The New York Times recently published an artilce discussing green consumerism.
The author says,
Critics question the notion that we can avert global warming by buying so-called earth-friendly products, from clothing and cars to homes and vacations, when the cumulative effect of our consumption remains enormous and hazardous.
“There is a very common mind-set right now which holds that all that we’re going to need to do to avert the large-scale planetary catastrophes upon us is make slightly different shopping decisions,” said Alex Steffen, the executive editor of Worldchanging.com, a Web site devoted to sustainability issues.
The genuine solution, he and other critics say, is to significantly reduce one’s consumption of goods and resources. It’s not enough to build a vacation home of recycled lumber; the real way to reduce one’s carbon footprint is to only own one home.
The article in general is quite critical about how trendy “eco-friendly” shopping is getting. I appreciate that they point out that buying “eco-friendly” goods is not a replacement for cutting down our consumption and dealing with the bigger issues, but I still feel that more and more environmentally-friendly products available on the market is a great thing. Especially because they are becoming more affordable for the average citizen. Think of Energy Star certified appliances, organic pest control products, certified organic products, Fair Trade products, etc., etc.
Of course, there are a lot of products that say they’re “green” when they are far from it. It’s up to us to still do the research and make informed decisions about what we buy, as always. We should also always consider where the products came from and how far away they were made, etc. So I agree with the authors that “green” is not always well defined our well thought out. But the fact that there are more options available to me is still a good thing!
You can read several interesting critiques of the article at TreeHugger.com and Clean Air Gardening.
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