Blog Action Day: Water

Consumer choices may feel personal, but they're always global. Whatever we do has some impact on everyone else, even if it's indirect. That thought is rather mindboggling and can make us feel paralyzed with indecision or resentful that we're supposed to be so darn responsible when we've got plenty of other thoughts to occupy our minds that have immediate impact on our own lives, thank you very much. That's why I want to take a different approach to my participation in this year's Blog Action Day. The topic is water. Over 4,000 bloggers will be discussing it in their posts today, covering every facet of the issue. But here at The Thoughtful Consumer, first let's just cut to the chase:

(1) There's not enough water in many parts of the world and often when there is enough, it's not readily available or clean.

 (2) if you're reading this blog, you're undoubtedly one of the lucky people who has access to water by simply turning on a tap. You're also probably quite aware that there are things that you can do to conserve water (maybe you're even doing many of them) and that there are charities that are working very hard to provide water for people who desperately need it (Drop in the Bucket is a favorite of mine that I've mentioned in the past).

And now, rather than focusing in more detail on the substantial and often tragic problems that the world faces concerning water, or even on other charities or specific solutions to those problems, I'd simply like to offer some images of water that, I hope, will make all of us feel gratitude and will inspire us to find a way to help share this crucial, life-giving natural resource that belongs to everyone.

Please enjoy, contemplate, then do whatever feels right:



(c) 2010 Cynthia Friedlob
All images from Stock.Xchng

Blog Action Day: Climate Change

The challenge facing a call to action to deal with climate change is that the issue is not an obvious problem on a daily basis. We might notice an unseasonal heat wave, or be inconvenienced by a drought that restricts our water usage; we might even have an intellectual awareness that the issue is a serious one, but most average consumers in our country don't really suffer as a result of it -- not yet.

The majority of people probably don't even see much of a connection between consumerism and climate change, but it exists. Every product that we consume requires not only the ingredients or components of the product itself, but also a manufacturing and distribution process for those components and the final product, all which have some sort of environmental impact. Often there's also an environmental effect during or immediately after the consumption of the product.

Probably the most obvious example that contributes to the climate change problem: a car. When we buy a car, we're not just buying transportation; we're buying the various metals, glass, fiberglass, rubber, etc. that were used to build the car, as well as the manufacturing process itself. Then we need fossil fuels to run the car. Fuel requires not only raw materials (which are extracted in an environmentally unfriendly way), but also plants to process them (also not environmentally friendly). When fuel is burned in the car (and in the giant tanker trucks used to deliver the fuel to our gas stations), the waste product contributes to pollution. The Environmental Defense Fund states, "U.S. autos emit more than 333 million tons of carbon dioxide each year, more than one-fifth of the nation's total carbon dioxide emissions. Any serious effort to fight global warming must include cutting auto emissions." (Click here for a detailed analysis on the EDF site about how cars contribute to global warming.)

Everything that we consume has some kind of environmental consequences, so limiting our consumption seems to be a simple way to lessen our negative impact (our carbon footprint) on the environment. And because we are such a wealthy society, our impact is substantial. Global Issues reported that "using the latest figures available, in 2005, the wealthiest 20% of the world accounted for 76.6% of total private consumption. The poorest fifth just 1.5%" (See Material World: A Global Family Portrait, one of my favorite books, for some startling images that show the differences between us and consumers in other cultures.)

We may not have a lot of time to make changes in our patterns of consumption in order to halt and perhaps reverse the climate change trend. A recent British study predicts that the polar ice caps will be gone in twenty years. "Remove the Arctic ice cap and we are left with a very different and much warmer world. . . Loss of sea ice cover will 'set in motion powerful climate feedbacks which will have an impact far beyond the Arctic itself' . . . This could lead to flooding affecting one quarter of the world's population, substantial increases in greenhouse gas emission from massive carbon pools and extreme global weather changes."

Well, that would get our attention, but let's not wait that long. We can get involved right now by supporting these or many other fine organizations that are making efforts to deal with climate change:

The Nature Conservancy

Greenpeace

Oxfam

There are also opportunities for political involvement here:

350.org (sponsors of the International Day of Climate Action, October 24th)

TckTckTck (a cooperative umbrella organization working for an international agreement to address this issue at the UN Climate Change Conference in Copenhagen, December 7-18, 2009. You can read more about the UN's effort to make this deal happen.)

And you can check out the other 7900+ blogs from all over the world that are participating in Blog Action Day. [Update at 4:00 p.m. Pacific Time: over 10,000 bloggers are participating and the event was kicked off by a topical post from UK Prime Minister Gordon Brown.]

I know, it seems a little overwhelming. I've written in the past about "shopper's compassion fatigue," that oppressive feeling of the weight of the world on our shoulders that we can get when trying to make the "right" decision about what to buy, or whether to buy at all. But as long as we're all traveling together on this small planet, it seems like a good idea to do what we can to keep that planet healthy enough to take care of us. And nobody ever said that being a thoughtful consumer was easy.

