Good Stuff? — A Consumption Manifesto: The Top Ten Principles of Good Consumption

Consumption is one of life’s great pleasures. Buying things we desire, traveling to beautiful places, eating delectable food: icing on the cake of life. But too often the effects of our blissful consumption make for a sad story. Giant cars exhaling dangerous exhaust, hog farms pumping out harmful pollutants, toxic trash pestering poor neighborhoods — none of this if there weren’t something to sell.

But there’s no need to trade pleasure for guilt. With thoughtfulness and commitment, consumption can be a force for good. Through buying what we need, produced the way we want, we can create the world we’d like to live in.

To that end and for the future, a Consumption Manifesto: Principle One. Reduce, Reuse, Recycle. This brilliant triad says it all. Reduce: Avoid buying what you don’t need— and when you do get that dishwasher/lawnmower/toilet, spend the money up front for an efficient model. Re-use: Buy used stuff, and wring the last drop of usefulness out of most everything you own. Recycle: Do it, but know that it’s the last and least effective leg of the triad. (Ultimately, recycling simply results in the manufacture of more things.) Principle Two. Stay close to home. Work close to home to shorten your commute; eat food grown nearby; support local businesses; join local organizations. All of these will improve the look, shape, smell, and feel of your community. Principle Three. Internal combustion engines are polluting, and their use should be minimized. Period.

Principle Four. Watch what you eat. Whenever possible, avoid food grown with pesticides, in feedlots, or by agribusiness. It’s an easy way to use your dollars to vote against the spread of toxins in our bodies, land, and water. Principle Five. Private industries have very little incentive to improve their environmental practices. Our consumption choices must encourage and support good behavior; our political choices must support government regulation.

Principle Six. Support thoughtful innovations in manufacturing and production. Hint: Drilling for oil is no longer an innovation.

Principle Seven. Prioritize. Think hardest when buying large objects; don’t drive yourself mad fretting over the small ones. It’s easy to be distracted by the paper bag puzzle, but an energy-sucking refrigerator is much more worthy of your attention. (Small electronics are an exception.)

Principle Eight. Vote. Political engagement enables the spread of environmentally conscious policies. Without public action, thoughtful individuals are swimming upstream.

Principle Nine. Don’t feel guilty. It only makes you sad. Principle Ten. Enjoy what you have—the things that are yours alone, and the things that belong to none of us. Both are nice, but the latter are precious. Those things that we cannot manufacture and should never own—water, air, birds, trees—are the foundation of life’s pleasures. Without them, we’re nothing. With us, there may be nothing left. It’s our choice.

Umbra Fisk, Grist Magazine. Slightly adapted from: http://www.worldwatch.org/node/1470 Access on June 1, 2007.

Good Stuff? — A Consumption Manifesto: The Top Ten Principles of Good Consumption

Consumption is one of life’s great pleasures. Buying things we desire, traveling to beautiful places, eating delectable food: icing on the cake of life. But too often the effects of our blissful consumption make for a sad story. Giant cars exhaling dangerous exhaust, hog farms pumping out harmful pollutants, toxic trash pestering poor neighborhoods — none of this if there weren’t something to sell.

But there’s no need to trade pleasure for guilt. With thoughtfulness and commitment, consumption can be a force for good. Through buying what we need, produced the way we want, we can create the world we’d like to live in.

To that end and for the future, a Consumption Manifesto: Principle One. Reduce, Reuse, Recycle. This brilliant triad says it all. Reduce: Avoid buying what you don’t need— and when you do get that dishwasher/lawnmower/toilet, spend the money up front for an efficient model. Re-use: Buy used stuff, and wring the last drop of usefulness out of most everything you own. Recycle: Do it, but know that it’s the last and least effective leg of the triad. (Ultimately, recycling simply results in the manufacture of more things.) Principle Two. Stay close to home. Work close to home to shorten your commute; eat food grown nearby; support local businesses; join local organizations. All of these will improve the look, shape, smell, and feel of your community. Principle Three. Internal combustion engines are polluting, and their use should be minimized. Period.

Principle Four. Watch what you eat. Whenever possible, avoid food grown with pesticides, in feedlots, or by agribusiness. It’s an easy way to use your dollars to vote against the spread of toxins in our bodies, land, and water. Principle Five. Private industries have very little incentive to improve their environmental practices. Our consumption choices must encourage and support good behavior; our political choices must support government regulation.

Principle Six. Support thoughtful innovations in manufacturing and production. Hint: Drilling for oil is no longer an innovation.

Principle Seven. Prioritize. Think hardest when buying large objects; don’t drive yourself mad fretting over the small ones. It’s easy to be distracted by the paper bag puzzle, but an energy-sucking refrigerator is much more worthy of your attention. (Small electronics are an exception.)

Principle Eight. Vote. Political engagement enables the spread of environmentally conscious policies. Without public action, thoughtful individuals are swimming upstream.

Principle Nine. Don’t feel guilty. It only makes you sad. Principle Ten. Enjoy what you have—the things that are yours alone, and the things that belong to none of us. Both are nice, but the latter are precious. Those things that we cannot manufacture and should never own—water, air, birds, trees—are the foundation of life’s pleasures. Without them, we’re nothing. With us, there may be nothing left. It’s our choice.

