It's not that simple, actually

I recently finished Not Buying It by Judith Levine and Buying Time and Getting By by Mary Grigsby. Not Buying It was about Judith Levine's experiment in going for a year without shopping; Buying Time and Getting By is an overview of the voluntary simplicity movement. Both articulated some of the qualms I have with the movement.

I commented to my coworker that I was very out of place in the voluntary simplicity movement (yes, I do follow it to the best of my ability). She was surprised--I'm very anti-consumerist, anti-big-box store, anti-chain, and all that, and prefer to do what little shopping I do at smaller, local venues, but find they are few and far between.

The movement is great for people who are trying to throw off the shackles of consumerism, to learn that really, their lives can be just as full and happy and rewarding without the newest trinkets, weekly trips to the mall, the Hummer, the Starbucks, whatever. Hades, it'll be even less stressful. For that reason alone, I think it's quite valuable, and the mindfulness it promotes when you do go out into the marketplace is a godsend.

But I do think it's a mistake for people to mix this up with an overtly political movement. Shopping less is a good step to take, consuming less is constructive, but it won't solve the problems that go hand-in-hand with overconsumption. We've still got issues of resource depletion and environmental degradation, corporate power run amok, marketing run amok, a middle- and lower-class that is sinking into debt, and exploited workers in sweatshops overseas. Levine recounted a time she emailed a suggestion to one of the political groups she donated to, and got a letter referring to her as a customer. She emailed back a terse note that she was a citizen, not a customer. And she's right.

She also tried to schedule an interview with the man who heads up the Take Back Your Time movement; she couldn't because he was too busy. Truly a Monty Python moment, that, but it wasn't very shocking. I remember thinking that would probably be the case with anyone involved in that movement since any work like that is time-consuming.

It does, however, point to a broader problem. It's all well and good to advocate saner workdays, or simple living, and all that. There's a reason why most VS folks are White and middle class--they can afford to do this sort of thing. They have the cultural capital and the resources to get by and do okay. And because of that, the focus shifts to what individuals can do and the whole thing is reduced to a self-help program. But it won't be effective until we make it part and parcel of a broader agenda. Take Back Your Time has a point--you can't be an active citizen when you're working sixty hours a week. (Which is why the working poor have a harder time being engaged citizens, by the way.) And for all of the pro-family talk on the part of the right-wing, mandatory overtime, or crappy wages that require two or three jobs per person isn't doing much to solidify the family unit. It kills me that this is seen as a pipe-dream, a silly little thing that limousine liberals want.

Sure, I know that shopping less will ease the burden on your wallet and will put a dent in the bottom line of the corporations. But it isn't going to mean anything as long as we think of ourselves only as consumers and not as citizens. And too many of us do--we fight our battles via boycotts instead of direct political action and agitating for change. We say we won't shop at Wal-Mart but think nothing of patronizing Target, another big-box store, and figure that our work is done. But Wal-Mart doesn't exist in a vacuum and it's able to get away with the crap it does because of the political climate we have today. We need to hold those folks who give corporations a free pass accountable.