To buy or not to buy - that is the question

S. Pathiravitana

The Buy Nothing Day is an idea that environmentalists and social activists have been trying to sell. This campaign has gone on for some time, actually a decade or so now, but I got to hear of it only the other day.

One reason perhaps is that this campaign is taking place mostly in the developed countries like Canada, where it began, and in the USA and Britain the leading countries where consumerism is rampant. The rate is so high that if this goes on uncurbed, environmentalists fear that soon there will be nothing left for anybody to consume.

This thought has been strengthened recently by a push it has got from the news of the increase in the rates of global warming.

And global warming in turn is a result of the over consumption of material goods resulting in the diminishing of resources of the world and increasing waste, says Pat Thomas, editor of the Ecologist.

Our air is getting polluted, potable water is becoming scarce, the Earth is warming up, in short the three or four fundamental elements that go to sustain this planet are being shaken to their core, not by four-legged creatures but by the supposedly intelligent two-legged animal - man.

Yet, people in the developed parts don't seem to realise the wisdom of observing the Buy Nothing Day. Here is a journalist reacting to the idea of observing a moratorium on shopping. The request to stay away from the shops even for one day, she said, put her into a cold sweat.

She says she genuinely enjoys shopping. "I admire things. I like looking at the difference between products. I like going to shops and choosing things, having a good long talk with the shop assistant - so long as they know their stuff. And then getting home and taking whatever it is out of the nice packaging...The whole process gives me real pleasure."

I am sure she speaks for a good many of us when it comes to enjoying the pleasures of shopping. For there was a time when I used to enjoy shopping too, especially going to bookshops, though I had only a little money enough then to buy a Penguin or two for about 25 or 50 cents and admire the more attractive and priceless books, flip through their pages and sigh for the cash to buy them.

But I do come out in a sweat now myself when I hear about the enormous environmental damage that goes into doing up that 'nice packaging' our journalist speaks of.

In America alone 900.000,000 trees are cut down in a year to obtain the pulp to make many items including newspapers, photo copying paper and that paper for 'nice packaging.' And during American holidays the waste accumulated after the holidaying is about five million tons. And of this, four million tons consist of wrapping paper and shopping bags.

How long can this last? And talking of waste, America is reported as having used hitherto 400 million photocopies a year which is said to amount to 750,000 copies every minute of the day! These facts have been released by an American institution which calls itself the Clean Air Council with a motto which says Protecting Everyone's Right to Breathe Fresh Air.

This year the organisers of Buy Nothing Day in Britain have expressed their confidence that people are showing some interest in observing this moratorium. Some evidence for this is that the news media in recent years like the BBC, CNN, MSNBC, USA Today, Wired and The Age have been giving publicity to the Buy Nothing Day.

A notable change of heart by two market retailers in Toronto, Canada, may be seen in the following report. "Two Kensington market retailers in Toronto, Left Feet and Heart on Your Sleeve, are closing their doors in observation of Buy Nothing Day.

They are promoting a "Sell Nothing Day!" as a stance against rampant consumerism. They believe in ethical retail and believe that businesses have a role to play in reducing our global environmental impact."

And another significant comment in this connection is by the New Scientist magazine. It is admitted by many that, "Although today people on average are four and a half times richer than our great-grand parents were at the turn of the century, Americans report feeling 'significantly less off than in 1958." This has prompted the New Scientist (4th October 2003 vol. 180 issue 2415, p 44) to do some research on this subject.

They have come up with the discovery that the more consumer goods that you have, the more you think you need to make you happy. "Happiness through consumption. But happiness through consumption is always out of reach."

I have seen such comments popping up in the most unexpected places. Guess from where this next quote comes from: "Politicians like Conservative leader David Cameron in the UK and Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger in California have caught on to this trend. The language is now more about happiness and well-being - and there's much less concentration on the language of pure economic growth."

You are right if you guessed that this observation was made by the BBC in its newsletter about a week or two ago. Whether the Buy Nothing Day will help to remind people where true happiness and well being lie, there are various research units engaged in finding out who is contented with his or her lot and who is not, country wise.

The New Economic Foundation and the Friends of the Earth, two research units, have discovered that 'the most deservedly happy place on the planet' is Vanuatu; and where is Vanuatu you may want to know and you will be referred to a group of 80 islands found in the Pacific ocean close to the east of Australia.

The grounds on which this Happiness Index rests are based on three factors - life expectancy, human well being and damage done to the country's environment. How have the developed countries fared on this index. As you may guess they have done pretty badly.

The top dogs are right at the bottom. Russia with 172 is preceded by the US with 150, Australia with 139 and Britain with 108. And why have the Vanatuans come first.? Because they have found them to be generally happy, and satisfied with very little How successful the Arnold Swarzeneggers and the David Camerons will be in leading their charges on the path leading to wellbeing and happiness, in an irretrievably complex economy, remains an open question.

There have been, however, poets in the West who have suspected that the path to happiness and wellbeing are obstructed, when you come to think of it, by your own likes and dislikes.

It is the Buddha's position, too, that if you can keep your distance from both likes and dislikes or to use the Buddhist words in use - thanha (desire) and dvesha (hate), you can achieve bliss.

I think it is Robert Frost who is also pushing this same line in his own style, in that gem of a poem, Fire and Ice, he published in the Harper's Magazine in 1930.

FIRE AND ICE

Some say the world will end in fire,
Some say in ice.
From what I've tasted of desire
I hold with those who favour fire.
But if it had to perish twice,
I think I know enough of hate
To know that for destruction ice
Is also great
And would suffice.