Crazy Town
Crazy Town
Escaping Consumerism: Why Crocheted Codpieces Are the Perfect Antidote to Fast Fashion
If American consumers ever come up for air under the pile of crap in their storage units, they find themselves face to face with a materialistic hellscape of megastores, McMansions, endless fleets of delivery trucks, and evil hordes of targeted ads. But help is on the way. Jason, Rob, and Asher present ideas for shaping up a world beyond consumerism.
Warning: This podcast occasionally uses spicy language.
Sources/Links/Notes:
- The original (and both catchy and annoying) Toys “R” Us theme song
- The melancholy remake of the theme song for a bankrupt Toys “R” Us, performed by Chase Holfelder
- U.S. Material Use Factsheet
- United Nations statistics on material footprint
- Self storage industry trends
- The environmental costs of fast fashion
- Story by Beth Porter, “What Really Happens to Unwanted Clothes?”
- Forbes list of billionaires
- George Carlin’s classic comedic bit about “stuff”
- Sandra Goldmark’s book Fixation: How to Have Stuff without Breaking the Planet
Jason Bradford
Hi, I'm Jason Bradford.
Asher Miller
I'm Asher Miller.
Rob Dietz
And I'm Rob Dietz. Welcome to Crazy Town, where we buy stuff we don't need with money we don't have to impress people we don't like.
Melody Allison
Hey, this is Crazy Town producer Melody Allison. Thanks for listening. Here in Season 6, we're exploring escape route pathways that just might get us out of Crazy Town. In today's episode, Jason, Rob, and Asher are escaping industrialism. And here's a quick warning. Sometimes this podcast uses swear words. Language! If you like what you're hearing, please let some friends know about Crazy Town. Now on to the show.
Rob Dietz
Hey, so sometimes I like to think of Crazy Town as a bit of therapy. So I would like to share a traumatic story of my past with you two to open this episode.
Asher Miller
Are you going to do your Freud kinda -
Jason Bradford
"Hey man, whatever."
Asher Miller
That's not how Freud spoke.
Jason Bradford
Oh, okay.
Asher Miller
"Tell me about your mother." I don't know -- I sound Latino. That was pathetic.
Rob Dietz
This therapy session is off the rails already.
Jason Bradford
So Rob, I want you to know, it's not what's wrong with you, it's what happened to you.
Rob Dietz
Okay, thank you.
Jason Bradford
Tell me.
Rob Dietz
Okay, so when I was a 17 year old about to embark on my college career, I needed to get some money to help pay for said college. So I really was a fan of North Lake Mall, which was near my house.
Jason Bradford
I had Valco Fashion Mall as my stomping grounds.
Rob Dietz
Okay, wow. Valco fashion, that's a good one. But a newer better strip mall opened up across the street from North Lake Mall. It was called North Lake Tower Festival.
Asher Miller
You know, there must have been a deep story between the owners of those two. Like, to open it directly across the street is like a big fuck you, don't you think?
Rob Dietz
I know. I know. It's rough. Well --
Asher Miller
Somebody pissed somebody else off earlier
Rob Dietz
The anchor store at North Lake Tower Festival was Toys R Us.
Asher Miller
That was the anchor store?
Rob Dietz
And you know, as a 17 year old, I liked playing with toys .
Jason Bradford
No, you must have outgrown it by then. It must have been horrible.
Asher Miller
Have you met Rob?
Rob Dietz
I was always a little behind, alright?
Asher Miller
It took him until he was 29 get over that.
Rob Dietz
Right. I still can get a good Star Wars scenario going with my action figures. So you guys know Toys R Us. Let me just play for you the ubiquitous, at that time, theme song
Asher Miller
You don't need to play it for us.
Jason Bradford
I don't actually remember it.
Asher Miller
You'll remember it as soon as you hear it.
Rob Dietz
I'm going to play it. Yeah, listen to this: <"Toys R Us" Theme Song plays>
Jason Bradford
Doesn't ring a bell. That's a shitty jingle if I can't remember it.
Rob Dietz
You don't recognize that?
Jason Bradford
No.
Asher Miller
I think there's something wrong with you.
Jason Bradford
That's incredible. I'm amazed.
Rob Dietz
Yeah, well, so I had to listen to that song on repeat all day long. Every day.
Asher Miller
Wait, they would play that in the store?
Rob Dietz
They would play that in the store, and they would play Carly Simon tunes.
Jason Bradford
My mirror neurons are in pain right now.
Rob Dietz
So one of the things about the Toys R Us is that just the sheer length, height, width of the store was incredible. The colors, like the pink Barbie aisle. It was just like kind of an explosion of your senses. And the thing about it it was really good, like I said, I wanted to get money for college. I made $4 an hour.
Asher Miller
Oh my God, you were just rolling in it.
Rob Dietz
And what I remember about that that summer --
Asher Miller
They were paying kid salaries.
Rob Dietz
Yeah, that's right.
Jason Bradford
It was an allowance.
Rob Dietz
So this is the thing, I remember just wanting out the whole summer. Like I didn't want to be there. My favorite parts of the day were when I could hide out in the warehouse and just stock diapers or whatever, you know? I wouldn't have to be out on that floor. Closing time was awesome.
Asher Miller
Wait, they were selling diapers?
Rob Dietz
Oh yeah, diapers and baby formula were huge there.
Asher Miller
Gotta run to the Toys R Us to get my diapers.
Jason Bradford
They were toy diapers.
Asher Miller
Right, for little stuffed animals.
Jason Bradford
Barbie diapers and stuff.
Asher Miller
Oh those are really small.
Jason Bradford
And Cabbage Patch Kids. I remember those.
Rob Dietz
Well, closing time was also a favorite despite the mess the store was. Imagine how messy a Toys R Us gets by the end of the day.
Asher Miller
Because kids are taking stuff out and then just dropping it off on the floor.
