Happy 40th Earth Day, Everyone
Apr 22, 2010, Updated Dec 09, 2016
This morning my inbox was filled with dozens of emails from various companies, all trying to get me to buy some thing to celebrate Earth Day. Reusable water bottles. Earth-logo t-shirts. Organic cleaning products. Foldable bicycles.
How ironic.
Buying things, no matter the intent, is part of the problem. Yeah, you can flame me all you want in the comments… I know that buying stuff is supposedly important to keeping our economy going, growth is good, yadda yadda… But buying things uses resources. It’s called being a “consumer” for a reason. Packaging things uses resources. Shipping things uses resources. The list goes on.
How many “Save The Earth” T-Shirts do we need to buy before we actually, well, Save The Earth?
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This Earth Day, instead of buying a thing, go out and DO. Go walk in the park. Ride your bike. Watch The Story of Stuff. Get outside for a run, and pause to pick up some litter on the side of the path. Go to a local farmer’s market. Sign this online petition.
And, if you really want to spend some money today, make a donation to the Environmental Working Group. One of their projects is to eliminate corn subsidies, a big problem that I’ll be writing about in future posts.
I did buy something today (Simple shoes!), but I also contributed to the EWG… a nice balance I think? Great post, A!