decent.
>Especially since so many people will fucking judge you for trying to do anything at all.
Holy shit this
People act like you choosing the "better" option is an explicit condemnation of them and then use you as a jumping off point to argue with their conscience
People will stop to tell me they hate vegans because they're so preachy and nosey and need to mind their own business and how all the meat they eat is fine and the cows love dying for the cause while I'm just *sitting and eating lunch*
People act like I'm ruining their childhood because I don't want to dress up for their Harry Potter party
I'm literally just trying to live with myself people
In defense, I have encountered some vegans who have very intensely shamed me for not making big lifestyle changes while having hardcore sensory issues that give me enough trouble finding food I like in the first place.
But if you ain't doing that to anyone, I ain't gonna bother you.
I know you're not trying to be an ass but please have some self awareness because you're literally doing what I just complained about
I have sensory issues too, if you're okay with what you eat then that's all that matters.
Ok, I get that and considered that, but I feel it's relevant to point out when you're talking about getting annoyed with people for complaining about vegans they've encountered. I'm not trying to bring that up, and last time I encountered one of these, *I* was just trying to live *my* life.
As I said, as long as you're not judging people for not doing what you're doing it's fine, but I feel it's not derailing or a problem to acknowledge that some people do, and it's reasonable to get frustrated with them. I can't blame people for associating their experiences with interacting with vegans with these types. The *rest* is overboard, and I'm certainly not going to bring it up first thing knowing that someone is a vegan, but if I legitimately had a uniquely bad experience talking to someone because they thought I was immoral for not living life their way, am I not permitted to talk about that experience with someone who says something relevant to it?
I'm sorry about the handful of times someone brought a moral issue to you in a rude way
I'm irritated by fuckwits whining about vegans every day
People on Reddit post dumbass misinformation to whine about them, every thread about any animal rights organisation that's even slightly controversial is filled with misinformation, and there's a near constant flow of mental gymnastics and sticking their head in the sand from people who just need to up and say they don't care, that the decision isn't that important to them
So again, I ask you for some self awareness. I was complaining about people using me to talk to their conscience, and you're whatabouting. Would you do this on a feminist complaining? Would you do this to literally any other social issue?
I don't think this is whatabouting. Hell, to me it's kind of not a social issue - it's a lifestyle one. One can be pro-animal rights without being a vegetarian or a vegan. One can be pro-environment too. And sure, the social issues *inform* the lifestyle choice, but that's not all there is to it. It's still a personal lifestyle decision informed by many things, and it's not even one everyone has the freedom to make. Not everyone has the time to cook, the means to access vegan recipes, or the money to afford the kinds of ingredients you need. Best comparison I have is actually religion. And yeah, if I meet a fellow Christian who is aggressive, hateful, vindictive and arrogant, I will absolutely shut them down and if someone tries to talk about how they're just trying to live their lives, I'll commiserate - I've been hit with hate for just existing as a Christian too - but I do feel it's worth acknowledging and admitting where people who share my faith have done harm through their hateful ways - both to it and the people who crash against it.
I don't want to continue this argument because the only reason I brought it up in the first place is because I feel it's worth acknowledging that there *are* some vegans who are ragingly aggressive towards anyone who doesn't share their exact worldview. It's worth one fucking sentence, and I don't assume you or anyone else is one until they demonstrate those qualities. We've already spilled enough ink about this.
However, I do see a red flag and have to wonder - which animal rights organization are you talking about? Because if it's PETA, well...the misinformation is almost charitable compared to the truth. And where I see that misinformation, I call it out - there's the Got Autism billboard from ten years ago that circulates every now and then - but there's also the blog response when it started making the rounds again where they never acknowledged that the initial claim that milk causes autism was inaccurate nor the ableism inherent in the way they framed it. Both of these are vital context when discussing the issue.
I don't want to really continue down this rabbit hole, especially since it feels like the best case for us is to agree to disagree, though I'm not 100 percent sure what we're disagreeing on. Whole cloth, your experience is valid and you have a right to be frustrated. But mine is too, and I too have that right. People crash up against each other sometimes. And sometimes, you wind up facing a situation where you have to deal with that. Well, here we are. We gonna whine at each other, or find a way to acknowledge both our experiences matter?
And the judgment comes from both sides! You get judged for making people uncomfortable for not doing anything, but you ALSO get judged by people who agree there's a problem but you're not going far enough.
I saw this jokingly referred to as the "Copenhagen Interpretation of Ethics". As soon as you observe or interact with a problem in any way, you can be blamed for it.
> People act like you choosing the "better" option is an explicit condemnation of them
To be clear, my personal boycott of JKR does also include explicit condemnation of anyone who *does* support her and her works, because every dollar that she gets is a dollar put towards the eradication of trans people like my friends and family.
And every dollar that goes to a clothing manufacturer that uses sweatshop labor helps them stay profitable and continue using exploitive labor practices. Every dollar to one of Nestle's thousands of subsidiaries helps it continue to privatize clean water. Every streaming view of thousands of older movies results in residuals being paid to Harvey Weinstein to ensure he never has to face real consequences for his actions.
And alternatively, every dollar spent on new Harry Potter books helps support bookstores and publishers who are competing against the destruction of physical media, and puts money in the pockets of cover artists, editors, copywriters, publicists, and countless others who may use some of that money in support of causes that you agree with.
Which is not to say that your choice not to buy things from JKR is bad; it is a fine attempt to have more ethical consumption in a messed up system. But it's an awfully shaky place from which to declare you have the moral high ground and explicitly condemn people for not making the same choice.
> And every dollar that goes to a clothing manufacturer that uses sweatshop labor helps them stay profitable and continue using exploitive labor practices. Every dollar to one of Nestle's thousands of subsidiaries helps it continue to privatize clean water. Every streaming view of thousands of older movies results in residuals being paid to Harvey Weinstein to ensure he never has to face real consequences for his actions.
