re: Choice
[Frederica Mathewes-Green  03/03 01:15 PM]

There's definitely a collision course between "gargantuan big-box" stores like IKEA, offering affordable quality and diversity, and "an economy where small artisans and businesses find it easier to enter the marketplace and compete for business." I don't see any way to reconcile these.

Your focus, Rod, is still on the perplexing power we have a consumers. I picture Scarlett O'Hara surrounded by beaux. Which retail outlet will receive our favors? We will always insist on buying the best, but what are the repercussions of where we buy it?

But if you go back before the consumer tidal wave, the assumption was that people would *make* most of what they used in daily life. Is it possible to recover that, any part of it? Should that be part of the Crunchy focus? Not just beer-making as a hobby, for example; I mean, trying as an intentional discipline to find ways to get around the need to *buy* everything, whether from a local entrepreneur or from Walmart.

The things a person touches in a day, the wrap of clothing, the bread and coffee consumed, the floorboards under bare feet — all these humble things have a kind of nobility, as intimate companions of ordinary human life. People used to be surrounded by things made by themselves, or by people they knew, even people who loved them. I keep feeling like there is something inherently dislocating about being companioned solely by things that came home in a plastic bag. Are there ways we can question the consumer imperative entirely?

The skills to make-your-own anything (not to mention the tools) are mostly lost, so the effort tends to attract those who want to co-opt this desire and sell us stuff. It falls into the category of one more consumer action, this one categorized as "hobby." The results are often more expensive than buying at the BigBox.

An intermediate suggestion is to ask before any purchase, "Is it possible to get this second hand?" Parachute out of the consumer cycle, and learn the skills of repairing and refurbishing. My Dad taught me how to refinish furniture; I'm teaching my granddaughter how to sew. It's a start.