(Part 3) Top products from r/Anticonsumption

Basically this. I am super frugal when it comes to buying things/items...I hate spending money on clothes (especially when most of the stuff out there these days is overpriced, cheaply made crap) or objects that aren't necessary. I do not mind spending money on food or going out with friends though. Although I have plenty of savings and could buy a new tv or netbook or cell phone (hell I don't even own a cell to begin with) or whatever...do I really need to? My tv still works. Sure it's 12 years old but it still works fine. My netbook is a few years old and it would be nice to have a newer one with a screen larger than 7" but is that really necessary? I've been using it for the past 3 years and would a larger screen really make me happier?

I don't know I guess my anticonsumption is very closely tied to my frugality and also to some Buddhist teachings that I've read about. Although I have urges to buy items, an ice cream maker for example, I tend to over think it...do I really need it, will it make my life better, is it really worth $70, will I actually use it? And eventually I just never make the purchase. I've been thinking about buying one for 3 years now...I have the money but I've lived for 36 years without one, do I really "need" one now? I should note that for the past 3 years I have not had any real ice cream as I am 99% vegan so it would be nice to be able to make my own vegan ice cream...yet I still can't seem to justify spending the money on this one object.

Anyway, I really enjoyed this book: http://www.amazon.com/Hooked-Buddhist-Writings-Desire-Consume/dp/1590301722

It totally shaped my thoughts regarding anticonsumption.

Hi! I’m currently reading “The Psychology of Overeating: Food and the Culture of Consumerism” by Kima Cargill. Link.
It’s very interdisciplinary, and doesn’t just focus on food..! Her style is very frank, and it’s clear that this lady is pissed off at consumerism. First couple of chapters are a bit “wtf”, but it gets real real good after that.

This book is part of our university reading list.

From the back “Drawing striking parallels between 'Big Food' and 'Big Pharma', Cargill shows how both industries use similar tactics to manufacture desire, resist regulation and convince us that the solution to overconsumption is further consumption. Real-life examples illustrate how loneliness, depression and lack of purpose help to drive consumption, and how this is attributed to individual failure rather than wider culture. “

Good luck with your dissertation! What a great topic. :)

Capitalism requires exploitation.
Successful capitalism requires consumers.
Consumerism is fetishistic.
Fetishism does not necessarily follow from consumers, and so ultimately no. Capitalism does not require fetishistic consumers.
It is, in demonstrable examples, the inevitable result. In history, capitalism always leads to fetishistic consumers.

Capitalism, however, does require that some people receive less than the value of their labor. Also, that some people who have capital receive more than the worth of their labor. This is the exchange for the risk they take with their capital.

Again, it is extremism that leads to unsustainable levels of exploitation. Though extremism is not necessary. It is, in demonstrable examples, the inevitable result.

Capitalism is in practice then, the replacement of serfs tied to the land with wage slaves. They are free to quit any given job, but not to quit the social strata. Postindustrial Peasants was a really interesting monograph that digs into this issue with lots of excellent research.

More to your point, there's a pretty good book (that's relatively balanced) that I read many moons ago that's worth reading for anyone interested in WalMart's practices:

> The WalMart Effect: How the World's Most Powerful Company Really Works--and HowIt's Transforming the American Economy

> https://www.amazon.com/Wal-Mart-Effect-Powerful-Works-Transforming/dp/0143038788

The book talks about the things you highlight here. It also looks at how it puts the screws to vendors (basically it opens great opportunities for them to reach much wider audiences, but makes them go to rock bottom pricing, which means they must sacrifice quality... many vendors will create WalMart specific versions of their products that are more cheaply manufactured so that they can meet WalMart's stringent low price demands).

It also looks at the good side of WalMart's practices. Like how they are so maniacal about lowering prices that they've reduced packaging down to the bare minimum, thereby generating less landfill trash, requiring less fuel to transport, etc.