Umbra Fisk, Grist Magazine. Slightly adapted from: http://www.worldwatch.org/node/1470 Access on June 1, 2007.

Aquele estranho animal

Os do Alegrete dizem que o causo se deu em Itaqui, os de Itaqui dizem que foi no Alegrete, outros juram que só poderia ter acontecido em Uruguaiana. Eu não afirmo nada: sou neutro.

Mas, pelo que me contaram, o primeiro automóvel que apareceu entre aquela brava indiada, eles o mataram a pau, pensando que fosse um bicho. A história foi assim (...).

Ia um piazinho estrada fora no seu petiço — tropt, tropt, tropt (este é o barulho do trote) — quando de repente ouviu — fufufupubum ! fufufupubum chiiiipum!

E eis que aí a “coisa”, até então invisível, apontou por detrás de um capão, bufando que nem touro brigão, saltando que nem pipoca, se traqueando que nem velha coroca, chiando que nem chaleira derramada e largando fumo pelas ventas como a mula-sem-cabeça.

“Minha Nossa Senhora.”

O piazinho deu meia-volta e largou numa disparada louca rumo da cidade (...).

Chegado que foi, o piazinho contou a história como pôde, mal e mal e depressa, que o tempo era pouco e não dava para maiores explicações, pois já se ouvia o barulho do bicho que se aproximava.

Pois bem, minha gente: quando este apareceu na entrada da cidade, caiu aquele montão de povo em cima dele, os homens uns com porretes, outros com garruchas que nem tinham tido tempo para carregar de pólvora, outros com boleadeiras, mas todos de a pé, porque também nem houvera tempo para montar, e as mulheres umas empunhando as suas vassouras, outras as suas pás de mexer marmelada, e os guris, de longe, se divertindo com seus bodoques, cujos tiros iam acertar em cheio nas costas dos combatentes. E tudo abaixo de gritos e pragas que nem lhes posso repetir aqui.

Até que enfim houve uma pausa para respiração.

O povo se afastou, resfolegante, e abriu-se uma clareira, no meio da qual se viu o auto emborcado, amassado, quebrado, escangalhado, e não digo que morto, porque as rodas ainda giravam no ar, nos últimos transes de uma teimosa agonia. E quando as rodas pararam, as pobres, eis que o motorista, milagrosamente salvo, saiu penosamente engatinhando por debaixo dos escombros do seu ex-automóvel.

— A la pucha! — exclamou então um guasca, entre espantado e penalizado — o animal deu cria!

QUINTANA, Mário. Poesia Completa. Rio de Janeiro, Editora Nova Aguilar, 2005.

Aquele estranho animal

Os do Alegrete dizem que o causo se deu em Itaqui, os de Itaqui dizem que foi no Alegrete, outros juram que só poderia ter acontecido em Uruguaiana. Eu não afirmo nada: sou neutro.

Mas, pelo que me contaram, o primeiro automóvel que apareceu entre aquela brava indiada, eles o mataram a pau, pensando que fosse um bicho. A história foi assim (...).

Ia um piazinho estrada fora no seu petiço — tropt, tropt, tropt (este é o barulho do trote) — quando de repente ouviu — fufufupubum ! fufufupubum chiiiipum!

E eis que aí a “coisa”, até então invisível, apontou por detrás de um capão, bufando que nem touro brigão, saltando que nem pipoca, se traqueando que nem velha coroca, chiando que nem chaleira derramada e largando fumo pelas ventas como a mula-sem-cabeça.

“Minha Nossa Senhora.”

O piazinho deu meia-volta e largou numa disparada louca rumo da cidade (...).

Chegado que foi, o piazinho contou a história como pôde, mal e mal e depressa, que o tempo era pouco e não dava para maiores explicações, pois já se ouvia o barulho do bicho que se aproximava.

Pois bem, minha gente: quando este apareceu na entrada da cidade, caiu aquele montão de povo em cima dele, os homens uns com porretes, outros com garruchas que nem tinham tido tempo para carregar de pólvora, outros com boleadeiras, mas todos de a pé, porque também nem houvera tempo para montar, e as mulheres umas empunhando as suas vassouras, outras as suas pás de mexer marmelada, e os guris, de longe, se divertindo com seus bodoques, cujos tiros iam acertar em cheio nas costas dos combatentes. E tudo abaixo de gritos e pragas que nem lhes posso repetir aqui.

Até que enfim houve uma pausa para respiração.

O povo se afastou, resfolegante, e abriu-se uma clareira, no meio da qual se viu o auto emborcado, amassado, quebrado, escangalhado, e não digo que morto, porque as rodas ainda giravam no ar, nos últimos transes de uma teimosa agonia. E quando as rodas pararam, as pobres, eis que o motorista, milagrosamente salvo, saiu penosamente engatinhando por debaixo dos escombros do seu ex-automóvel.

— A la pucha! — exclamou então um guasca, entre espantado e penalizado — o animal deu cria!

QUINTANA, Mário. Poesia Completa. Rio de Janeiro, Editora Nova Aguilar, 2005.