Rob Dietz
One of my favorite things to do there was send people elsewhere. So I remember one time, they used to sell Huffy bikes and this guy came in he's like, "Hey, I was thinking about getting a bike for my daughter. What do you recommend?" And I was like, "I recommend you go to the bike store."
Jason Bradford
Right, because those bikes will break.
Rob Dietz
I was also just a 17 year old ass.
Asher Miller
I guess you weren't getting paid on commission.
Rob Dietz
Yeah, well and then of course Toys R Us went bankrupt in 2018. And there's a guy --
Jason Bradford
Probably couldn't pay his medical bills.
Rob Dietz
Yeah, there's a guy named Chase Holfelder who recorded a remake of the Toys R Us song that I want to play for you guys. Check this one out: <Song plays>
Rob Dietz
A day that will live in infamy.
Jason Bradford
That's actually good. I like that. I like that.
Asher Miller
So sad.
Rob Dietz
Yeah, he turned it into a dirge, right. It's like the death of Toys R Us. It's really incredible.
Asher Miller
Well, that jingle will live on in our brains until we die.
Rob Dietz
Well, you know, despite the soft spot I've got in my heart for Legos and Star Wars, action figures and vintage video games and stuff like that, the Toys R Us mega store was a really good example of, well, our topic today: Over the top consumerism where you're enticed to buy a bunch of plastic crap that you don't need. Let's not even talk about the advertising that comes along with that. At least not yet.
Asher Miller
Do you think that you became less of a consumerist fuckface after working there?
Rob Dietz
Yeah, probably. I mean, I think the reason I'm in therapy with you guys right now is like trying to shake that stuff off.
Asher Miller
Well, I'm grateful. I'm grateful to your summer at Toys R Us.
Jason Bradford
So I think we should traumatize our audience now.
Rob Dietz
As we do.
Jason Bradford
With giving them the Crazy Town kind of statistics related to consumerism.
Asher Miller
Do we tell people that we're actually being underwritten by the American Therapy Association?
Rob Dietz
And we're sponsored by Toys R Us. Buy our bankrupt toys.
Jason Bradford
Yeah, yeah.
Asher Miller
They're paying us in old toys.
Jason Bradford
Yeah. Anyway. Okay. So in 2019, U.S. per capita total material consumption -- This is including fuels so this is an important thing -- was 23.75, let's just round it up to 24 metric tons per person. That's per capita.
Asher Miller
24 metric tons, okay.
Rob Dietz
So in 2019, I use 24 metric tons of crap per year?
Jason Bradford
Yeah, and that includes fuels. And more than half of that is actually oil, coal, and natural gas. Stuff that we just combust, right?
Rob Dietz
Oh, so that's good. Only half of it was Barbies and Star Wars action figures.
Asher Miller
So that's like a dozen cars in weight.
Jason Bradford
Pretty freaking gigantic, right? This is 88% higher than in Europe, right, which has comparable if not better standards.
Asher Miller
Losers.
Jason Bradford
Now, what's interesting for me to think about is that in the last 100 years or so, the use of renewable materials, what is considered like wood or natural fibers. That has decreased dramatically. It went from 41% of the total materials by weight to 5%. So 95% of what we now are, quote unquote, "consuming" is non-renewable materials.
Rob Dietz
Great, great.
Jason Bradford
I mean 41% wasn't that great. And that's because there's minerals like you know, rock and sand. These things, they don't regrow. You mine this stuff out. It was still like 60% of the U.S. economy 100 years ago. Now, what's interesting to think about it is you talk about the plastics in the toy store and stuff, but currently about 80% of the non fuel consumption of materials goes towards construction. It's like freeways expanding, the malls that the Toys R Us goes in.
Rob Dietz
All the houses of suburban sprawl.
Jason Bradford
And also houses are getting bigger. So in 1920 to 2014, the average floor area at a U.S. home increased from a little over 1,000 square feet to almost 2,700 square feet.
Rob Dietz
Well, that's progress, right?
Asher Miller
Wait a second. I'm feeling bad about myself now. Because when I moved from California here, I had a 1,200 square foot house in California, and I doubled the size of my house which is insane.
Rob Dietz
You're just trying to keep up with the times.
Asher Miller
No, we re not even keeping up. That's still smaller.
Jason Bradford
You're still below, or you're still smaller than average of the current new house. But here's what's interesting, you've got your four people in your home.
Asher Miller
Yes. And a dog.
Jason Bradford
And a dog. So the average U.S. home actually now has 2.5 people.
Asher Miller
Oh, sweet.
Jason Bradford
Well, but you're behind because . . .
Asher Miller
Oh, if we actually think about it per person --
Jason Bradford
Yeah, you're behind.
Asher Miller
We're way behind.
Jason Bradford
But if you do the math, like there are more is more people living per home in 1920 than there is today, right? So actually, per capita today, everyone has the equivalent of what a family of four had together in 1920.
Rob Dietz
Again, thank you for reporting statistics of progress. I want to take you guys to sort of a culmination of consumerist culture. You know, you're talking about the houses getting bigger. And of course with a bigger house, you've got to fill it with more stuff, I guess. But it starts overflowing. So what do you do?
Asher Miller
It's hard to get the balance right, you know.
Rob Dietz
Well this is why America is so ingenious. You go rent a self storage unit where you can keep your excess stuff. So I got a bunch of stats on self storage. So we're gonna play two truths and a lie. I'm going to read you three statistics, one of which I made up. And you guys try to, you know, try to suss out what it is.
Jason Bradford
Okay.
Rob Dietz
Okay. Here's one: We've got greater than 1.8 billion square feet of self storage space in the U.S. That's approximately the size of Washington DC. Okay, there's one stat for you. No calculating. This is all intuition. Jason's reaching for a calculator.
Jason Bradford
Okay, I'm just doing the per capita. That seems reasonable.
Rob Dietz
Do it in your head.
