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brieana

- 3 years ago

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What happens when it stops being "cool" to be "green".

I'll take story: A while ago, I subletted a room in a house with some girls I didn't really know. One of which was very much into the "environmental" image. She worked in health clubs, ran 3-5 miles everyday, and was a recycling n**i. Now, of course, I have nothing against recycling- I really think it's a good thing that we've become more conscientious about our effect on the environment. But if I or anybody else in the house even forgot one time, we would get "a talking to". Besides being that annoying roommate you never want to have, she took hour long showers 2-3 times a day, used the blowdryer, flattener, etc every time, and left all the lights and fans on all the time, whether or not anybody was home. My point is an attempt to think about is how much the media and pop culture decides what we care about. A while back we cared about the oil spills, then the ozone, and now we have moved on to only caring about surface features that do not help save the environment as much as they do make a person "popular", "self-satisfied", or just smug. Herein lies my question: Is caring for the wrong reasons still caring? At what point will this extreme divorce of perception from true issues become the problem?

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If we stop been green, i think the plant will soon die.

I hate all this "greening" that's going on. For the most part it's completely superficial and most people only do it for the self satisfaction. I've been conserving electricity and water, reducing waste and reusing almost everything I come in contact with since I was a little boy. That's how I was raised, but now I have to listen to "green" people b*tch about my truck (which I maintain meticulously). I hope this fad goes away quickly.

we really dont have any chose in the matter.... clean up or get kicked off.. the earth will clean herself .. one way or the other.. ...

One can't expect everyone to be perfect. For example, one can call a vegetarian a hypocrite for wearing leather shoes. But yet the vegetarian with the leather shoes still helps in the decreased death of animals for consumption by giving up meat for food, helps lower greenhouse gas emissions, and makes his or her body a healthier place. The wearing of leather shoes should not take away from the bounty of other good things which come from being a vegetarian. The same can go for your roommate. Though it's her smugness that irks me in this situation.

I was hosting a party once and there was a boy holding court every time I passed him telling everyone within earshot all about his pain and sorrow. I could see he had bought somehow into the idea that to be truly connected to others we should share at a deep level with them.Obviously he had come accross this in books and magazines, it's all the rage in poular culture.I was meanwhile quietly hoping I'd find a way of helping him question this (quite dangerous) belief. The stuff he was sharing was very heavy indeed. At one point I went into the kitchen and found him washing up at the sink. I sat down quietly and the next thing he said without turning his head to see who had come into the room was "Do you compost, dali?" I burst out laughing which was a bit of an ice breaker. Anyway my point is that people are doing their best. there is so much desire to get it right. Popular culture dishes out half baked solutions all over the place and we latch on to them believing they will somehow fulfill us. Misguided folk and those evangelical about all these wonderful new age solutions to present human crisis are really only doing their best.All they need is the space to at least try them .At some point their efforts will lead them to real meaning . A girl likes the light to help her see while applying the slap. Afterwards she likes to keep cool so that it does not run so she keeps the fans on . Also where's the use in looking fabulous if all the lights are swithched off and nobody can see you? My friends tales of woe got him laid time after time. As they say there is always method in the madness but I believe every little helps.....and in time we learn fact from fiction. She was only doing what she could More power to her!!

Refer your room mate to this article: http://www.williams.edu/HistSci/curriculum/101/garbage.html" target="_blank">http://www.williams.edu/HistSci/curriculum/101/garbage.html I think it's important that we reduce the amount of waste we create and reduce the energy we use. But what so many rabid, pedantic recyclers do not realize is that everything is a trade off and there are no easy solutions. Recycling sometimes consumes more energy than it saves, but it does assuage many consciences. I wish the rabid recyclers would devote their energy instead to petitioning for companies to use less packaging material in the first place. We need to change the way we make things initially to make them either more biodegradable or less energy consuming to recycle, or we're all just patting ourselves on the back for accomplishing nothing. We need to buy from and support companies that have the right idea about waste reduction. For example, I buy the milk at the grocery store that comes from a local diary that uses old fashioned glass bottles. I pay a 2 dollar deposit on the gallon bottle which I get back when I take my rinsed out bottle back to the grocery store. The dairy comes and picks up the glass bottles and washes them out to reUSE them, not recycle them. And while I'm on my soapbox I'll mention that buying local food from a farmer's market is a terrific way to help the environment, because it reduces the energy that goes into bringing food to your table by eliminating the transportation costs. In the example you describe, your room mate was wasting lots of energy, including the energy she spent recycling. I don't know if the problem lies in caring for the wrong reasons. I think the problem is taking action without getting a clear picture of what is the best action to take.

