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!