Jason Bradford
I did.
Rob Dietz
Okay. Stat number two: Public storage, which is the very generic name of the largest self storage company in the United States -- You can get that under New York Stock Exchange abbreviation PSA.
Rob Dietz
Buying some. Buying some. Yeah, so this company Public Storage was the fastest growing company in the United States during the aughts. So from 2000 to 2009. Okay? Here's your third stat: There are 50,000 self storage facilities in the U.S., a number that is more than the combined total of subway Starbucks and Walgreens outlets.
Jason Bradford
My gosh.
Asher Miller
Whoa.
Rob Dietz
Those are your three stats.
Jason Bradford
And we're supposed to figure out which was is wrong?
Rob Dietz
One is false.
Asher Miller
So let me first commend you. He did a pretty good job of coming up with these. I mean, they're all insane.
Jason Bradford
They're all insane. And I could believe any of them. This is a problem for me.
Asher Miller
See, I'm smart. So I have a theory here. But no, you go first Jason.
Jason Bradford
I'm gonna say the 50,000 one is -- just hit that number is t0o round. And it's just you know, Subway, Starbucks, Walgreens, so convenient. That's bullshit. I'm calling you on it.
Rob Dietz
Wow. I hate my voice when you're mimicking it.
Asher Miller
I am gonna say it's the second one. And here's why -- Because you said the aughts. That was a period of great growth for a lot of companies. So maybe Public Storage wasn't growing a lot. But you know --
Jason Bradford
A lot of stuff was growing.
Asher Miller
I mean, isn't that when Facebook came online. Even Starbucks I bet was growing faster. There was this great Onion headline which was, "Starbucks' next growth strategy is opening Starbucks in their own bathrooms." I mean, they were growing like mad.
Jason Bradford
There's like pictures of Starbucks kitty corner to each other on the same block. That was just ridiculous.
Asher Miller
So I'm gonna say it's the second one.
Rob Dietz
Okay. Well, I'm gonna tell you, and I hate this, because Asher you premised all that with saying, "I'm smart." And it turns out you are. So just for once in his life we've corroborated his intelligence.
Asher Miller
Dunning Kruger has nothing on me.
Rob Dietz
Yeah, I kind of thought that could have been a giveaway. Because yeah, like, that's when the tech boom really was taking off, too. So well, can we just look at the public storage, the self storage, as being emblematic of this acceleration in consumerism
Jason Bradford
Sure, let's pick an emblem.
Rob Dietz
I mean, here's a real stat again: In 1984, there were 6,600 self storage facilities in the U.S., and now there's 50,000 of them. I mean . . .
Asher Miller
That's progress. Something I read was that 65% of the people who have self storage also have a garage.
Jason Bradford
Of course. It's not like the walk up apartment in New York City.
Asher Miller
Exactly, it's not like, I downsized, I have a small space, I need to have storage or whatever.
Jason Bradford
I live on a boat.
Asher Miller
Exactly. 65% of them have a fucking garage.
Jason Bradford
Probably a three car garage.
Rob Dietz
Hey, the garage is sacred space for the car.
Asher Miller
Right. Of course. We shouldn't even consider it as something that you can --
Jason Bradford
You can store a lot of stuff in your car, too.
Asher Miller
You talked about self storage as being kind of emblematic. I think that what's happened with fashion, in the acceleration of what people are calling fast fashion, that's actually really telling in terms of what's been happening with consumers. And because, you know, the truth is, and we've talked about this before, consumers kinda became the sort of staple of the American economy and the global economy. Decades and decades and decades ago was sort of a born out of industrialization and overproduction of stuff. They started advertising, and loans and all the things that they did to kind of make it possible for people to buy shit, right. So we've been on that path for a while. But there's an acceleration that's happening. And fashion is really interesting. So here's my turn to do stats. In 2015 according to True Costs, the world consumes around 80 billion new pieces of clothing every year.
Jason Bradford
That's like 10 per person worldwide.
Asher Miller
Yeah, a little bit more. And that's 4% more than 20 years ago.
Rob Dietz
Well, just saying internally, externally, that's not helping my therapy session, okay? It's going to get worse.
Jason Bradford
It always gets worse.
Asher Miller
People are now buying 60% more clothes and wearing them for half as long as they used to. Okay?
Rob Dietz
I take mine off by noon every day.
Asher Miller
Exactly. And we're not just talking about, you know, superstar singers changing their outfits on stage. 30% of all the clothes made globally are never actually worn.
Jason Bradford
Oh that's sad.
Rob Dietz
What are you doing with them?
Asher Miller
I don't know. They just --
Jason Bradford
They must be in self storage units.
Asher Miller
They probably don't sell. Actually, that's a good question. How many of them are sold and never worn versus just never sold? Yeah, good question. And then, let's just talk about some of the environmental impacts.
Rob Dietz
Yeah cuz why not? Let's get really depressed here.
Asher Miller
Textile waste is the fastest growing part of the waste stream in the United States.
Jason Bradford
And that's why we're highlighting it.
Asher Miller
This is so fantastic.
Rob Dietz
You know when you're paddling down the river in a canoe and it's just shirts and pants, and you can barely get the canoe through all of that. It's the worst.
Asher Miller
Sadly, in some places in the world it's kind of like that. In the U.S., 80% of us clothing is either sent to the landfill or incinerated. So people think when they donate clothing or they return clothing, whatever, it goes to another home that's in need, you know. Whether it's in the U.S. or somewhere else, but 80% of it.
Jason Bradford
Yeah, cuz most of it's probably pretty crappy.
Asher Miller
Let's talk about some of the social implications. Kind of the injustice of it. So who would you think is the richest man in the world? Who comes to mind when you think of the richest person?
Rob Dietz
Well in our Phalse Prophets season, we had the Elon Musk episode about Elon Musk brought to you by Elon Musk. I would guess him.