There are two different incoming lines actually - a clean line comes in for showers, sinks, washing machines, etc. A grey line (they call it a purple line since the tubing itself is purple to differentiate it) comes in for toilets, outdoor spigots for watering the lawn, etc. The outgoing line goes out to a treatment plant but doesn't get treated up to 100% clean levels, just up to grey levels, and gets pushed back to the community via the purple pipes. So you never water your lawn or flush your toilet with water that's been cleaned enough to be potable, but enough to not harm anything. Also, you don't need to tap into reservoirs or source streams/rivers/lakes to water your lawn - you're using recycled water.

Original NPR link where I first heard about it. Also, the same guy's book.

Thanks. Yeah I think they both definitely complement each other, but the "what can I bring forth" mindset really resonates with me moreso.

It is pretty aligned with the Buddhist concept of "genuine happiness," that Alan Wallace really discusses in his work and teachings:

http://www.amazon.com/Genuine-Happiness-Meditation-Path-Fulfillment/dp/047146984X

“Cradle to Cradle: Remaking the Way We Make Things” is a book I am currently enjoying that covers these topics. The anti-corporation sentiment is unrealistic, though, as large companies are what develop and set in place sustainable energy via solar, wind, etc. and are able to invest in recycling programs to reuse plastics, etc. in the first place—but that’s my only qualm about the book so far. Here’s an Amazon link.
https://www.amazon.com/Cradle-Remaking-Way-Make-Things/dp/0865475873/ref=nodl_

The same view is expressed in Charles Wheelan's book Naked Economics.

Also, Paul Krugman's In Praise of Cheap Labour (mit.edu) is worth reading.

Sure, if we all stopped consuming 50% of what's being produced, this would make half the production obsolete. The twist in thinking is that this is a good thing and not a bad one as the growth imperative would suggest.

I see the way out through going back to more self-sufficiency. The alternative to a consumer society is a society of mostly self-sufficient people. This is the basis of freedom from economic pressures as it decouples your well-being from the ups and downs of the market economy. Then, how would you get such economically free people back into wage-slavery? In fact, this was the situation prior to the industrial revolution. There's a nice book on the subject of how initially economically independent farmers were systematically robbed of their means of self-sufficiency to drive them into the factories, basically the ironically very forced birth of the "free" market capitalism. There was also a recent article posted about the book.

So basically it is not that we simply stop consuming and then how do we get our food? Instead we go back to more self-sufficiency and no longer require neither wages nor the products of wage-labor. This way, each person can individually step out of the vicious circle that is our current economic system.

For more detail on how to do this - practically, you may want to read "Possum Living", "Early retirement extreme" or "How to live without a salary".

More mainstream are books like "Your money or your life" or "Work less, play more."

Critical Pedagogies of Consumption: Living and Learning in the Shadow of the "Shopocalypse" (Sociocultural, Political, and Historical Studies in Education)

Amazon Link


A good collection of papers on different topics concerning hyper-consumption. On the light side of academic writing and pretty broad in focus, so no previous experience in the field is necessary

I highly recommend his book http://www.amazon.com/The-Book-Taboo-Against-Knowing/dp/0679723005

Amazon sells a book called “Reasons to Vote for Democrats” and it’s just blank. Here the book is

Source: the book Rainwater Harvesting by Brad Lancaster. This part is in the foreword by Andy Lipkis.

https://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/1583487670/

Radical Simplicity: Small Footprints on a Finite Earth
http://www.amazon.com/Radical-Simplicity-Small-Footprints-Finite/dp/0865714738

[Ecotopia] (http://www.amazon.com/Ecotopia-Ernest-Callenbach/dp/0553348477) by Ernest Callenbach

Found it!

https://www.amazon.co.uk/Happy-More-Less-Everything-Absolutely/dp/0552172359

let's not forget these types of stupid books:

https://www.amazon.com/All-Reasons-Vote-Donald-Trump/dp/152379819X


https://www.amazon.co.uk/What-Every-Thinks-About-Apart/dp/1849531986/ref=sr_1_1?s=books&ie=UTF8&qid=1365032194&sr=1-1