Rethinking Green
easy approaches to being ‘green’ are en vogue, but do they shoulder the environmental burden?
Posted Apr 18, 11:56 am in environment, human nature, improvements, sustainability
Note: This article is a response to this “eco-business”, which sells standard cleaning products in reused containers.
I don’t mean to engage in the perfect solution fallacy here, but a business selling Windex in reused bottles encapsulates a lot of the things that I think are misguided about the green movement. I do believe that reusing materials is a very good thing, but I am concerned that ‘green marketing’ efforts like this hoodwink well-intentioned people into thinking that minor and convenient consumption changes can offset the huge environmental problems we create by not making serious inquiries to our overall lifestyle choices.
In my mind, efforts like this have the worrying effect of diverting attention away from the real problems (overconsumption), and instead breeding attitudes founded on ease and ignorance (e.g. “well, as long as I recycle, I’m doing my part”) and reliance on consumer goods to promote ideas that really require behavioral changes. I understand that recycling is generally a good thing, but I’ve met countless people who think that just recycling is equivalent to being environmentally conscious. And it’s not; it is simply one expression of it. Buying Windex in recycled bottles and recycling aluminum cans is not, as many people will likely see it, absolution for our collective extravagance. If you read up on the economics of recycling you might see why this is the case (to put it shortly, recycling takes a lot of energy, uses a lot of resources, and has a huge carbon footprint of its own).
The conversation about environmentalism has been so dumbed-down and reduced to quick-fix solutions that it has started to promote the problem by making consumers feel like the only role in the consumption process (with regards to social impact) is the last stage— recycling the empty bottles, cans, and cardboard boxes of the stuff they buy. And while this one way to make a contribution, it’s not even close to being the most effective way to transform concern for the environment into action; it’s just the easiest way— and that’s a big difference.
The reality is that if we really care about the environment, we will need to consume less overall. We will likely need to make major sacrifices to our comfort levels. If we really care, we may need to accept some major inconveniences in our lives. We cannot get something for nothing.
Buying a reused plastic bottle is indeed a small step towards a massive goal, but we should not be tricked into thinking that answers can be bought so easily and shipped to our houses. As I mentioned before, with true commitment comes sacrifice.
We like quick solutions, but it is time to start thinking harder about our roles in creating the problems, instead of trying to consume our way out, which is the way we got in in the first place. But unfortunately, modern culture hinges so much on consumption and consumer products being the solutions to our problems that it is our instinctual response to look for our solutions there— externally— instead of within ourselves and our behavior. Unfortunately, that is precisely the wrong place to look.