Jason Bradford
No, not anymore. He's been canceled so much because of his outlandish behavior.
Asher Miller
He's still number two.
Jason Bradford
He's still number two? Wow.
Asher Miller
So according to Forbes, Elon is still number two. Bezos is up there. The wealthiest person in the world is Bernard Arnault, a Frenchman. He made all his wealth in fashion and luxury goods. He's worth about $180 billion.
Jason Bradford
Wow.
Rob Dietz
Sweet.
Asher Miller
The fashion industry is actually one of the largest employers in the entire world, globally. Something like 75 million people are employed by it. According to Nonprofit Remake, 80% of apparel is made by young women, so ages 18 to 24, around the world. Often working in dangerous working conditions, getting paid for very low pay. So you know, the contrast between Arnault and the reality for many, many primarily young women in our world producing these things that people don't wear.
Jason Bradford
Well, I think when we think about fashion you often think about something that is stylish. Or you know, some designer has gone through . . . But a lot of it is complete junk. Like you know, what's driving me crazy, I've noticed is that all the sports teams now have a new uniform, a new hat, for almost everything, every season.
Asher Miller
Like it's Mother's Day, gotta wear pink.
Jason Bradford
Exactly. Cancer or military appreciation.
Asher Miller
All the things that nobody really should give a shit about.
Jason Bradford
It's just driving me crazy.
Rob Dietz
If you're gonna buy a souvenir shirt, you gotta get the one with the athlete's name on the back. You know, you gotta get a new one the next year with new athletes.
Asher Miller
Yeah, because they keep getting rid of the athletes. Well, and that's something else about fashion, which is that it's become so connected with individuals and celebrities, right? I mean, I don't know if it started with Michael Jordan and Nike, you know, but that didn't used to necessarily be the case. I mean, fashion was set, you know, in different ways. And that's why, you know, we think of things being fashionable. It goes through these cycles, or these periods, or whatever. And it's influenced by people, usually the wealthy, right? Or whatever. But we've attached it so much to like individual personas. And for celebrities, athletes, a lot of the money that they make actually comes from documents, you know, endorsements, or having their own product line that they have.
Rob Dietz
Yeah, the smart ones do that. The Jordans and the LeBrons, they run their own consumerism shops.
Asher Miller
Exactly, they start their own business.
Rob Dietz
Yeah, I think the sports jerseys is a good example of how people out here can get drawn into it, you know. It's like, "Oh I gotta get the new jersey." And I'm even guilty like, I bought my daughter the special Rose City jersey version of the Portland Timbers because there was a cool new one, so . . .
Asher Miller
It's okay to buy something every once in a while, Rob.
Rob Dietz
Well I did incinerate it immediately because that's what our culture says to do.
Asher Miller
You had her wear it once, right? Yeah, here we are talking about stuff, the stuff that we've collected, of just consumerism run wild. And you played some clips for us earlier, Rob. When I think about stuff the first thing that comes to mind is the George Carlin bit, "A place for my stuff."
Rob Dietz
Absolute classic.
Asher Miller
Do you guys -- Yeah, I mean, the whole thing is worth watching but I'm just gonna play a little bit that he did from one of his shows.
George Carlin
You know how important that is. That's the whole meaning of life, isn't it? Trying to find a place for your stuff. That's all your house is. Your house is just a place for your stuff. If you didn't have so much goddamn stuff, you wouldn't need a house. You could just walk around all the time. That's all your house is, a pile of stuff with a cover on it. You see that when you take off in an airplane, and you look down and you see everybody's got a little pile of stuff. Everybody's got their own pile of stuff. And when you leave your stuff, you got to lock it up. Wouldn't want somebody to come by and take some of your stuff. They always take the good stuff. They don't bother with that crap you're saving. Ain't nobody interested in your fourth grade arithmetic papers. They're looking for the good stuff. That's all your house is. It's a place to keep your stuff while you go out and get more stuff.
Jason Bradford
That's pretty good. Yeah, that kind of sums it up right there.
Rob Dietz
Well, I mean, to me, it's hilarious. He's almost just stating facts -- but it's so funny, right? My favorite part of the thing is, "Have you noticed that their stuff is shit, and your shit is stuff?" I love that part.
Jason Bradford
Yeah, you go to these like yard sales, and you're like, "Oh my God. I can't believe the crap these people have." But then of course, you probably have half the same stuff, right?
Rob Dietz
But then you buy it and bring it home.
Asher Miller
But yours is not crap.
Rob Dietz
Now I have the crap. Well, you know, there is some awesome stuff out there that you do need to sock away in your house. And here's one I found. It's called Handerpants. And it's underpants for your hands.
Jason Bradford
What do you mean? Isn't that called gloves?
Asher Miller
Exactly.
Rob Dietz
So it's like a fingerless glove that looks like whitey tighties covering your hands.
Jason Bradford
Not a bad idea.
Rob Dietz
And the whitey tighty version you can buy for $14.50.
Asher Miller
What are you supposed to do with it?
Rob Dietz
Well, that's the funny thing. It says on their ad that it's stylish for any occasion. Hundreds of uses --wonderful.
Jason Bradford
It's like you have your hankie on your hand ready to go.
Asher Miller
Exactly. All I could think is the nasty stuff that you wipe on it. And it's white.
Rob Dietz
But here's the thing, it's $3 more for the chic black Handerpants.
Jason Bradford
It's a great name, Handerpants.
Asher Miller
You know somebody just -- The whole thing came out of coming up with that name when they're drunk one night. It's completely like a backwards way of coming up with the product.
Rob Dietz
And that's 90% of their customers -- They're ordering when they're drunk, "Ah I've gotta have some Handerpants.
Rob Dietz
This is a message to all you Crazy Townies out there. Sometimes Jason, Asher, and I wish you could be here in the room with us when we're riffing on ecomodernist nightmares, the end of capitalism, the collapse of civilization, and lines from Arnold Schwarzenegger movies. Since you can't be here. Maybe we could still be in contact in another way. If you've got a comment about the show, or you want to throw some shade at us, or you've got a question . . .
