Saturday, November 24, 2007

Suddenly, Buy Nothing Day makes sense to mainstream


http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2007/11/23/BUBETG17L.DTL


KCBS had stories covering Buy Nothing Day

and a book about The Corruption of Consumerism
Benjamin Barber, author of "Consumed: How Markets Corrupt Children, Infantilize Adults, and Swallow Citizens Whole," on American capitalism.

More media coverage here:
http://adbusters.org/metas/eco/bnd/news.php

Suddenly, after An Inconvenient Truth etc., Buy Nothing Day makes sense to the mainstream.

In a weak economy, even questions about its impact, which was ridiculed in the past are less evident. I think it may be time to raise the issue of high market and retailers expectations and what would be a non-damaging and sustainable economy with some stability for average workers: more emphasis on simple, basic, durable goods made relatively locally, of a quality that lasted long enough that a higher price was accepted? Didn't we have at least a partial economy sort of like that 60 or so years ago? I remember when people began to decry "planned obsolescence" in the 1950s, particularly in connection with toys and automobiles.

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