merchimerch (![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png)
merchimerch) wrote2008-02-21 09:10 am
merchimerch) wrote2008-02-21 09:10 am
haagen dazs is covered in bees!
I find this article interesting:
http://money.cnn.com/2008/02/17/news/companies/bees_icecream/index.htm
It is good to see large companies publicizing the bee colony collapse and funding research toward a solution. I really do think this is a positive thing.
However, my skeptical side thinks that perhaps Haagen Dazs realized that Ben and Jerry's is quite successful because it has the Whole Foods style of appeal to customers. I call it "whole foods appeal" because Whole Foods and Ben and Jerry's sell a high-priced luxurious product(s) with the extra bonus of allowing its customers to feel good about purchasing it because a portion of the proceeds goes to an environmental cause.
Part of the eco-chic movement seems to be consuming for a cure. I have a problem with the idea that people can really have an environmental impact by buying the "right" products and brands. Don't get me wrong - buying green is better than buying not-green, but I still think that buying less and buying local is the more productive path to healing our over burdened earth.
Regardless, now Haagen Dazs can have a portion of the eco-chic market share. People who like to buy their ice cream in tiny tubs rather than big bricks can now have a choice as to which brand of delicious, environmentally mindful, smug satisfaction they would like to consume :)
http://money.cnn.com/2008/02/17/news/companies/bees_icecream/index.htm
It is good to see large companies publicizing the bee colony collapse and funding research toward a solution. I really do think this is a positive thing.
However, my skeptical side thinks that perhaps Haagen Dazs realized that Ben and Jerry's is quite successful because it has the Whole Foods style of appeal to customers. I call it "whole foods appeal" because Whole Foods and Ben and Jerry's sell a high-priced luxurious product(s) with the extra bonus of allowing its customers to feel good about purchasing it because a portion of the proceeds goes to an environmental cause.
Part of the eco-chic movement seems to be consuming for a cure. I have a problem with the idea that people can really have an environmental impact by buying the "right" products and brands. Don't get me wrong - buying green is better than buying not-green, but I still think that buying less and buying local is the more productive path to healing our over burdened earth.
Regardless, now Haagen Dazs can have a portion of the eco-chic market share. People who like to buy their ice cream in tiny tubs rather than big bricks can now have a choice as to which brand of delicious, environmentally mindful, smug satisfaction they would like to consume :)
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I would like to see the democratization of 'eco-chic', where most people have easy access to things like organic food, better lightbulbs, and less polluting ways of living. I don't want this to be a thing of the 'elites' only - we won't realize the benefits until we have economies of scale.
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I guess that even more than making greener goods cheaper and more affordable, I'd like to see a return to conservationalism as a moral value or something. My grandparents are old school conservationalists, and were big activists in the Audobon society. I was raised with a mind toward consuming less and efficiency. Honestly, even more than making solar and wind power cheaper and more readily available, I think a return to the ideals of buying less, throwing away less, and reuse is really what is needed. However, that's damn near impossible to market to our hyper consumerist society.
Getting back to our Puritanical roots - that's what's need in this country!
Seriously though...I'd love to see more puritan values being pushed in terms of environmentalism and spartan lifestyle rather than all the puritanical outrage about sex and religion.
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That being said, the consumer nature of society - the fact that many things have a built-in lifetime and are not made to last, is something that will change only over a long period of time.
It may not change - we're exporting this lifestyle globally, and now kids growing up in China and India want the same access to STUFF that we do.
My planetary footprint is about 5, even with all the eco-stuff that I do. That means that if everyone lived the way I do, we'd need five Earths' worth of resources.
This is why I don't call myself sustainable ... it's fundamentally impossible at this point in this First world country, because even if you personally did everything you could, reduced as much as you could, the systems that you implicitly rely upon - from the military to the road and rail infrastructure - consume prodigiously.
That being said, I do try and be mindful and be smarter about what I can control directly.
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I just wonder if there is a way to step out of the "stuff" box culturally. Probably not, but I'd like to imagine the possibility.
And I agree that planned and perceived obsolescence is one of the most important aspects of our consumer goods economy, and one of the most insidiously dangerous for the planet. Quite literally, they don't make things like they used to, and it's very much on purpose.
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My talk at Solaris 2007 was called "Green Footprints." My point in that talk was that it's going to be impossible to not leave a trace, but we can certainly lighten the load. And that we cannot let the perfect be the enemy of the good.
Once a person breaks out of apathy and becomes aware of and accepts the reality of the looming environmental crisis, it becomes too easy to trap yourself in despair. The problems appear huge and overbearing, and "what can one person do?" is a commonly heard from refrain.
We didn't get here overnight, and the problems we are trying to solve will not be solved overnight. I hope that our actions now build cultural momentum that ripples through society, and makes it feasible for the necessary changes that are yet to come.
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My grandma had this saying about individual action rippling out like when you throw a stone in the pond. That tends to be my approach to altruism--it's still good if it's small and close to home.
However, at some point, cultural change needs to happen. I believe it is possible, even in this generation, but it needs to be done at a personal level.
And you gave a talk at Solaris? How neat - I was just hearing about that from someone.
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Individual change is the harbinger of cultural change and at some point polluting will be like smoking.
One hopes anyway
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Ironically, just as I have decided to go vegan for a while, vegetables may be in shorter supply...
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Canaries in coal mines are an apt metaphor at this point, except there's no way out of this mine.
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I get what you're saying about the need to push consumption rates down, but that sort of social change can barely happen over a generation, let alone overnight. In the meantime getting people to buy greener products is a step in the right direction.
Hi there BTW :).
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As I said above, I agree that greener is better regardless, but I'd like to see more happening in traditional ways in non-elite social brackets. My inner neo-Marxist would love to see a break down of conspicuous consumption at the morality level.
And hi - I hear that you make it to my end of the bay sometimes - lemme know when, since it would be great to hang out.
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(Anonymous) 2008-02-23 02:49 am (UTC)(link)Of course email always works.