Asher Miller
Or you have a suggestion of escape route stuff.
Rob Dietz
Yeah, maybe you've got a story of your own you want to share. Go over to Apple podcasts or iTunes and leave us a review and write your comment there. In your comment, include your idea, whatever it is, and we'll think about sharing it in an episode.
Jason Bradford
How's this? "I'll be back." Is that any good?
Rob Dietz
Oh my God, that's terrible.
Jason Bradford
You try it, you try it.
Rob Dietz
"Get to the chopp-ah!"
Rob Dietz
Okay, another listener comment we've got this episode comes in from a fellow named James. His subject is, "The future of rural space." So you know --
Jason Bradford
What the hell is he talking about?
Rob Dietz
I think rural areas.
Jason Bradford
Oh!
Asher Miller
We were both thinking about it. Growing potatoes in space.
Rob Dietz
Are there Starlink satellites in rural space? Okay, so James says, "In case you are unaware, I'm watching the World Bank presentation, "The Future of Rural Space" on YouTube. Their take could not be more different from your own." What strikes me is that's a huge surprise that we are not perfectly aligned with the World Bank.
Rob Dietz
I can't believe they haven't been listening to us. This is ridiculous. We gotta email them.
Asher Miller
Let me guess, the future rural space in their view is there is no future for rural space.
Rob Dietz
Right. It's develop that sucker. We need cities on that rural space.
Asher Miller
Get rid of it. That's an abomination.
Jason Bradford
Thank you for the tip. I'm gonna look it up and I'm gonna write them an angry letter.
Rob Dietz
Yeah. Thanks, James.
Rob Dietz
So here we are at the Marvin Harris Memorial lens of doom as it applies to consumerism. And the quick reminder, Marvin Harris was an anthropologist/sociologist type who had a little theory called cultural materialism in which he said the infrastructure, the surroundings, play a huge role in determining the structure, or the rules and policies that binds society together, which in turn plays a huge role in shaping the superstructure, or the culture and belief systems. Okay. So let's talk a little bit about the infrastructure of consumerism. There's a lot to it. I mean, we've already talked about advertising. You can think of stuff that you see in the real world, like shopping malls and these big houses where George Carlin has to put all of his stuff.
Jason Bradford
Built environment, yeah.
Rob Dietz
Yeah, the mega stores or big box stores. We've talked in the past about cargo ships and the containers, the standardized containers, that can go off the ship and onto rail and truck, and that amazing infrastructure.
Asher Miller
All the highway systems.
Jason Bradford
That's right.
Rob Dietz
Yeah, I listened to an episode of a podcast that's put out by the Atlantic recently, and they were looking at barcodes. You know, the UPC symbols on every product. And that was a huge thing for standardizing the checkout line, but also inventories and making all that stuff more efficient.
Asher Miller
Yeah. Have you guys been to a store recently where like the barcode didn't work and they had to punch in like the 16-digit number.
Jason Bradford
It takes forever.
Rob Dietz
You know, think of the sorry employee that used to have to put a price sticker on every single product. Yeah, I mean there's other stuff too, like Amazon and related businesses, the delivery trucks and delivery services, the computer networks that are behind all of this, like PayPal and software services. I mean, huge. It's like the infrastructure of life.
Jason Bradford
And you're just scratching the surface I'm sure.
Asher Miller
And well, there's the thing about all the supply chains of these things, right? So when we talk about fashion, for example, you know, there's the global international commodity market for things like cotton, which is a whole shitshow.
Jason Bradford
I've been to cotton fields in Arizona. It's just incredible.
Rob Dietz
Well, and I've seen the movie "Trading Places" where they are trading orange juice futures on the commodity exchange. So that's my education.
Asher Miller
That was high stakes trading.
Jason Bradford
I think the other thing that's important about fashion is that, you know, since we waste so much of it, it doesn't build up in our homes. It goes away. It goes somewhere. And my favorite example of that was when I would travel, there will be the stores called USA stores in different countries. And you walk in and it's like, reams and reams of compressed blocks of t-shirts from the United States.
Rob Dietz
They were almost generating a fusion reaction.
Jason Bradford
Yes, it was so dense. And every once while you'll see like some documentary where they're in some country like Guinea Bissau in Africa, or whatever. And someone's wearing like the Super Bowl loser winner shirt. You know what I mean?
Rob Dietz
Yeah, like, so they printed up all these t-shirts --
Asher Miller
The team that didn't win.
Jason Bradford
Yeah, right.
Rob Dietz
So in some part of the world you're saying, in Guinea Bissau, my Atlanta Falcons actually held on to their lead against the New England Patriots and won that game.
Jason Bradford
And there's a whole village celebrating that.
Rob Dietz
They're just wearing that t-shirt.
Asher Miller
They're just walking around thinking the Atlanta Falcons are the best team. Of course, we know the truth.
Jason Bradford
And I don't actually know if that's a real example, but stuff like that is what I'm getting at, yes.
Jason Bradford
I just watch the unboxing videos, and I get dopamine.
Asher Miller
Sure. I remember traveling in Eastern Europe after the fall of the Soviet Union and American jeans were like so hot. You know, like getting Levi's was incredible. Yeah, well, so we're talking about infrastructure. Here's a weird one for you. What about dopamine? Like I was thinking about dopamine as being something that's really part of all this because a lot of this consumerist culture or the habits of consumerism, you know, buying stuff, is really fed by the dopamine rush that people get when they go buy something at a store, or they get a package delivered to their home when they're opening it up. You know, you talk about those unboxing videos.
Jason Bradford
Exactly. That's recycled dopamine is what that is.
Rob Dietz
This is not one of our escape routes. Go watch unboxing movies to short circuit your dopamine system.
