Listen to the podcast; join the follow-up teleconference at www.compression.org. This podcast topic is “Fashionable Waste.” Learn how to address complex issues, think from alternate viewpoints, originate solutions, and dialog with others.
Follow up Teleconference: The waste of being fashionable is enormous when it is a commodity marketed to everyone. The podcast spews out a few statistics about this waste.
The average American has far more clothes and shoes than he/she needs. The teleconference will start by asking what’s in your closet and why.
Then we move to how we might distinguish between things we really need versus things we just want — for convenience or for social distinction. How would this change if we must pay much more attention to minimal use of resources than “cost efficiency,” our own time saving, and our personal convenience?
What about the materials from which garments are made? Can we change? Synthetic fabrics (lots of petroleum-derived polymers) are now hypothesized to account for a high percentage of plastic microparticles found almost everywhere on earth, perhaps from laundering them. This is a topic to seed a great discussion on that summary of Compression Thinking, “Live as well or better while using much, much less.” How can we do that with footwear and garments?
If you get ambitious prepping for the teleconference, Google the “Dirty Dozen” toxins commonly found in packaging, cosmetics, furniture, clothing, and other everyday items. Some of them, like mercury are plain, old fashioned poisons; others are those sneaky endocrine disruptors. The fear of plastic microparticles is less from micro solids than from the chemicals that may leach out of them — everywhere.
And fashion is not confined to footwear and garments. It includes everything from cosmetics to swimming pools if we are trying to keep up with the Joneses. In an age of excess, how can we cultivate a sense of status in conspicuous frugality instead of conspicuous consumption?
- 8 PM Eastern, 3/24/2020