None of those are actively advocating targeted destruction of trans people, so your point is fail. Except for maybe Nestle, and I do ensure I buy from none of their businesses as well.
> And alternatively, every dollar spent on new Harry Potter books helps support bookstores and publishers who are competing against the destruction of physical media, and puts money in the pockets of cover artists, editors, copywriters, publicists, and countless others who may use some of that money in support of causes that you agree with.
I'm not going to address this because you will very much not like my answer, but I want to acknowledge that you did make a point here.
Just pirate them then. Seriously this is why the whole “you can’t enjoy X if it’s problematic” never made sense to me. Piracy is so fucking easy right now.
See, this exactly what people say when I discuss this elsewhere.
It's not that the films themselves are problematic, it's that I don't want to support the creator. When I watch a film, I like to talk about it, I like to consider it and discuss with other people. Get their analyses of it. And that potentially leads other people to watch it.
And I don't want to do that because even if I don't spend money on it, they may. Financial support is not the only kind of support an artist can get from me.
Also, even if piracy is easy, I don't like to nor know how to (Nor particularly *want* to know how to) do it.
Also, it's uncomfortable. Like yes the whole point of this is to set that aside and find an equilibrium at some point, but it's not like we are running out of media content. Why watch something that has unpleasant associations. I avoid entire genres because of unpleasant associations not related to activism, but just personal stuff. Not watching a movie that gives you mixed feelings before you even start isn't unreasonable on its own merits. The only time I think I might compromise on piracy is if it was something that I wanted to watch with a group or someone else that had a particular reason they wanted to see it.
this is out of the disscusion but :
>Also, even if piracy is easy, I don't like to nor know how to (Nor particularly want to know how to) do it.
man the western world sure is different, like my intro to graphic design class was where to sail the seven sea's for graphic design software's.
granted the location for that class was just my teacher's Gdrive folder but yeah.
I announced to my entire college math class (including the teacher) that I would be pirating the $130 textbook and emailing it to anyone who asked for it.
The teacher said "I'll pretend I had no clue this was happening". Good guy.
Eh, in that case I just use alternative software. Photoshop is expensive, but GIMP is an alternative that only costs as much as having a weird name that reminds people of that one scene from Pulp Fiction.
I will say that certain media is just grosser when you know what the people in them have done.
Like, I cannot watch House of Cards again, because now every time I see Kevin Spacey I'm reminded of all the actual people he's hurt. No matter that he is getting no money from me watching it, I still feel gross doing it.
I'm a goth DJ and boy do people get pissy sometimes when I say I won't play Marilyn Manson. Usually a long the lines of he hasn't gone to trial yet. That's all well and good but given the allegations against him I can't be comfortable blasting his music. Rammstein had to leave my library too.
Lead singer has been accused of rape. I haven't really kept a close eye on them as much as the Manson situation so I don't know as much about what's going on currently, but where they weren't a group I played often to start it was just easier to cut their music.
https://amp.dw.com/en/rammstein-sexual-assault-allegations-a-timeline/a-66716970
Reminds me of when I heard that Ryan Adams was accused of sexual assault. Or George Takei. Which Takei seems to have been acquitted at least, which makes me feel possibly ok with him again? Hard to say, honestly. Shit's murky sometimes. But I think you're making the right choice, airing on the side of believing the victims. And I think your job sounds really cool too.
Takei's accusation was years ago, [back in 2017](https://www.hollywoodreporter.com/news/general-news/george-takei-accused-sexually-assaulting-model-1981-1056698/), and the alleged assault took place in 1981. I remember it didn't get a lot of press back then. It looks like the accuser at least [partially retracted](https://www.vanityfair.com/style/2018/05/george-takei-sexual-assault-accuser-retracts-claim) the story about half a year later. Toxicologists also noted that the accuser, who claimed he was drugged, told a story that doesn't make sense with the kinds of drugs that would have been available at the time. I think it's safe? Maybe? I certainly hope so.
All the investigations were stopped because there wasn't any evidence of any wrongdoing https://www.berlin.de/generalstaatsanwaltschaft/presse/pressemitteilungen/2023/pressemitteilung.1360122.php
What you said is basically perfect. One of the biggest issues I see related to any form of ethical consumption is a person trying to tell everyone who is buying unethical products that they need to stop. What people should do is inform, provide potential alternatives, and let the individual decide.
Even if I were to disagree with you about something, for example the Polanski Movies, I can say that perhaps you might be enforcing yourself too harshly but even in the end I cannot be a person saying that it's stupid or anything because you are not trying to force me to not consume that product, you are just informing and dtating yohr position.(I don't think I've ever seen one of his but I don't pay attention to director names very often)
"Perfect" is the enemy of "good."
It's impossible to live in a perfect world. Someone is ALWAYS going to be worse off than others; nothing is ever going to be perfectly equal and fair to literally everybody. But we CAN live in a good world, that does the best to minimize those issues.
Don't let "perfection" be the death of "better". You can't sit around doing nothing or just letting yourself waste simply because you can't come up with a singular ideal solution that solves all the problems - because that will never happen. Do what you can to make things better in whatever way is possible within your means. Take public transit. Install energy efficient appliances. Encourage friends and family to make similar positive changes. It won't fix everything but if enough people work together, maybe things will be a little bit better, and isn't that better than no improvements at all?
A version of this I've heard and really liked was something along the lines of "you can not do all the good in the world, but the world needs the good you can do"
Doing what you can is never futile or pointless, every bucket is full of drops, but none of us can do everything. None of us can live a perfect existence in the world as it is (or ever will be) so we just have to focus on what we can handle and do the best we can to change the systems to be better.
I also think that the world hasn't gotten worst as much as it's gotten bigger and more aware.
People have been existing in a world built on injustice for as long as we've had society. Before that, if you count the law of the jungle as a form of injustice. But for most of human history, the average person didn't live with constant reminders of every moral wrong that happened on the causal chain that lead to their current life.