Asher Miller
But like, where does dopamine fit? Is it infrastructure? It's not like structure. It's not part of like the rules of society. It's not superstructure. So it's gotta be infrastructure.
Rob Dietz
I think it is infrastructure. Even though it's inside our bodies.
Asher Miller
Weird. I don't know. I think it plays a big role in all this.
Jason Bradford
Yeah, it does.
Rob Dietz
It's pretty wild. Yeah, I like thinking of that -- of the way we're built is infrastructure.
Asher Miller
Physical, yeah. Or internal infrastructure.
Rob Dietz
Alright well let's turn to structure now, which again, these are the rules of consumerism. And, you know, we could get really exhaustive here, but there's just some things that rose to the surface for me when I was thinking about this. One is the way that in our culture, working a high paying job it's like a rule. You've got to do that if you want to be able to afford what you need. I mean, even medical care in the United States. If you want to afford that, you better have a job that's giving you insurance and paying you because your insurance isn't going to cover it. You know, there's other rules too. Like hey, have 27 credit cards and buy everything on credit. And don't worry about carrying a debt if you don't have the money. Just do it.
Asher Miller
I mean, we've talked about this before. Credit was a huge --
Jason Bradford
Invention.
Asher Miller
Yeah. You know, creating credit and credit cards, and the mechanisms of all that, totally unlocked the consumer culture. I mean, without that I think it would've been really difficult.
Jason Bradford
Go back to Season Four, people. A lot of stuff we're touching on is Season Four material here.
Rob Dietz
Another one that really came up for me, in terms of the kind of policies and rules of consumerism, is that marketing has become it's a major field of study that you apply to every single business, you know? Every business that's out there has teams of marketers to push their stuff.
Asher Miller
The team we have a Post Carbon Institute, incredible.
Rob Dietz
Well I mean, we do have communication staff. That is incredible because we have to get our message out there. But you know, they're not trying to sell you a bunch of plastic crap.
Jason Bradford
It'd be easier if we were.
Asher Miller
It'd be a lot easier.
Jason Bradford
What we're trying to sell is the hardest stuff.
Asher Miller
Depression.
Rob Dietz
And I even looked at, I was sort of like, well, what about marketing in the universities? And, you know, the U.S. News and World Report, they do a lot of stuff with ranking colleges, but they also talk about the different majors. And they had this to say about marketing: They said, "A marketing major studies the branding and promotion of products and services to the public, and how to target specific demographics."
Jason Bradford
I'd be so proud of my kids if they went into marketing.
Rob Dietz
It's a field of study.
Jason Bradford
I know. I can't believe it.
Asher Miller
But it actually makes a big difference. Good marketing, like you think about Nike and the "Just Do It" ad. It was incredible. I could go on a rant about universities and marketing, because you're talking about degrees in marketing and how they're describing that. Let me just tell you how much fucking mail my family has received in the last I don't know how many months from every university in the entire country practically. Some of them, 8 to 12 times. I'm not even joking. Like, constantly just sending us postcards, sending us packets, sending us magazines, emails, basically trying to get my son to apply to their college so that they could decline him basically.
Jason Bradford
I still remember one of those when I was in high school. I got one, it was you know, a pretty glossy thing. It says, "How does Puget Sound?"
Asher Miller
Oh, that's clever.
Jason Bradford
Isn't that good?
Rob Dietz
That's good marketing. Excellent marketing. I want to go on a little rant about marketing as a verb. To market something -- it's like you with your birding.
Asher Miller
In Europe, they talked about marketing as a different -- it means a different thing. It means to actually go to market. Here it doesn't.
Rob Dietz
Yeah, here --- Yeah, you gotta market the shit out of Puget Sound University.
Asher Miller
There's another thing that enables this consumerism and it really applies to some of the stuff that we're talking about with fashion, right? Which is sort of return policies and the changes that have happened I think with how easy it is to return things. So we've seen a real shift with the internet age in e-commerce where I think a lot of what e-commerce was trying to do was to undercut and compete against retail stores. So they're offering you know, a lot of it was around like free shipping in some cases, but they're also making it really easy to return stuff, you know? And changing those to make it so easy. And there's actually an infrastructure around that too. Like the infrastructure around that is you can buy something from Amazon, you know, on your computer, it gets delivered to you amazingly in your house, you get your dopamine rush and you're like, "Fuck this. I don't like it." And then you just basically can drop it off at the UPS store or wherever you go, and you don't have to do anything. You literally just drop it. "Here's the box," and they take care of all of it for you. And with kind of free return policies or exchanges, or whatever, you just get the next thing.
Rob Dietz
Do you get any dopamine from that drop off procedure?
Asher Miller
I don't know if it's the same level of dopamine.
Jason Bradford
But people are buying extra sizes because they're not sure. And then they send the sizes that don't fit back.
Asher Miller
Because we used to go to the store and try on different sizes. I mean, we've had that in my house. My son, who's grown so much, it's like, what's the right shoe size for him?
Jason Bradford
Right, yeah. Sure. I think a lot of that gets trashed, doesn't it?
Asher Miller
Yes. We've talked about this. Yeah, most of it goes to the garbage, you know.
Rob Dietz
Pretty soon we can get rid of the trucks and we can have those old bank vacuum tubes just running to everybody's house. So Amazon just puts stuff in a vacuum tube that comes to your house, and you just shovel stuff back in there.
Asher Miller
Well Amazon has been working on drone deliveries, right? And in some places guaranteeing that you can get stuff within two hours.
Jason Bradford
It's hard because I don't tend to follow these rules. So like, I wear the same clothes over and over again. I'll often have the same pair of pants, the same sweatshirt day in and day out. I do change underwear and socks and t-shirts.
Rob Dietz
Yeah, you've got a brand new pair of Handerpants.
