But there's something else this shift of focus does. It helps us to ignore the fact that we're so much more than just consumers. Raj Patel says it plainly in Stuffed and Starved, pg. 312:
The honey trap of ethical consumerism is to think that the only means of communication we have with producers is through the market, and that the only way we can take collective action is to persuade everyone else to shop like us. It alters our relationship to the possibility of social change. It makes us think we are consumers in the great halls of democracy, which we can pluck off the shevles in the shops. But we are not consumers of democracy. We are its proprietors. And democracy happens not merely when we shop, but thorughout our lives. The connection between those who eat and those who grow food cannot be measured in terms of brand loyalty points or dollars spent. To short-cut the food system, and to know the people who grow our food, is more than to broker a relationship between buyer and seller. It is to build a human contact that goes beyond a simple transaction and that recognizes certain kinds of commonality, certain kinds of subjugation, and struggles, fights, for an end to the systemic inequalities in power which shape the way rich and poor live today.
2 comments:
This is all true. But as one of the pushers for awareness actions, I need to clarify.
When I talked about awareness in that brainstorming session I made the mistake of using consumption scenarios, which devolved into talking about, say, which company is greener than which other.
That wasn't my intention, nor what I had in mind. Rather, I was envisioning a way to help us understand all the ways in which we are connected to the larger system, and to help us explore the effects of our actions, not (just) in terms of consumer choice, but in terms of public policy, community participation, and even personal health.
The project is still very vague, and as you see I keep having trouble describing it, but I'll be careful to avoid using consumer choice issues in my pitch. I completely share your conviction that we can't buy our way out.
Yup, I think such a facility as you suggest would be of enormous benefit. And even raising awareness of consumer choices would be helpful, no doubt but, as I say, only to an extent. I hope my post doesn't suggest I'm against raising awareness!
(One point: In all these raising awareness schemes I still suspect the problem of overwhelming users would have to be addressed. It's a big, complicated world -- and I just want to eat a banana.)
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