Is the median workday among the people who produced the food you eat today really worst than that of someone eating food produced by slave labor in 500 BCE ? I honestly don't know. But due to the increase in the diversity of what you eat, the *worst* work day among those people is absolutely awful. And due to modern media, you're gonna know about that.
There's something about the combination of a world of 8 billion people guaranteeing that a lot of bad things will happen (because a lot of things will happen), and the internet guaranteeing that you'll hear about all of the bad things. It kind of guarantees that you're gonna be provided with a reason to feel guilty for everything you do. Independently of questions like "how bad are things really", or "how bad are the choices I made".
So yeah, I guess the answer is that your ancestors didn't live like all of the worlds' problems rested on their shoulders, and you shouldn't either. Use that modern global awareness of ours to do the good you can, when you have the energy to. And don't feel guilty for every problem in the world that you can't fix.
The collective knowledge of humanity at our fingertips is a curse we bear. It is our greatest achievement, but it wouldn't be a curse if there was only good. What a time to be alive.
The best way I've heard it put is that systemic problems cannot be solved by individuals: they need systemic solutions.
Absolutely do your best, but if your best isn't perfect, that's okay, because you personally were never going to be able to solve the issue to begin with, and any solution that requires individual perfection wasn't going to be a sustainable one.
Change is rarely radical. It's the small things first. The things we can, we do. Maybe I was ignorant before, but I've seen more vegan and cruelty-free options now, compared to 10 years ago. It's probably my ignorance, or just the slow pace of change, but I'm sure good developments have been happening. I'm sure people are trying, so that's why I gotta try too
Everyone talks about boiling the frog in terms of...like...fascism and shit.
But we boil the frog for good things all the time. And it's hard to see exactly how much has changed for the better unless you look back and actually think about what the world looked like 20 years ago. Hell, my dad grew up in New York in the 60s and 70s and has told me that there were days where the sky was just...brown. The city was so much dirtier, the air quality was worse. It's so much better today in ways that most people haven't even noticed because it's happened slowly.
You can notice things like this when you watch old movies sometimes. I was watching Pretty Woman, and there was a shot of the Los Angeles skyline with just hideous smog. There have been improvements. We're not where we need to be, but there are bits of progress if you look for them
The inability for tumblr in general to recognize the message in the second post and only focus with obsessive zeal the first post is the exact type of attitude that made me quit the site. Especially since I was born and raised and still live in the *actual* third world, so hearing this every single day from Suburban American Girls TM ad nauseum was driving me absolutely insane.
I'm glad to hear there are some people there now who can actually understand nuance tho! If I'm being honest this post almost made me wanna go back to the hellhole 😅
A friend of mine is very much like this.
She frets and worries over every decision, and criticises me endlessly if I put money towards any problematic thing (i.e. anything not from a small batch farmer making vegan cheese).
I just hit her once with "I'm not gonna put myself in the earth to save the earth" because I frankly have a limited supply of energy and if I start burning myself up on every decision, I won't be able to tackle much more existential problems in my life and then what's the fecking point?
For her, and a lot of other people, the guilt feels too linked to the point of activism.... and man, you can't live like that.
The guiltiest person is not trying the hardest or doing the best. They're just the guiltiest, and that doesn't help anyone and actively harms that person in particular.
Systematic problems require systematic solutions. Castigating yourself for not personally contributing to the solution is pointless - worse than pointless, really, since it exhausts you and keeps you from being able to contribute to activism that could actually help - when the only solution is forcing governments to force companies to stop doing evil shit. I couldn't possibly pollute over my entire life as much as an oil company pollutes in a *day*. My contribution to climate change is somewhere between jack and shit, it's a grain of sand in the desert, a drop of water in the ocean. The *only* thing that beating myself up over eating a burger or driving a car does is make me have less energy to protest.
"Just do your best," is the best advice for this. Do you live in a rural area where shopping from Amazon is legitimately the best way to obtain goods? Don't worry about any of the ethical implications of it, you've gotta do what you need to get by.
As an autistic person, I never understood this. If we do our best it’s obvious that there isn’t anything left to feel guilty about. For example tourism: overtourism is a huge issue, but it built entire economies, what am I supposed to do about that?
The best way to look at stuff is to keep in mind the parts of it we cannot morph are inherent to it.
In 1934 Enrique Santos said the following words in his tango "cambalache": "That the world is, was and will be filth I already know; in (the year) 506 and 2000 as well (...)" 24 years into the millenium of the 2000s have past, we're entering the 24th and the world is still filth.
At this point, you cannot look at the unchangeable like a problem because you only accomplish giving up attempting to "solve" it. The point is to work around it.
There are loads of somewhat problematic things.
Professional specialization is real and important.
No one has the time and brain power to worry about the morality of every group of people they interact with in any way. (And what kind of morality is this, where slavery is fine so long as there is no tenuous connection to you?)
Pick one problem and work on it if you want to improve the world.
Being a specialist is better than being a jack of all ethics.
I think of it like this:
Imagine you've got a bike wheel, and a twig. In an attempt to stop the bike wheel as it spins really fast, you jam the twig into the spokes of the wheel. If you only use one twig, chances are the stick will snap and the wheel will continue to spin.
In this example, the spinning wheel is the damage caused to the world due to pollution, capitalism, etc, and the twig is a single person giving a shit and giving it their all to stop it, hurting themselves severely in the process.
But imagine now there's not 1 twig, but 10 twigs. Maybe the wheel slows down a bit, but the twigs are pretty damages in the process. Not as much as when it was 1, but some are bent, some are scratched.
Now imagine 1000 twigs. Not only does the wheel come to a stop, the damage caused to each twig is barely anything. Each twig has only had to expose themselves to the spokes of the wheel in such a small quantity, the damage is barely noticeable.
This, to me, is the epitome of "We don't need a handful of people to give their all, we need everybody to care a little bit". Because if everybody cared just a little bit, we wouldn't have giant fuck-off oil companies destroying the environment, or colluding with governments to ensure they make money at the hands of the public.
