I tried sending this article on consumerism to two other email lists but
regardless of it's merits - I can't get any feedback. Then it occurred to
me that I might have more luck if I try "futurework" . So here goes. I
can only only assume that everybody is happy with the way things are in
todays world! It would be nice to have a bit of dialogue.
Consumerism - A Personal View
The pleasures and excitement of consumerism know no bounds. Never a day
goes by without offers to wash my house, clean my drives, fences,
gutterings etc. It's difficult to go far each day without being bombarded
by fantastic offers and one is definitely not in the "in" crowd unless seen
to be constantly twiddling a cellular phone. I am told that it will cost
several hundred dollars at least to convert my old analogue TV, when it
finally becomes obsolete, to digital or maybe when the time comes I should
give radio a go.
To prosper, capitalism must invent ever more ingenious schemes for
squeezing the last penny out of the unwary, and this is a process that has
been going on ever since the start of the industrial revolution in one form
or another. The one difference that stands out between then and now is the
pace of the swindle. Methods of extracting cash are commonplace today that
were but flights of fancy in the 1800s. The inventive genious of humankind
when it comes to raw profit is limitless. There is no doubt that if you are
the entrepreneurial type, 'the world is your oyster'. The fact that it may
lead to untold misery hardly warrants a second thought. For example, in
Pakistan human suffering goes from bad to worse as the country takes the
road to trade liberalisation with no qualms. Since the country entered its
first structural adjustment programme (SAP) in 1988 the consequences have
been no different than those seen in the rest of the world as the distance
between the working and the capitalist classes grows ever wider.
Livelihood, which is critical to human dignity has been cruelly snatched
away to be replaced by anger, crime, hopelessness and in many cases - suicide.
At least in New Zealand the government seemed to see reason when earlier
this year it introduced new legislation to limit the growth of Poker
Machines. The maximum number on any new site will be nine machines instead
of the eighteen as at present it declared selrighteously. Mind you, the
government had no intention of stopping the growth of poker machines, just
slowing it down a bit. A bit like shutting the stable door after the horse
has bolted. It would be hard to imagine a more lucrative cash cow than the
gaming industry. Who worries if a small minority gets hooked on the
gambling industry? That's their fault isn't it? After all, nobody says to
go and leave the baby in the back of the car on a boiling hot day for three
hours while Mum goes and plays the gaming tables at the casino. It seems
inevitable that a small minority will become addicted to gambling with
tragic results or are there alternative strategies which could be tried?
Finally, as a specific example of how rampant consumerism disadvantages
most of us is that of coffee. We have been hearing a lot lately of how the
world's trade ministers have been meeting in Doha to hammer out a 'free'
trade agreement, but what we want and need is not 'free' trade but fair
trade. It is for this reason that a number of the world's celebrities have
been signing the Fair Trade pledge to give the world's small coffee
producers a decent return for their labours. The situation for small
coffee farmers and their families has never been more desperate. World
prices have never been so low for decades yet coffee sales in the
so-called first world are going through the roof. The farmers in Latin
America, South East Asia and Central Africa see a ridiculously low return
for their labours, while the transnational corporates make a killing.
It is because of this fact that a number of well known names such as Sam
Neill and Garrick Tremain encourage others to buy Fair Trade coffee, not
'Free Trade' coffee.
