The Old School Should School Us

I watched this short video from the Just One campaign ( and I suggest you watch it too, two mins long: http://tradeasone.com/justone) and I see the continued theme of how stuff is ruining the world. It's a great campaign and its tag line is "If every church goer in America made one fair trade purchase, a million families would rise above the poverty line for a year". I myself don't go to church, but I would hope that the amount of people they are talking about needed to make this difference will in fact do so, church goers or not.
There's a billboard in the background of this video that says "Buy More". I think that's so sad, it's funny. That's literally what every commercial, ad, billboard, pop up, side of a bus, poster, mannequin and media is telling us, but we have a hard time decoding it because we see ourselves in the ads. We are subconsciously cued with every advertisement to tell ourselves "With that product, I shall finally be ahead." Problem is, theres many more products than this one that will 'get us ahead'. I feel bad for myself; I was not wise to this until recently, and still fall prey to the temptation to buy so that I can "improve myself". This past holiday season, when I was really starting to wake up to all of this, I worked in a mall. The holidays mean that every store makes millions of new bags with this year's holiday slogan that they've chosen. I really don't want to think of the leftover bags sitting in a landfill somewhere. Anyways, so one bag in particular said "The Limited is Happiness." Are you kidding me? If a clothing store is my happiness, I am screwed. That bag though really sums up the advertising world and props to the Limited for being so honest about how they're trying to sell you happiness so that you come back and buy some more when your sweater, I mean happiness, shrinks or goes out of style.
That's our world though. I'd like to say we big tough Americans know better than that but we don't. I include myself in that, obviously. If we knew better there would be a huge pendulum swing back to making products here in our own country. They would actually last a long time because someone had the skills it took to make it instead of plopping down a set of instructions in front of a little Asian girl to make a sweatshirt. My boyfriend has this great coat that belonged to his grandfather. It is a pea coat that looks brand new. My pea coat is from a chain and is about ten years old, and it looks like it. The coats are a symbol of how our industrial revolution has failed us. The coat companies would have gone out of business I guess if we all only needed one coat per lifetime, or so they say. I think the coat makers would have found plenty of business in growing kids if you ask me. So now we have crap coats that hardly last so that we'll need to buy a new one. The rich get richer.
I was watching a show today that was interviewing a celebrity. She was talking about how in the seventies you had one maybe two barbies. Now she is trying to teach her kids that that life is still okay even though the advertisers want her kids to believe that they need teacher barbie, swimmer barbie, stripper barbie, kidding. It's crazy how in one generation we have successfully switched to a more is better philosophy for this country. We let stores open on Sundays so they could make more money and be home less with their families so they can buy them more stuff to make up for them being home less because they are making more money.
Well I'll put this topic on pause for now because given this challenge, it will come up again. Not being a part of corporate America is another reward I'm glad to rack up this year.

My product of the day comes from the Just One campaign's website. It's a cute soccer ball. http://tradeasone.com/shop/sports-toys/sports/soccer-ball-size-3-dots.html