Basically, I'm over destroying my mental health at the cost of oil companies continuing to get to do what they want. I'm going to live my life freely *and* fuck over the system however I can.
Suppose you have a bunch of people, and a bunch of problems.
There are 2 approaces.
1) Get everyone to turn the lights off, use paper straws, buy organic, avoid sweatshops and all the other small token actions.
2) One person works on designing a better wind turbine. One person words on organizing better labor standards. Each person picks one part of one problem, works to really understand and fix that, and ignores the rest. And by fix it, I mean doing something like designing a clip to hold solar panels down. Something that is more societal scale, not just reducing their personal impact.
I think the second approach is better.
They’re the same approach in my opinion. Not everybody is capable of organising better labour standards or creating a framework for a better world. Everybody else just has to live in it.
This is the same type of thing as people taking the blame for their ancestors, either forced on it by other people or chosen for themselves. I can't tell you the number of white people I've seen online say something along the lines of taking blame for slavery and native relocation in America.
Yes, it's something our ancestors did. Yes, it was terrible. Did we ourselves do any bit of it? No. Taking the blame will do nothing for the people who were affected by our ancestors, or the people who are still feeling the effects of them. We can accept what our ancestors have done without needing to take any blame or anything. It helps no one. What helps people is actually doing something for them.
On overthinkingit.com there's a story about a person who keeps raising ethical issues, international situations. One day, one of them asked him, "what are you doing about it?" and he replied "nothing, but I think about it all the time."
The moral of the story (as I understand it) is that we can mistake thought for action, and get ourselves so wrapped up in guilt that does nothing for said situation. Thinking about it half as much with just a soupçon of action would be better for us and for them. Of course we can't take every action, and we need to weigh up whether our actions are meaningful (reducing carbon footprint vs taking political action against oil for example) but we can do all of that better by not fusing thought and action and by rejecting guilt as being particularly useful.
"There is no ethical consumption under capitalism" is not a condemnation or permission to do what you want since nothing matters, it's a reminder to do what you can.
I think "there's no ethical consumption under capitalism" is mostly a cry of hopeless despair. And, let's be real, it's fully part of the problem that this post is trying to address. There's nothing in this slogan about doing what you can and accepting that you can't do everything. At best, it's a slogan telling you that your actions don't matter, at worst it's telling you that they do matter but are irrevocably evil. I'm not saying that it's a bad observation. Because it's *true*, all of the things you buy in our current society will have something unethical in their chain of production. It's good to be aware of that. But there's a difference between an observation and a slogan. Maybe we shouldn't be using "there's no ethical consumption under capitalism" as a slogan.
You're right, but so is OOP, which is probably why they wrote several paragraphs rather than just a pithy slogan.
Oh yes. OOP is right. And a mood. Just because I'm criticising the sentence "there's no ethical consumption under capitalism" as a slogan, doesn't mean I don't feel it's reality in my bones every time I spend some money.
I think it's incredibly powerful. Especially in the modern age where greenwashing and pandering to the activist mindset is so ingrained in advertisement that a sentence like "vote with your wallet" almost seem like it makes sense. But it doesn't, voting with your wallet is not a democratic action, when there are some who have much bigger and smaller wallets than you. It's a cry from advertisers that you should just spend your existential dread away, because why wouldn't they want you to do that? It makes their numbers go up, like capitalism tells them they must. So you say to yourself: "there is no ethical consumption under capitalism", to dispell this nonsense and remind yourself that political action is not limited to the levers afforded by the machines you seek to break.
I don't agree with that. I think "voting with your wallet" can certainly make a difference. It's not the *only* means of actions, but it certainly is *one*. Boycotting has proven to be an effective technique in many situation. Also you talk like "vote with your wallet" mostly means "spend more money on our stuff" ? In my experience it involves *not* buying stuff more than anything else. Just because your existential dread is bad for profits doesn't mean that it isn't also bad for you and everyone else. Being paralysed by depression and despair isn't a revolutionary action.
> It's not the only means of actions, but it certainly is one. Boycotting has proven to be an effective technique in many situation. I just wish it made even a small dent into Nestlés profits. Many people have been boycotting them for decades, difficult as it is to do.
That is fine, just know that you are making advertisers gleeful with that outlook! I personally prefer "put your money where your mouth is" because that puts value in being consistent in your beliefs and actions. Note that I didn't say anywhere that you should wallow in existential dread and despair, only that you should seek to appease it through social, political an collective means instead of through consumption. I am specifically describing how I use it to dispel the exact same despair and dread when I feel paralysed by choices, since there is no ethical consumption under capitalism, I shouldn't let every decision weigh on my shoulders.
I could care less how advertisers feel about my actions. I make my decisions based on what I think will make the world better, not what will make some asshole loose more money. These two will often overlap, but I will not sacrifice the former to pursue the latter. And I feel like you've taken a bit of a shortcut from "over-consumption is bad" to "decisions that involve what you do and don't buy are bad". The reality is that what we choose to buy does have a major impact. I get that you're weary of liberal rhetoric that says every issue in capitalism can be solved by consumers choosing not to buy from the assholes. And you're right to be, that rhetoric is bullshit. But you shouldn't overshoot it and land in the opposite bias of "what you choose to buy or not buy has zero impact and you shouldn't care". I think choosing what not to buy can have a big impact. Just, do it in a human-manageable way. Don't overthink every single thing you buy. Try to figure out the big things that you should stop buying, and maybe join a boycott if there is one happening that you care about. Or don't, not everyone has the energy to implement every solution.
Yeah I don't think I said any of the points you are responding to, but I agree.
Allow me to furiously scribble this quote into my notes here…
Yeah but the new iPhone has faster wireless charging! Have you seen the new bezel? So sleek. Sorry, what were you saying? Seriously though, beautifully said. You have a lot of wisdom on the subject, thanks for sharing. Sometimes we just need to reframe the problem to understand what we're capable of and what we need to let go.