"Is caring for the wrong reasons still caring? At what point will this extreme divorce of perception from true issues become the problem?" I think we all sometimes care for the wrong reasons. And I think we all sometimes can't see the contradictions in our own actions. I agree that as a society we seem to focus on surface features--because its easier and it gives us the illusion we are actually doing something. But, as you pointed out, being conscientious about recycling while wasting resources is hardly productive. Its like trying to hide a gaping hole in the wall with a post-it note. And yes, there's that annoying element of smugness and self-satisfaction. I see it in poeple who point at overweight people and condemn them for their poor eating habits, while buying nothing bur processed foods at the grocery store. I see it in people who harshly judge alcoholics or drug addicts while taking just a little something to get then through the next 15 minutes. We can't change anyone. We can only do our best (while remaining obejctive about our thoughts and actions), and hope we set a good example.

i think if it stops being "cool", maybe people will realize it's smart and, in order for mankind to survive, unavoidable. @Arjuna yeah, i hope so too. but i wish i could be as confident as you are about that matter. i really hope there's gonna be some serious change soon.

I dont think this is so much about the issue of being green and agree with Arjuna. It`s going to get bigger. I think the issue here is the nauseating, controling, bossy and pedantic personality of your roommate. Sounds like some kind of OCD- LOL. She is not the "green -police" and I think you should tell her to back off. No- actually- I think you should move out. I wouldnt want to live anywhere where somebody tells me HOW to live my life. It`s not law (yet) and only when you have the same kind of conviction as she does would you go green like her and feel good about it. What I am trying to say here is that the issue isnt "green or not" - it is "free will or not"

I don't think we have a choice. We pretty much put ourselves here and now we have to deal with it. Thankfully, we are looking at it in a positive way, making it cool to be green instead of a hassle we still have a lot of work and improvement that needs to be done baby steps

I don't think that environmentalism is going to stop being "cool" anytime soon. I think that we are reaching a new level in society, when not only bad things like the recession, 9-11, and awful natural disasters are happening, but great things like the election of Obama and more awareness of what is going on in the world. I think that we're reaching a new "Golden Age" where the world will get so much better and people will be more world-aware. I think that the environment is going to be a much higher priority from now on.

I think it is less that people are trying to be cool as it is that we seem to have some kind of weird ADD that keeps us from really focusing on an issue for to long. Maybe this stems from the amount of media coverage something gets. Actually, this might be the cause because most news organizations focus on reporting on sensational stories that will eventually be forgotten. For example: while everyone was talking about Michael Jackson dying there was a coup in Central America that no one heard or cared about. I guess it all depends on where the focus is.

@brieana the architecture building, university of michigan, ann arbor

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brieana

What happens when it stops being "cool" to be "green".

willow522

If we stop been green, i think the plant will soon die.

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eclipsia

we really dont have any chose in the matter.... clean up or get kicked off.. the earth will clean herself .. one way or the other.. ...

Sara

Dali

jedikelb

BlueCrayon

philg

i think if it stops being "cool", maybe people will realize it's smart and, in order for mankind to survive, unavoidable. @Arjuna yeah, i hope so too. but i wish i could be as confident as you are about that matter. i really hope there's gonna be some serious change soon.

chantarella

colevi

I don't think we have a choice. We pretty much put ourselves here and now we have to deal with it. Thankfully, we are looking at it in a positive way, making it cool to be green instead of a hassle we still have a lot of work and improvement that needs to be done baby steps

Arjuna

wanderingWolf

What happens when it stops being "cool" to be "green".

If we stop been green, i think the plant will soon die.

we really dont have any chose in the matter.... clean up or get kicked off.. the earth will clean herself .. one way or the other.. ...

i think if it stops being "cool", maybe people will realize it's smart and, in order for mankind to survive, unavoidable. @Arjuna yeah, i hope so too. but i wish i could be as confident as you are about that matter. i really hope there's gonna be some serious change soon.

I don't think we have a choice. We pretty much put ourselves here and now we have to deal with it. Thankfully, we are looking at it in a positive way, making it cool to be green instead of a hassle we still have a lot of work and improvement that needs to be done baby steps

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