The Compact: Bay Area Alternative Consumption
by Kyeann Sayer, Nomad on 02.17.06
Thank goodness there are so many approaches to dealing with consumerism and sustainability. Buy Nothing Day and YouthXchange are a couple that we've covered (in addition, of course, to featuring the "hippest" eco-wares ourselves). Enter The Compact, a group who pledge to only acquire from thrift shops, Craigslist, freecycle.org, eBay and flea markets in 2006. The Bay Area bunch named themselves in allusion to the Mayflower pilgrims' zeal and support one another in a virtual Plymouth Rock sort of way with a blog and Yahoo! Group. My favorite part of the Chronicle article about them confirms my experience as a consumer: once implanted the desire to shop cannot be eradicated, only channeled in less- and non-harmful ways. From the article:
[T]he main advantage of being in a group is "you can brag to someone," said Boyd.Perry agreed.
"After a while you get this bravado. You want to brag more and more," he said. "I found a Razor scooter for $15 at Thrift Town. That was great, but it doesn't top the free sewing machine I got on Craigslist. The stakes just keep getting higher."
Perry, who said he loves to shop, went into withdrawal the first few weeks of entering the Compact. For many people, shopping is a recreational and social activity that almost transcends consumerism. Boyd described it as an urge to "line the nest."
"But after a few weeks the buzzing in your head subsides," Perry said. "Although if I continue to shop crazily at thrift stores, is that any better?"
He thought about it for a moment.
"I think it is."
Alternative Consumption: all about sublimation? For some of us, for sure. Via tipster Dave Silvester :: The Compact
This is the coolest thing I have seen in a long, long time. You just made my week.
I don´t mean to brag (really) but I think the majority of my friends went through the ages 16-19 on second hand objects only. It was more an economical and style issue more than anything else though. The only thing that guys seem to be unable to buy second hand is shoes. Women seem to wear shoes less judging by the availability.
Sverrir,
It's probably because a man won't buy a new pair of shoes until he has to, whereas women tackle shoe issues the "Everest" way. They buy them "because they're there"! ;-)
Change can be hard. This year I promised myself that most goods I needed would come from alternative sources(organic, recycled, used, and fair trade). As a woman, I am inclined to shop. This article definitely speaks to me. One of my ideas behind buying more recycled and organic goods came from my desire to spend less. It is an enormous challenge in American culture to curb spending. Shopping is an enjoyable activity and I have to watch that I am making careful decisions. I recently read an article that spoke about how shopping effects serotonin levels. A measurable increase was found during the finding or looking process of shopping, interestingly though the increase drops AFTER the purchase. It makes you wonder what are people shopping for?
hadsell22
Maybe the reason the desire to shop is so difficult to shed and can only be sublimated is that we're really sublimating other desires into shopping.
It seems to me that in societies where shopping isn't recreational, you'd do other things with your free time. I am not sure if there are many post-technological societies where shopping isn't recreational (I'm sadly unfamiliar with the wonderful variety of non-American cultures), but in historical societies where shopping wasn't recreational, it was also often impractical and therefore not the first choice for obtaining even necessary goods.
If you lived in a culture where you made many of the things you needed, you would have a creative outlet that recreational shoppers (Americans in particular) might not have.
That same culture might demand that you go outside and find or grow the food you needed. Contrast that with how seldom most of us have a good reason to go outside. When the weather is nice, I want to go shopping. I know that is a ridiculous response to my desire to be outside, but I've got very little else to do outside. Walking in the park alone is too boring and sitting outside reading a book is too passive to fill the desire. (I'm working on finding other ways to spend time outside when the weather is nice, and when I can't, I do as the Compact does and shop at thrift stores.)
Perhaps shopping as recreation is itself a sublimation of other, older and more basic desires - the desire to be outside, the desire to provide for our families, the desire to be creative. (Shopping isn't inherently creative, I know, but putting together a fabulous outfit at bargain prices or redecorating your home are creative acts that are mainly fueled by shopping.)
Shopping is not an ingrained need. It's a habit. Just because you feel a pull to do something doesn't mean you've got a gene for it! Remember conditioned responses? From Psych 101?
Shopping centers are often pleasantly lit, colorful, and smell nice. They make them this way in order to make you want to come often and buy often. Don't make me laugh with some half-baked biological rationalization for succumbing to the carefully-orchestrated lures.
"After a few weeks, the buzzing in your heaad subsides." Ahhh...
Shopping is the modern world's answer to our inherent hunter/gatherer traits. When you can just walk into a supermarket a few blocks from your home and find thousands of different foods, there is no longer that satisfaction of finding a good thing to eat in an otherwise barren environment.
So we turn shopping into a primal adventure!
Also, there is the advertisers' tactic of making us feel like we are missing out on some crucial element of life by not owning a product that makes us feel like we need more stuff.
And, of course, the lack of social intimacy in our modern lives leave us emotionally empty and craving something - though most people aren't aware that it's human companionship - which drives us to hoard things in an effort to fill our emptyness.
So, yeah, a support group for living more sustainably is great. I hope that the folks in this Compact group don't take it too far and make it an obsessive thing. There are many instances where buying something new is good for the world - for example, buying materials to fix up used items or make your own things, or environmentally friendly artwork from artists or craftspersons, or a well made item that will last for a very long time and will provide a useful service.
very cool Linda!