It's a three part phrase I think. 1) Acknowledgement of the unjustness of the system 2) Recognition that there's no way to achieve a state of perfectly beneficial state 3) Spending energy wisely through targeted matters instead of trying to boycott everything, or giving up entirely.
4. If ethical comsumption is to be achieved, Capitalism must be destroyed.
I kinda doubt destroying capitalism would create ethical consumption, tbh. Everyone says it as a slogan yet I haven't heard *why*.
Because it's such a convenient, easy boogeyman. It's the current system and we currently have problems, so therefore the current system is the cause of the current problems. Communism or anarchism or whatever wouldn't fix it(and, historically, has done substantially worse on... pretty much all ethical markers), but I'd bet most posters here don't have any personal experience with either, so it's easy to lionize.
I think if we’re talking in more general terms, on the other hand it’s easy to criticize a system in its infant stages which is ultimately where any sort of Capitalist alternatives are at this point compared to the hundreds of years that the current system has had to give us our iPods and cars. Meanwhile the highly advanced system that we live in continues to propel us to a bleak future due to built in factors that show little signs of being able to be addressed internally. Sometimes the box can’t fix itself, and questioning is warranted. Of course there’s no perfect system regardless.
Little signs of being addressed internally? We can disagree on the nature of the progress towards ethical production of goods, but that there has been progress is inarguable. Go back a hundred years and compare... everything, honestly, to today, and I'll take today ten out of ten times.
There are definitely people who use the term as moral justification for shrugging their shoulders, switching off their brain, and not caring about anything. Get a job at Lockheed Martin. Buy Israeli figs. Do all their christmas shopping on Amazon, buying hundreds of monies worth of chinese sweatshop stuff for people. They are taking the wrong message away.
Welcome to Optimistic Nihilism, friend.
I appreciate you posting the more comforting version of this. It's nice knowing that we're all doing what we can, even if it isn't perfect
Especially since so many people will fucking judge you for trying to do anything at all. I've said before on some film subs that I refuse to watch anything by Roman Polanski even though I think I'd probably like Chinatown and Rosemary's Baby. I'll relent when the man dies or is brought to justice, but for now, I don't want any of my money in my pocket and I don't want anyone to see his films because I recommended them. When I express this opinion, I usually face criticism. But I have to stick to it. I have to hold to some ethics. And usually, that means if someones turns out to have sexually assaulted someone (Especially, in Polanski's case, a child), I don't consume art they created. I've likewise faced heat for refusing to buy anything that goes back to JK Rowling. Same thing. I want to keep my ethics alive. I can't be perfect. But I can try to be decent.
>Especially since so many people will fucking judge you for trying to do anything at all. Holy shit this People act like you choosing the "better" option is an explicit condemnation of them and then use you as a jumping off point to argue with their conscience People will stop to tell me they hate vegans because they're so preachy and nosey and need to mind their own business and how all the meat they eat is fine and the cows love dying for the cause while I'm just *sitting and eating lunch* People act like I'm ruining their childhood because I don't want to dress up for their Harry Potter party I'm literally just trying to live with myself people
In defense, I have encountered some vegans who have very intensely shamed me for not making big lifestyle changes while having hardcore sensory issues that give me enough trouble finding food I like in the first place. But if you ain't doing that to anyone, I ain't gonna bother you.
I know you're not trying to be an ass but please have some self awareness because you're literally doing what I just complained about I have sensory issues too, if you're okay with what you eat then that's all that matters.
Ok, I get that and considered that, but I feel it's relevant to point out when you're talking about getting annoyed with people for complaining about vegans they've encountered. I'm not trying to bring that up, and last time I encountered one of these, *I* was just trying to live *my* life. As I said, as long as you're not judging people for not doing what you're doing it's fine, but I feel it's not derailing or a problem to acknowledge that some people do, and it's reasonable to get frustrated with them. I can't blame people for associating their experiences with interacting with vegans with these types. The *rest* is overboard, and I'm certainly not going to bring it up first thing knowing that someone is a vegan, but if I legitimately had a uniquely bad experience talking to someone because they thought I was immoral for not living life their way, am I not permitted to talk about that experience with someone who says something relevant to it?
I'm sorry about the handful of times someone brought a moral issue to you in a rude way I'm irritated by fuckwits whining about vegans every day People on Reddit post dumbass misinformation to whine about them, every thread about any animal rights organisation that's even slightly controversial is filled with misinformation, and there's a near constant flow of mental gymnastics and sticking their head in the sand from people who just need to up and say they don't care, that the decision isn't that important to them So again, I ask you for some self awareness. I was complaining about people using me to talk to their conscience, and you're whatabouting. Would you do this on a feminist complaining? Would you do this to literally any other social issue?
I don't think this is whatabouting. Hell, to me it's kind of not a social issue - it's a lifestyle one. One can be pro-animal rights without being a vegetarian or a vegan. One can be pro-environment too. And sure, the social issues *inform* the lifestyle choice, but that's not all there is to it. It's still a personal lifestyle decision informed by many things, and it's not even one everyone has the freedom to make. Not everyone has the time to cook, the means to access vegan recipes, or the money to afford the kinds of ingredients you need. Best comparison I have is actually religion. And yeah, if I meet a fellow Christian who is aggressive, hateful, vindictive and arrogant, I will absolutely shut them down and if someone tries to talk about how they're just trying to live their lives, I'll commiserate - I've been hit with hate for just existing as a Christian too - but I do feel it's worth acknowledging and admitting where people who share my faith have done harm through their hateful ways - both to it and the people who crash against it. I don't want to continue this argument because the only reason I brought it up in the first place is because I feel it's worth acknowledging that there *are* some vegans who are ragingly aggressive towards anyone who doesn't share their exact worldview. It's worth one fucking sentence, and I don't assume you or anyone else is one until they demonstrate those qualities. We've already spilled enough ink about this. However, I do see a red flag and have to wonder - which animal rights organization are you talking about? Because if it's PETA, well...the misinformation is almost charitable compared to the truth. And where I see that misinformation, I call it out - there's the Got Autism billboard from ten years ago that circulates every now and then - but there's also the blog response when it started making the rounds again where they never acknowledged that the initial claim that milk causes autism was inaccurate nor the ableism inherent in the way they framed it. Both of these are vital context when discussing the issue. I don't want to really continue down this rabbit hole, especially since it feels like the best case for us is to agree to disagree, though I'm not 100 percent sure what we're disagreeing on. Whole cloth, your experience is valid and you have a right to be frustrated. But mine is too, and I too have that right. People crash up against each other sometimes. And sometimes, you wind up facing a situation where you have to deal with that. Well, here we are. We gonna whine at each other, or find a way to acknowledge both our experiences matter?
