While poking around for excellent articles to link to in my sites of interest post for the day, I came across this story at the International Herald Tribune, and I just had to comment on it in a post of its own, because the article is awesome, and it makes some really excellent points. Granted, many of these points have been made on this very site before, numerous times, but something about seeing them in print makes me all giddy inside. Go read it. It’s short, and it filled my heart with glee, so I think you might enjoy it.

The basic point of the article is that going “green” requires consuming less crap. I mean, fundamentally. The whole point is to reduce your impact on the world, so therefore you need to be consuming less, buying less, re-using more, and living a lifestyle which is oriented more on conservation than consumption.

The thing is, as the author points out, this is actually kind of boring. If you care deeply about the environment, you do things like showering less frequently, reusing containers, keeping stacks of recycling around, wearing used clothes, and so forth. You actually use everything you own until it wears out or cannot be retooled in a new way. You take your shoes to the saddlery to be repaired, you make rag rugs out of torn clothes, you use holey socks as dusters.

However, now that “green” has become fashionable, this weird situation is arising where major companies are marketing green products, creating a consumer market for green goods. Which is, uhm, totally insane.

Look. I am all for the production of necessary products in environmentally sustainable ways, and for the promotion of more ethical living. But I see the green movement going the same way as the local foodshed movement; it’s becoming an elite pursuit for the wealthy. By turning the green movement into an orgy of consumerism, we’re sending the message that you need to buy shit to go green.

On the contrary, to go green, you need to not buy shit. And I hate that two good movements, coming from a good place, are just turning into capitalist nightmares, marketed at the wealthy and the people who blindly follow trends. It seems like every “green living tips” article I see has a list of crap to buy, and that doesn’t really encourage people in lower income brackets to pursue more ecologically friendly modes of living. We should be stressing that caring about the Earth doesn’t require money, it just requires some logic, and anyone is capable of doing their part.

I’m “green” by nature, not because I care about the environment, although I do, but because I grow up dirt poor, so I’m a cheapskate. I use energy efficient tools in my house because they save me money, and the environmental benefit is a nice bonus. It would never occur to me to toss a container after using it once, to leave a light on when I’m not using it, to do anything but compost. I suspect that a lot of people lived green long before living green was a concept in the minds of corporations.

It’s gravely disappointing to me that the green movement is going where it is, that people are being told they can have their cake and eat it too. Sure, build a monstrous house! If you use “green certified” building materials, it’s ok! Sure, drive a car! If it’s a Prius, it’s ok! Be selfish! You can buy indulgences!

That’s what I was so pleased to see this honest and frank article in the IHT, because it pointed out the glaring truth of the matter. And how delightful it would be to see a genuine movement of people working to consume less, rejecting the products marketed to them and using common sense to think about how they can reduce their impact on the environment. There’s “living the green lifestyle,” and then there’s the reality of living a conscious life, and these two things are very different.