Is consumer society sustainable in todays world?
Every politician you here from whatever country bleats on about GDP, import export balances and driving growth.
How can you have a society based on economic growth in world that is running out of materials, becoming increasingly polluted & with a run away climate problem? Especially when there are too many people on the planet in the first place and most of them live a very hard life.
Western consumer society cannot see beyond instant gratification and a cheap price. How can wearers of Primark or ASOS for example bear to wear fashion that is clearly produced in sweatshops where workers labour in awful conditions for less than a $ a day?
It is the same whether you are purchasing a $1000 Iphone made in china for a fraction of that price or a piece of furniture made in china , india or the far east.
Perhaps there are just too many people prepared to turn a blind eye for the sake of ‘I want it now” to slake their bottomless thirst for ‘looking cool’.
Greta T has it right and if a 12 year old can have the guts to stand up and be counted then should the rest of us follow suit. Or do we just stay blinded by consumerist greed, forgetting that it only really benefits the rich few who use the general population like sheep to be ‘shorn’. The money that provides the ‘lifestyles of the rich and famous’.
It is really not right but unless we decide to do something about it, resources will continue to shrink and the climate will get worse. And you guessed it – its the general populace that will feel the brunt of new laws, regulations, restrictions & shortages. Not the super rich and the political classes who profess to care while they laugh all the way to the bank.
Watching the Handmaid’s tale makes you realise that all this is just a step away so think , people , think.