© 2009 Cynthia Friedlob

Blog Action Day: Poverty

The chaos that has surrounded the world of finance lately has most of us thinking about our own situations, comfortable or precarious as they may be. Also, the outrageous disparity between the extraordinarily wealthy and, oh, the entire rest of humanity has been getting more press lately than it has in the past. Or perhaps in the past, outrageous wealth was seen strictly as an admirable goal for which to strive. Maybe not so much anymore. Of course, we want certain creature comforts and some sense of security as we grow older, but the concept that extreme wealth can be "too much" is no longer exclusive to those who take religious vows of poverty.

Is there an ethical limit to wealth? It's a viable topic for debate, especially if wealth is concentrated in the hands of a few while the majority of the world's population suffers from a dire lack of food, potable water and decent medical care.

The U.S. is a wealthy country, with a per capita GDP of $46,000. But not everybody is flush with cash. In 2004, twelve percent of our population lived below the poverty line. And how does that translate to annual income? In 2007, the poverty threshold for a single person under 65 was $10,787; the threshold for a family group of four, including two children, was $21,027.

Can you imagine supporting a family on $21,027 a year? Can you imagine squeaking by on your own with about nine hundred dollars in your pocket each month? Less than two hundred fifty each week? That would mean no health insurance, so you'd be forced to rely on free clinics and hope to arrange free prescription drugs. You'd have no car because insurance and gas costs are too high, so public transportation, walking or maybe using a bicycle would be your only ways to get around.

What about a place to live? The average rent back in 2005 in New York was $2400 per month; in San Francisco, it was $1573; and in Los Angeles it was $1421. You could find relatively cheap rent in Oklahoma City, Birmingham, Memphis and other smaller cities and towns, but even at $600-$700 per month, that would leave you only a few hundred dollars for utilities and a phone.

Did you need some clothes to wear, too? Charity and thrift stores would be your only options, unless you found some generous friends. And you wanted to eat? You'd have to be one incredibly brilliant shopper to come up with enough food and it's unlikely that your diet would be nutritionally balanced.

Sounds rough, doesn't it? But, if you worked for minimum wage ($6.55 per hour in 2008), you'd gross $13,624 per year, putting you above the poverty line. You can read about just how difficult it would be trying to scrape by on minimum wage in Barbara Ehrenreich's Nickle and Dimed: On (Not) Getting By in America. The author voluntarily tried the task, at one point nearly ending up in a homeless shelter.

Ms. Ehrenreich knew she'd be able to return to her comfortable life after her adventure in journalism was complete. But how demoralizing it must be, on top of the physical demands and the fear of losing a job or even taking an unpaid sick day (most minimum wage jobs offer no benefits), to live on the edge, knowing that, without a lot of luck and super-human determination, there's likely nothing but more of the same in your future. And that's here in the land of opportunity.

My favorite book that depicts the relative wealth of nations is Material World: A Global Family Portrait by Peter Menzel. Here's the description from the Amazon.com review:

"In honor of the United Nations-sponsored International Year of the Family in 1994, award-winning photojournalist Peter Menzel brought together 16 of the world's leading photographers to create a visual portrait of life in 30 nations. Material World tackles its wide subject by zooming in, allowing one household to represent an entire nation. Photographers spent one week living with a 'statistically average' family in each country, learning about their work, their attitudes toward their possessions, and their hopes for the future. Then a 'big picture' shot of the family was taken outside the dwelling, surrounded by all their (many or few) material goods."

Not only is this book visually riveting, it offers unique insight into the lives of ordinary families in other cultures by sharing not only a glimpse of their daily experiences, but also what possessions they live with and find valuable. It provides necessary perspective for all of us.

It's easy to feel overwhelmed by the issue of poverty, but paralysis doesn't help the situation. Instead, it's more useful to take action, no matter how small that action may be. One possibility you might consider is donating to:

Kiva is a micro-loan organization that allows individuals to donate as little as $25 to an entrepreneur who needs just a little boost to begin a business. For example, one of the featured entrepreneurs today is Mr. Net Sopheak's Group. Mr. Sopheak and his wife live in Cambodia. They are requesting a loan of $350 to buy two pigs to start a pig breeding business. The repayment term of their loan will be ten months. Only $25 is still required to meet their goal. You could help this family, or many other families, improve their living conditions by making a donation.

Whatever your situation, I urge you to act with a donation of money, useful goods that are no longer useful to you, or, if you're struggling right now and feel that you haven't a spare penny, consider donating your time.

If you're reading this blog, you're economically better off than so many people who share our planet. Poverty is a tragedy. But it also would be very sad for those of us who are more fortunate to experience a poverty of spirit. Let's nourish our spirits by acting for the benefit of others today, Blog Action Day.

© 2008 Cynthia Friedlob