Honestly, I think “voting with your dollars” is equally as bullshit a propagandized myth as “environmentalism is everyones equal responsibility”. And just like the latter, I don’t mean that you shouldn’t always be trying to do the right thing for ecology when you can as an individual. I mean more that these ideas are designed to route us away from actions that can be truly effective, which strike at the root of the institutional problem, such as abolishing economic policies that create situations where corporations can externalize their waste onto the world in the first place. You simply cannot get to such a state by “dollar voting” or selective consumer boycotts. Definitely do promote living in a way that limits your individual impact, within reason, just don’t delude yourself into thinking that is any sort of solution to the issue itself. You are forced to be a liberal consumer, and so long as the institution remains, that is what you will remain. I think we have much more to gain by rallying around the common enemy of capitalism and corporatism than we do in shaming or otherwise pressuring our peers to restrict their own personal economic choices even further than they have already been. Because we really aren’t just “clueless consumers”, none of us are. We are individuals with needs, wants, fears, stresses, worries… And if we are presented with actions to take they really need to be actions that lead to meaningful change rather than ones that just cultivate self-resentment.
Honestly, I think “voting with your dollars” is equally as bullshit a propagandized myth as “environmentalism is everyones equal responsibility”. And just like the latter, I don’t mean that you shouldn’t always be trying to do the right thing for ecology when you can as an individual. I mean more that these ideas are designed to route us away from actions that can be truly effective, which strike at the root of the institutional problem, such as abolishing economic policies that create situations where corporations can externalize their waste onto the world in the first place. You simply cannot get to such a state by “dollar voting” or selective consumer boycotts. Definitely do promote living in a way that limits your individual impact, within reason, just don’t delude yourself into thinking that is any sort of solution to the issue itself. You are forced to be a liberal consumer, and so long as the institution remains, that is what you will remain. I think we have much more to gain by rallying around the common enemy of capitalism and corporatism than we do in shaming or otherwise pressuring our peers to restrict their own personal economic choices even further than they have already been. Because we really aren’t just “clueless consumers”, none of us are. We are individuals with needs, wants, fears, stresses, worries… And if we are presented with actions to take they really need to be actions that lead to meaningful change rather than ones that just cultivate self-resentment.