Sustainable Living
Most people I know talk about sustainability in regard to the environment. I think that is a rather narrow path to take. Sustainable living involves more than just dealing with environmental issues.
Sustainability is approached (not achieved) when the environment, the economy and society develop in collaboration using only the resources that can be replaced. An essential element of the concept is ensuring future generations' ability to do the same. It involves fair trade and social justice. It means livable lives for everyone. If we cannot come up with lifestyles that everyone can adopt, it isn't really sustainable, is it?
Wes talks about sustainability and the treadmill of production. I have trouble thinking my way through that discussion. I, like so many others, keep trying to find ways that we can produce our way out of this mess. But I know we cannot. I know that we cannot have continual growth, our economy cannot keep growing - most of the growth we have achieved in the last 50 years seems to me to be a shell game, a global "robbing-peter-to-pay-paul." How can you call it growth if all you are looking at is profits? What about all those costs that keep getting deferred? Costs my children and grandchildren will end up paying...
As I said, I know we cannot fix this by producing - but I am having a hard time grokking it. Maybe it's denial - if we cannot produce our way out of this dilemma, how do we get out of it? Or can we?
Makes me want to buy a piece of ground and get sheep again (and all the other crap for a self-sustaining lifestyle). I think I have read too many apocalyptic SciFi novels...
Sustainable living involves more than just dealing with environmental issues.
Sustainability is approached (not achieved) when the environment, the economy and society develop in collaboration using only the resources that can be replaced. An essential element of the concept is ensuring future generations' ability to do the same. It involves fair trade and social justice. It means livable lives for everyone. If we cannot come up with lifestyles that everyone can adopt, it isn't really sustainable, is it?
Wes talks about sustainability and the treadmill of production. I have trouble thinking my way through that discussion. I, like so many others, keep trying to find ways that we can produce our way out of this mess. But I know we cannot. I know that we cannot have continual growth, our economy cannot keep growing - most of the growth we have achieved in the last 50 years seems to me to be a shell game, a global "robbing-peter-to-pay-paul." How can you call it growth if all you are looking at is profits? What about all those costs that keep getting deferred? Costs my children and grandchildren will end up paying...
As I said, I know we cannot fix this by producing - but I am having a hard time grokking it. Maybe it's denial - if we cannot produce our way out of this dilemma, how do we get out of it? Or can we?
Makes me want to buy a piece of ground and get sheep again (and all the other crap for a self-sustaining lifestyle). I think I have read too many apocalyptic SciFi novels...
One problem with talking about sustainability is that it is an overwhelming idea. There is great resistance to changing our lives, especially if we think it means deprivation of any kind... even inconveniencing ourselves is sometimes more than we can deal with. I admit it - I have those days.
Another issue is that it is so very difficult to know when we are hearing/reading valid information, and when what we are hearing/reading is just sales hype - just Greenwashing.
A third major problem with sustaining the sustainability movement is it is so DAMN expensive to go green - or at least it feels like it is. Products seem to cost so much more when it bears the label - "Green."
And one last issue (at least the last that I can think of right now) is that there is not much solidarity in the movement. So many people are doing so many different things. I know that there rarely is the unity in a social movement that people think there is, but I cannot help thinking that a bit more unity and common direction would help considerably.
So, we are adding new sustainable ways to our lives, one thing at a time - CF lightbulbs, buying local produce, using cloth tote bags, riding bicycles whenever possible, driving less, investing responsibly, using fewer toxic chemicals and trying to talk more with people about sustainable living.
I have to think about all the work it takes incrementally or I will give up on it.