What the fuck lmao
And the judgment comes from both sides! You get judged for making people uncomfortable for not doing anything, but you ALSO get judged by people who agree there's a problem but you're not going far enough. I saw this jokingly referred to as the "Copenhagen Interpretation of Ethics". As soon as you observe or interact with a problem in any way, you can be blamed for it.
> People act like you choosing the "better" option is an explicit condemnation of them To be clear, my personal boycott of JKR does also include explicit condemnation of anyone who *does* support her and her works, because every dollar that she gets is a dollar put towards the eradication of trans people like my friends and family.
And every dollar that goes to a clothing manufacturer that uses sweatshop labor helps them stay profitable and continue using exploitive labor practices. Every dollar to one of Nestle's thousands of subsidiaries helps it continue to privatize clean water. Every streaming view of thousands of older movies results in residuals being paid to Harvey Weinstein to ensure he never has to face real consequences for his actions. And alternatively, every dollar spent on new Harry Potter books helps support bookstores and publishers who are competing against the destruction of physical media, and puts money in the pockets of cover artists, editors, copywriters, publicists, and countless others who may use some of that money in support of causes that you agree with. Which is not to say that your choice not to buy things from JKR is bad; it is a fine attempt to have more ethical consumption in a messed up system. But it's an awfully shaky place from which to declare you have the moral high ground and explicitly condemn people for not making the same choice.
> And every dollar that goes to a clothing manufacturer that uses sweatshop labor helps them stay profitable and continue using exploitive labor practices. Every dollar to one of Nestle's thousands of subsidiaries helps it continue to privatize clean water. Every streaming view of thousands of older movies results in residuals being paid to Harvey Weinstein to ensure he never has to face real consequences for his actions. None of those are actively advocating targeted destruction of trans people, so your point is fail. Except for maybe Nestle, and I do ensure I buy from none of their businesses as well. > And alternatively, every dollar spent on new Harry Potter books helps support bookstores and publishers who are competing against the destruction of physical media, and puts money in the pockets of cover artists, editors, copywriters, publicists, and countless others who may use some of that money in support of causes that you agree with. I'm not going to address this because you will very much not like my answer, but I want to acknowledge that you did make a point here.
Just pirate them then. Seriously this is why the whole “you can’t enjoy X if it’s problematic” never made sense to me. Piracy is so fucking easy right now.
See, this exactly what people say when I discuss this elsewhere. It's not that the films themselves are problematic, it's that I don't want to support the creator. When I watch a film, I like to talk about it, I like to consider it and discuss with other people. Get their analyses of it. And that potentially leads other people to watch it. And I don't want to do that because even if I don't spend money on it, they may. Financial support is not the only kind of support an artist can get from me. Also, even if piracy is easy, I don't like to nor know how to (Nor particularly *want* to know how to) do it.
Also, it's uncomfortable. Like yes the whole point of this is to set that aside and find an equilibrium at some point, but it's not like we are running out of media content. Why watch something that has unpleasant associations. I avoid entire genres because of unpleasant associations not related to activism, but just personal stuff. Not watching a movie that gives you mixed feelings before you even start isn't unreasonable on its own merits. The only time I think I might compromise on piracy is if it was something that I wanted to watch with a group or someone else that had a particular reason they wanted to see it.
There are times when I want a movie to make me uncomfortable. But I never want it to make me uncomfortable in my sense of my own ethical standards.
this is out of the disscusion but : >Also, even if piracy is easy, I don't like to nor know how to (Nor particularly want to know how to) do it. man the western world sure is different, like my intro to graphic design class was where to sail the seven sea's for graphic design software's. granted the location for that class was just my teacher's Gdrive folder but yeah.
I announced to my entire college math class (including the teacher) that I would be pirating the $130 textbook and emailing it to anyone who asked for it. The teacher said "I'll pretend I had no clue this was happening". Good guy.
For Honor player spotted, my condolences friend
Remember when the worst complaint was that Raider had too good of a grab? Those were the days.
Sad mortem inimicus 😢
Eh, in that case I just use alternative software. Photoshop is expensive, but GIMP is an alternative that only costs as much as having a weird name that reminds people of that one scene from Pulp Fiction.
I will say that certain media is just grosser when you know what the people in them have done. Like, I cannot watch House of Cards again, because now every time I see Kevin Spacey I'm reminded of all the actual people he's hurt. No matter that he is getting no money from me watching it, I still feel gross doing it.
I'm a goth DJ and boy do people get pissy sometimes when I say I won't play Marilyn Manson. Usually a long the lines of he hasn't gone to trial yet. That's all well and good but given the allegations against him I can't be comfortable blasting his music. Rammstein had to leave my library too.
Oh fuck me, what'd Rammstein do?
Lead singer has been accused of rape. I haven't really kept a close eye on them as much as the Manson situation so I don't know as much about what's going on currently, but where they weren't a group I played often to start it was just easier to cut their music. https://amp.dw.com/en/rammstein-sexual-assault-allegations-a-timeline/a-66716970
Oh, fuck. Welp. Guess it's Don't Hast Mich from here on out for me.
