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I've been trying to reduce my consumption and general materialism for a while. This is fairly difficult, to be honest, because I don't generally buy a lot of stuff, or really *want* to buy a lot of stuff. Books and DVDs are the main things I buy, and mostly it's books.
One problem with the consumer goods market in the US is that we're being told that we can put our dollars where our mouths are, to encourage our corporate masters to do responsible blah blah. Hence even Walmart sells organically-grown produce now. But it's still mass consumerism, just with a shiny label on it.
You gotta eat, though, so you can't just say fuck it, I won't buy food. Subsistence farming is damned hard work. Even growing veggies in your back yard/on your windowsill takes a lot of skill. (I'm still sad that my yellow pepper plants only produced 2 peppers all last summer. I can grow rosemary, but you can't make dinner out of rosemary.) So you have to pay people for your food.
Sustainable farming practices and humane treatment of animals are important to me. I buy as many veggies as I can, and all my eggs, from the farmers market. I chat with the people who grew the food I'm going to cook, or raise the chickens who laid the eggs. I pay $4.50/dozen for amazing eggs, with gorgeous orange yolks and thick brown shells, laid by chickens who walk around in a field and eat grass and bugs.
(Whereas a dozen eggs laid by chickens crammed a dozen into a cat-carrier-sized cage and de-beaked so they won't peck each other to death cost $2.50 for Eggland's Best; less presumably for store brand.)
When I can't get something at the farmers market, which is fairly regular; sometimes I need a veggie out of local season, I buy at the co-op. They get organically-grown produce, with a preference for local and regional farmers, when possible. (We don't exactly get mangoes in NC...)
It costs more, probably. I pay more for my food than someone who shops at Food Lion or Walmart. Until you think about the true costs of food. Hidden in the cheap food is the cost to the animals confined in CAFOs, the cost to the environment of hog lagoons, the cost to human and animal health, the cost of antibiotic resistance... If these costs were added up, "cheap" food would cost more than sustainable food.
(The problem is, though, that people without the means to purchase sustainable food, those who live in food deserts, those who don't but don't earn enough to pay the premium for sustainable food, those for whom Walmart is the only game in town, are already at a disadvantage as far as nutritious food goes, and making food even more expensive without having some sort of offset, like, I don't know, wage increases, hurts them far more than it hurts me.)
One problem with the consumer goods market in the US is that we're being told that we can put our dollars where our mouths are, to encourage our corporate masters to do responsible blah blah. Hence even Walmart sells organically-grown produce now. But it's still mass consumerism, just with a shiny label on it.
You gotta eat, though, so you can't just say fuck it, I won't buy food. Subsistence farming is damned hard work. Even growing veggies in your back yard/on your windowsill takes a lot of skill. (I'm still sad that my yellow pepper plants only produced 2 peppers all last summer. I can grow rosemary, but you can't make dinner out of rosemary.) So you have to pay people for your food.
Sustainable farming practices and humane treatment of animals are important to me. I buy as many veggies as I can, and all my eggs, from the farmers market. I chat with the people who grew the food I'm going to cook, or raise the chickens who laid the eggs. I pay $4.50/dozen for amazing eggs, with gorgeous orange yolks and thick brown shells, laid by chickens who walk around in a field and eat grass and bugs.
(Whereas a dozen eggs laid by chickens crammed a dozen into a cat-carrier-sized cage and de-beaked so they won't peck each other to death cost $2.50 for Eggland's Best; less presumably for store brand.)
When I can't get something at the farmers market, which is fairly regular; sometimes I need a veggie out of local season, I buy at the co-op. They get organically-grown produce, with a preference for local and regional farmers, when possible. (We don't exactly get mangoes in NC...)
It costs more, probably. I pay more for my food than someone who shops at Food Lion or Walmart. Until you think about the true costs of food. Hidden in the cheap food is the cost to the animals confined in CAFOs, the cost to the environment of hog lagoons, the cost to human and animal health, the cost of antibiotic resistance... If these costs were added up, "cheap" food would cost more than sustainable food.
(The problem is, though, that people without the means to purchase sustainable food, those who live in food deserts, those who don't but don't earn enough to pay the premium for sustainable food, those for whom Walmart is the only game in town, are already at a disadvantage as far as nutritious food goes, and making food even more expensive without having some sort of offset, like, I don't know, wage increases, hurts them far more than it hurts me.)
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no subject
Date: 2010-07-20 11:06 pm (UTC)From:Japanese people don't do a lot of that bullshit since their populace is a lot more educated about that shit and a Japanese farmer's pride is damn difficult to fuck with.
The only non-JP produce I have a weakness to is New Zealand golden kiwis. I know importing like that is so bad for global warming but the price and mmm, my guts need the fiber. :X Nothing helps drop a deuce like a Kiwi in the morning. :X
What's crazy is Japanese people seem to have way more labor intensive farming practices but don't charge that much more for food. And Japanese people don't have food subsidized as crazily as Americans.
Labor intensive? Yeah!
Look at these grapes and peaches.
http://www.f-roll.jp/news/post_15.html
Japanese people often wrap their fruits on paper while they're on the vine/branch or whatever to prevent damage and pests. Wrapping all those things must be a serious time sink. Yet they do it.
Does anyone in America do that? I have no idea...I don't think so, even with the throngs of Mexicans working under the table.;P
You can eat chicken eggs raw here. Safely. You don't need to keep them refrigerated unless you eat them really slowly. My previous city, Nagoya is quite proud of their chickens.
These Nagoya Ko-chin are messy eaters but they seem to have more room than any American chicken has ever seen:
http://yamayurisou.hamazo.tv/e836566.html
Holy shit, Japanese farmers give them...vegetables?!
http://yamayurisou.hamazo.tv/e1234669.html
In Japan, I buy 10 eggs for the price I'd buy a dozen in America at your average store. Only these chickens have space and very clean conditions.
Japanese chickens are just naturally productive as all hell. I loved how craigslist had people looking for Japanese cock. Will pay nice prices for Japanese cock. LOL. Too bad that listing is gone ><
The real crazy thing? Japanese farmers put their pictures on their product. So, if these mushrooms kill me, I know to send my parents to whack Mr. Yukito Sawada of Nagano prefecture. Okies.
If you need an excuse to go out, do the world a favor and light these people on fire:
http://topdocumentaryfilms.com/the-world-according-to-monsanto/
Mmmmmmmmmmmmmm kobe beef.....NOM
no subject
Date: 2010-07-21 10:52 am (UTC)From:I used to live in the People's Communist Nanny Collective of Berkeley, State of Drugifornia. You were not allowed to have cocks in city limits but hens? Have as many as you want. No point in having cocks, it's not like they lay eggs. Or are they tastier?
no subject
Date: 2010-07-21 12:44 pm (UTC)From:no subject
Date: 2010-07-21 11:06 pm (UTC)From:I live in an apartment which bans pet ownership, but I'm pretty sure that if I bought my own place, I can do whatever.
Then again, a lot of really smart things are banned in America. Like what fucking MORONS decided to ban outdoor laundry lines? What, you afraid of seeing my underwear? It's gonna somehow make peoples husbands and lesbian wives have affairs?
Gawsh. I supposedly left the land of the free? O_o