Jason Bradford
Yes, exactly. But other than that, it's like I cycle through the same thing. But you know, there's this whole stigma against wearing the same, like fancy clothes out to events, when people would go out to like events. And you have to get a different dress or whatever.
Asher Miller
It's more for women than men to be honest. I mean, I can wear the same tux.
Jason Bradford
I can wear the same suit over and over and no one's gonna care.
Rob Dietz
Well, I think that's getting into the idea of superstructure and the culture around this. So let's maybe segue there. And I gotta say that it is pervasive in American culture to think if I can just own that one thing, that thing over there, I'm gonna be happy. Like I feel like that's programmed and an underlying current in the whole setup. And I want to be immune to it, but sometimes I find I'm not. You know, I can get pretty obsessive about -- Especially cycling stuff, you know? Like gotta have a really nice bike. Yeah. Geez I think the other thing, and I don't fall prey to this one that much, but it's sorta like your stuff defines who you are. Rather than your values, rather than what you're bringing to the world, it's the load of crap that you have on you, and with you, and what you're wearing.
Asher Miller
I think we're all susceptible to that stuff. Like, we have attachments to brands. I remember learning about how, I think Ford was the first company that started offering different paint colors for for their cars, you know?
Rob Dietz
I don't know. I thought Ford was: you can have it any color you want as long as it's black.
Asher Miller
Right. Well I don't remember which company it was, but that was an innovation that they had. And that was part of it was being able to sort of say, like, this represents my identity. Do you know what I mean? I know some people are like, "I only get a car this color." It's not even like the brand. Do you know what I mean? But attaching your identity to an object or a consumer product, I think we're all susceptible to it. My favorite time of year is Christmas.
Rob Dietz
It's the most wonderful time of the year.
Jason Bradford
That's a pretty good song.
Asher Miller
And Black Friday. And I'm so glad that they decided to roll out Cyber Monday. They're gonna have, you know, I don't know what . . . Throw up Thursday.
Rob Dietz
Buy more crap Friday. You need a self storage unit Sunday.
Jason Bradford
I mean, the taco industry has got their own day.
Asher Miller
Right, Taco Tuesday.
Jason Bradford
That's huge. That's one's fine.
Asher Miller
We need more days of the week just so that we can, you know, offer them up to different brands.
Jason Bradford
You can have sandwich Saturday.
Rob Dietz
Oh, look at you. You're like a marketer.
Asher Miller
Yeah, but that whole thing. I mean, here ask the Jew -- How did that happen? How did this Christmas thing happen where suddenly you have to buy a whole bunch of shit to show people that one, apparently you love Jesus Christ, and you love your family.
Jason Bradford
Yeah. I mean it was more -- I'm sure we could do a whole episode on how Christmas was commercialized blah blah blah.
Asher Miller
But it's like this --
Jason Bradford
Oh yeah. It's completely embedded. And in so many stores now you get guilted into buying something because like, you know the local stores really rely on the Christmas season to stay in business. So if you don't want your whole downtown shuttered, shop locally so you can, you know. I have a big problem. I have drawers that I open and I go, "Oh yeah. This is the kitch that was in my stocking for the last 20 years." Like the stuff doesn't go away.
Jason Bradford
All your little Beavis and Butthead dolls.
Jason Bradford
Little like keychain knives, or whatever, that you can't actually use because if he ever goes someplace that has a metal detector you lose your car keys. And I don't know. It's just crazy stuff where what are you going to do with all this stuff? So this is the problem --
Asher Miller
Storage. We've already solved this problem. A storage unit.
Jason Bradford
Here's what I'm thinking: even if you are good and do your best--
Asher Miller
You get gifts from people.
Jason Bradford
You get gifts from people. Yeah, it's like how many pairs of pajamas do you need? I don't know. Or robes? So anyway . . .
Asher Miller
I can't get enough.
Rob Dietz
That's why, again, you need your home incinerator from Amazon.
George Costanza
Every decision I've ever made in my entire life has been wrong. My life is the complete opposite of everything I want it to be. If every instinct you have is wrong, then the opposite would have to be right.
Rob Dietz
We started today with my therapy session on having worked at Toys R Us. One escape route that happened to me is I got a job in landscaping.
Jason Bradford
Mowing lawns and using leaf blowers. Sounds wonderful.
Rob Dietz
Yeah well let's add to that. It was 100 degrees often in the Southern United States.
Jason Bradford
85% humidity.
Rob Dietz
Yeah. I mean, pretty rough stuff. It was way, and I mean way more fulfilling.
Asher Miller
Were you like listening to Toys R Us jingles while you were doing this work?
Rob Dietz
Of course. Of course I was. But no, I mean, I can't say the work was unbelievably meaningful, but it was much more meaningful. And it was at least outside. I wasn't surrounded by you know, technicolor plastic shit all day long.
Jason Bradford
And those Atlanta glass office parks look wonderful because of you.
Rob Dietz
Yes, yes. It was really, really quite nice. So I mean, you know, to me that's a first do the opposite -- is just avoid if you can.
Jason Bradford
Retail? Yeah. Well, I complained about you know, getting gifts and stuff. My wife actually has a nice set of rules for this. Like, there's an exception --
Rob Dietz
Oh, so she has a structure.
Jason Bradford
She does. She does. And her structure is if your gift is giving an experience. Right? So like, she's trying to get me to do these wingsuit sort of courses.
Asher Miller
What?
Rob Dietz
She's trying to kill you.
Asher Miller
She wants to kill you.
Jason Bradford
Well, there's good insurance right now. It's gonna expire soon.
Asher Miller
She's gotta get you out there.
Rob Dietz
Also because you're anti-consumerist, you're getting like a third hand wingsuit.
Asher Miller
A reused one. You don't know where it came from.
Jason Bradford
Goodwill.
Asher Miller
You don't know what happened to the guy.
Rob Dietz
This one is still good. The left wing's got some holes in it. You can duct tape those.