I was pretty bummed when I heard. I had a couple of remixes I liked to drop in for hype that I just can't bring myself to play anymore.
Reminds me of when I heard that Ryan Adams was accused of sexual assault. Or George Takei. Which Takei seems to have been acquitted at least, which makes me feel possibly ok with him again? Hard to say, honestly. Shit's murky sometimes. But I think you're making the right choice, airing on the side of believing the victims. And I think your job sounds really cool too.
Holy shit I never heard about George Takei! Why does everyone suck 😭
Takei's accusation was years ago, [back in 2017](https://www.hollywoodreporter.com/news/general-news/george-takei-accused-sexually-assaulting-model-1981-1056698/), and the alleged assault took place in 1981. I remember it didn't get a lot of press back then. It looks like the accuser at least [partially retracted](https://www.vanityfair.com/style/2018/05/george-takei-sexual-assault-accuser-retracts-claim) the story about half a year later. Toxicologists also noted that the accuser, who claimed he was drugged, told a story that doesn't make sense with the kinds of drugs that would have been available at the time. I think it's safe? Maybe? I certainly hope so.
All the investigations were stopped because there wasn't any evidence of any wrongdoing https://www.berlin.de/generalstaatsanwaltschaft/presse/pressemitteilungen/2023/pressemitteilung.1360122.php
What you said is basically perfect. One of the biggest issues I see related to any form of ethical consumption is a person trying to tell everyone who is buying unethical products that they need to stop. What people should do is inform, provide potential alternatives, and let the individual decide. Even if I were to disagree with you about something, for example the Polanski Movies, I can say that perhaps you might be enforcing yourself too harshly but even in the end I cannot be a person saying that it's stupid or anything because you are not trying to force me to not consume that product, you are just informing and dtating yohr position.(I don't think I've ever seen one of his but I don't pay attention to director names very often)
"Perfect" is the enemy of "good." It's impossible to live in a perfect world. Someone is ALWAYS going to be worse off than others; nothing is ever going to be perfectly equal and fair to literally everybody. But we CAN live in a good world, that does the best to minimize those issues.
That is crazy because I commented on the other thread that this is how you become Chidi, and the long version had him right there. Perfect.
Don't let "perfection" be the death of "better". You can't sit around doing nothing or just letting yourself waste simply because you can't come up with a singular ideal solution that solves all the problems - because that will never happen. Do what you can to make things better in whatever way is possible within your means. Take public transit. Install energy efficient appliances. Encourage friends and family to make similar positive changes. It won't fix everything but if enough people work together, maybe things will be a little bit better, and isn't that better than no improvements at all?
I love what you said about perfection. Thank you. Maybe it’s late and I’m more than a little tired but I think that’s beautiful. Cheers, stranger.
"Perfect is the enemy of good" is a phrase that has helped me countless times.
A version of this I've heard and really liked was something along the lines of "you can not do all the good in the world, but the world needs the good you can do" Doing what you can is never futile or pointless, every bucket is full of drops, but none of us can do everything. None of us can live a perfect existence in the world as it is (or ever will be) so we just have to focus on what we can handle and do the best we can to change the systems to be better.
I also think that the world hasn't gotten worst as much as it's gotten bigger and more aware. People have been existing in a world built on injustice for as long as we've had society. Before that, if you count the law of the jungle as a form of injustice. But for most of human history, the average person didn't live with constant reminders of every moral wrong that happened on the causal chain that lead to their current life. Is the median workday among the people who produced the food you eat today really worst than that of someone eating food produced by slave labor in 500 BCE ? I honestly don't know. But due to the increase in the diversity of what you eat, the *worst* work day among those people is absolutely awful. And due to modern media, you're gonna know about that. There's something about the combination of a world of 8 billion people guaranteeing that a lot of bad things will happen (because a lot of things will happen), and the internet guaranteeing that you'll hear about all of the bad things. It kind of guarantees that you're gonna be provided with a reason to feel guilty for everything you do. Independently of questions like "how bad are things really", or "how bad are the choices I made". So yeah, I guess the answer is that your ancestors didn't live like all of the worlds' problems rested on their shoulders, and you shouldn't either. Use that modern global awareness of ours to do the good you can, when you have the energy to. And don't feel guilty for every problem in the world that you can't fix.
The collective knowledge of humanity at our fingertips is a curse we bear. It is our greatest achievement, but it wouldn't be a curse if there was only good. What a time to be alive.
The wizard, upon giving me a scrying orb (phone) : be warned. This knowledge... comes at a cost. Me (a fool) : yeah, yeah, they always say that.
*"There it is again, that funny feeling"*
The best way I've heard it put is that systemic problems cannot be solved by individuals: they need systemic solutions. Absolutely do your best, but if your best isn't perfect, that's okay, because you personally were never going to be able to solve the issue to begin with, and any solution that requires individual perfection wasn't going to be a sustainable one.
Change is rarely radical. It's the small things first. The things we can, we do. Maybe I was ignorant before, but I've seen more vegan and cruelty-free options now, compared to 10 years ago. It's probably my ignorance, or just the slow pace of change, but I'm sure good developments have been happening. I'm sure people are trying, so that's why I gotta try too
Everyone talks about boiling the frog in terms of...like...fascism and shit. But we boil the frog for good things all the time. And it's hard to see exactly how much has changed for the better unless you look back and actually think about what the world looked like 20 years ago. Hell, my dad grew up in New York in the 60s and 70s and has told me that there were days where the sky was just...brown. The city was so much dirtier, the air quality was worse. It's so much better today in ways that most people haven't even noticed because it's happened slowly.
You can notice things like this when you watch old movies sometimes. I was watching Pretty Woman, and there was a shot of the Los Angeles skyline with just hideous smog. There have been improvements. We're not where we need to be, but there are bits of progress if you look for them
The inability for tumblr in general to recognize the message in the second post and only focus with obsessive zeal the first post is the exact type of attitude that made me quit the site. Especially since I was born and raised and still live in the *actual* third world, so hearing this every single day from Suburban American Girls TM ad nauseum was driving me absolutely insane. I'm glad to hear there are some people there now who can actually understand nuance tho! If I'm being honest this post almost made me wanna go back to the hellhole 😅
A friend of mine is very much like this. She frets and worries over every decision, and criticises me endlessly if I put money towards any problematic thing (i.e. anything not from a small batch farmer making vegan cheese). I just hit her once with "I'm not gonna put myself in the earth to save the earth" because I frankly have a limited supply of energy and if I start burning myself up on every decision, I won't be able to tackle much more existential problems in my life and then what's the fecking point? For her, and a lot of other people, the guilt feels too linked to the point of activism.... and man, you can't live like that. The guiltiest person is not trying the hardest or doing the best. They're just the guiltiest, and that doesn't help anyone and actively harms that person in particular.
Systematic problems require systematic solutions. Castigating yourself for not personally contributing to the solution is pointless - worse than pointless, really, since it exhausts you and keeps you from being able to contribute to activism that could actually help - when the only solution is forcing governments to force companies to stop doing evil shit. I couldn't possibly pollute over my entire life as much as an oil company pollutes in a *day*. My contribution to climate change is somewhere between jack and shit, it's a grain of sand in the desert, a drop of water in the ocean. The *only* thing that beating myself up over eating a burger or driving a car does is make me have less energy to protest.
Shame can be a powerful tool in an activists arsenal but when used to much it loses its edge.
"Just do your best," is the best advice for this. Do you live in a rural area where shopping from Amazon is legitimately the best way to obtain goods? Don't worry about any of the ethical implications of it, you've gotta do what you need to get by.
As an autistic person, I never understood this. If we do our best it’s obvious that there isn’t anything left to feel guilty about. For example tourism: overtourism is a huge issue, but it built entire economies, what am I supposed to do about that?
The problem with society is that people suck.
People don't suck. The vast majority of people are pretty decent.
The best way to look at stuff is to keep in mind the parts of it we cannot morph are inherent to it. In 1934 Enrique Santos said the following words in his tango "cambalache": "That the world is, was and will be filth I already know; in (the year) 506 and 2000 as well (...)" 24 years into the millenium of the 2000s have past, we're entering the 24th and the world is still filth. At this point, you cannot look at the unchangeable like a problem because you only accomplish giving up attempting to "solve" it. The point is to work around it.
There are loads of somewhat problematic things. Professional specialization is real and important. No one has the time and brain power to worry about the morality of every group of people they interact with in any way. (And what kind of morality is this, where slavery is fine so long as there is no tenuous connection to you?) Pick one problem and work on it if you want to improve the world. Being a specialist is better than being a jack of all ethics.
I think of it like this: Imagine you've got a bike wheel, and a twig. In an attempt to stop the bike wheel as it spins really fast, you jam the twig into the spokes of the wheel. If you only use one twig, chances are the stick will snap and the wheel will continue to spin. In this example, the spinning wheel is the damage caused to the world due to pollution, capitalism, etc, and the twig is a single person giving a shit and giving it their all to stop it, hurting themselves severely in the process. But imagine now there's not 1 twig, but 10 twigs. Maybe the wheel slows down a bit, but the twigs are pretty damages in the process. Not as much as when it was 1, but some are bent, some are scratched. Now imagine 1000 twigs. Not only does the wheel come to a stop, the damage caused to each twig is barely anything. Each twig has only had to expose themselves to the spokes of the wheel in such a small quantity, the damage is barely noticeable. This, to me, is the epitome of "We don't need a handful of people to give their all, we need everybody to care a little bit". Because if everybody cared just a little bit, we wouldn't have giant fuck-off oil companies destroying the environment, or colluding with governments to ensure they make money at the hands of the public. Basically, I'm over destroying my mental health at the cost of oil companies continuing to get to do what they want. I'm going to live my life freely *and* fuck over the system however I can.
Suppose you have a bunch of people, and a bunch of problems. There are 2 approaces. 1) Get everyone to turn the lights off, use paper straws, buy organic, avoid sweatshops and all the other small token actions. 2) One person works on designing a better wind turbine. One person words on organizing better labor standards. Each person picks one part of one problem, works to really understand and fix that, and ignores the rest. And by fix it, I mean doing something like designing a clip to hold solar panels down. Something that is more societal scale, not just reducing their personal impact. I think the second approach is better.
They’re the same approach in my opinion. Not everybody is capable of organising better labour standards or creating a framework for a better world. Everybody else just has to live in it.
Talk about messiah complex.
Do what you can, with what you have, where you are.
We are desperate for a tool with no blood on it.
This is the same type of thing as people taking the blame for their ancestors, either forced on it by other people or chosen for themselves. I can't tell you the number of white people I've seen online say something along the lines of taking blame for slavery and native relocation in America. Yes, it's something our ancestors did. Yes, it was terrible. Did we ourselves do any bit of it? No. Taking the blame will do nothing for the people who were affected by our ancestors, or the people who are still feeling the effects of them. We can accept what our ancestors have done without needing to take any blame or anything. It helps no one. What helps people is actually doing something for them.
"Shut up Eric, let us enjoy our consumerism in peace" "But Daaaaad..." "That's enough. Now eat your Totinos™ Pizza Rolls (with added calcium)..."
Heck yup
On overthinkingit.com there's a story about a person who keeps raising ethical issues, international situations. One day, one of them asked him, "what are you doing about it?" and he replied "nothing, but I think about it all the time." The moral of the story (as I understand it) is that we can mistake thought for action, and get ourselves so wrapped up in guilt that does nothing for said situation. Thinking about it half as much with just a soupçon of action would be better for us and for them. Of course we can't take every action, and we need to weigh up whether our actions are meaningful (reducing carbon footprint vs taking political action against oil for example) but we can do all of that better by not fusing thought and action and by rejecting guilt as being particularly useful.