Asher Miller
Those are not blood marks on there.
Jason Bradford
Right. The other rule is like it's got to be edible, drinkable, or burnable. Like candles or a cord of wood. I don't know.
Rob Dietz
I was gonna say everything's burnable, right. You just need some gasoline.
Asher Miller
A cord of wood as a gift.
Rob Dietz
Here's a few more infrastructure changes that I would want to see. I mean, one would be complete boycott of the storage industry. Maybe except when you're moving, or something like that. Another would be getting rid of or downplaying, to the extent you can, advertising. And I got this pretty cool ad blocker software. You know, we have to use computers for this godforsaken work that we're doing here. And I noticed the ad blocker works really well, like Asher, you're always sending depressing articles that I need to read.
Asher Miller
And it blocks the entire article?
Rob Dietz
Well, it will. It'll say like, "Oh, sorry. You have to turn off your ad blocker to access this news website." Because that's how they're making their money. And it just saves me time because I don't read your article.
Asher Miller
Time and psyche, right? A friend of ours, Steve Lambert who is an artist, years and years ago he developed this Firefox add on, which was basically an ad blocker, but what it did was replace ads with beautiful art.
Jason Bradford
Oh, that's nice.
Asher Miller
Which is really sweet. Lovely.
Rob Dietz
That's pretty cool. Yeah. I like what you were saying, Jason, about the Costa Rica small hut or whatever. Like, I like to think of infrastructure that a backpacker or a bike tourist has.
Asher Miller
Or Jack Reacher.
Rob Dietz
Yeah. Well, I mean, it really is like down to the essentials and the simplification that comes with it. I mean, I think that's why so many people like backpacking.
Asher Miller
I have a confession. So talking about essentials, you know, I was backpacking, I was in Europe for seven months when I was in college in the early 90s. And at the time, I was listening to the Grateful Dead on cassette tapes. And I was going to be gone for seven months.
Jason Bradford
Wow, how many cassettes tapes did you bring?
Asher Miller
So I brought 60 cassette tapes. And that's that.
Jason Bradford
That's for one concert.
Asher Miller
That sat like a brick at the bottom of my huge backpack. That was at least 10 pounds. And I had to take that with me. So you know, your essentials and my essentials, Rob, might be a little different.
Rob Dietz
Yeah. Well, I mean, it makes sense to me. I mean, you're gonna not have underwear, but you're gonna have Grateful Dead tapes.
Asher Miller
Exactly.
Jason Bradford
Well you know, I think we should call back to Vicki Robbins because she talks about the meaningfulness of time. And this also relates to the meaningfulness of stuff. If you think about, if you're spending your time working, right, and you're making money, you have to work more to get all this stuff. To maintain all this stuff. And so, if you can focus on the meaningfulness of stuff and pare it down, then your finances really become less of a critical thing. That can be secondary in your life rather than the primary thing you need, so that you can have this stuff.
Rob Dietz
Yeah, it's huge. I feel like that's how I, I won't say got ahead, but caught up, after I left college. I was in debt and I just didn't buy anything for three years. And I remember that as a really happy time. Paid off all my student loans. And it gave me the freedom to change careers because I didn't like what I was doing.
Asher Miller
There's two things about that that to me feel really important. One is, you're talking about, in order to get this stuff, the need to get a job and the pressure that that creates. It's also the reverse in a sense, which is I think that a lot of people resort to consumption of things, you know. Whether it's products, or it can be actually entertainment as a form of consumption, because they feel an emptiness in their lives, right? So if you're spending all your time working, or doing things that are unfulfilling to you, that don't feel that meaningful to you, you're actually more inclined to seek that from something else. So if you're lucky enough to be able to dedicate your time to something that gives you joy, and meaning, and purpose, maybe there's less of a desire to consume things in order to kinda fulfill yourself.
Jason Bradford
And you'll be paid so much less anyway that you won't have the possibility.
Asher Miller
Yeah. It's a beautiful virtuous circle. You're gonna get paid shit so you can't afford any of that stuff. But there's the other piece about that, that was the second thing, which is that you can appreciate things a lot more when you don't have as much of them. You know, like, if you're needing to save up for something, or you decide that you're going to save up to get something that maybe is more expensive, but higher quality and is gonna last longer. It means a lot more to you, I think, then something that you could buy quickly. And I think that's part of why, you know. The shit we get is so crappy, no wonder we just returned 60% of it, you know, or whatever.
Rob Dietz
Yeah, one of the problems with trying to change the structure that surrounds us is a lot of it's embedded in the laws or in institutions, and we don't have direct access. So one of the things I often do is I make my own rule, and pretend like it is one of those embedded rules. So the example is credit cards. I've never carried a debt on a credit card my whole life.
Jason Bradford
Yeah, I haven't either. I mean, accidentally, maybe. I forgot to pay it off.
Rob Dietz
Treat it like it's a debit card. You never buy stuff on a credit card unless you can stick it to the bank by just using the service but never paying them interest. To me, that's a way to have your own policies. I want to turn to the cultural like, how can we have a different culture around consumerism, and this can be relatively quick because we covered this back in episode 33. when I got to interview Sandra Goldmark. Do you guys remember? She had that book "Fixation: How to Have Stuff without Breaking the Planet." And so that was during our Hidden Drivers season. And it was an episode about relative status and status seeking behaviors, or the Keeping Up with the Joneses or the Kardashians. And she had these rules for stuff that I thought were pretty awesome.
Jason Bradford
We probably made that Kardashian joke in that episode.
Rob Dietz
Oh I'm sure. Too easy. So she adapted these rules from Michael Pollan's -
Jason Bradford
Pollan?
Rob Dietz
Pollan/Pollen. Yeah.
Jason Bradford
I don't know.
Rob Dietz
You say Tomolan I say Tamalen. So his rules for food were, "Eat food, not too much, mostly plants." Very succinct. Very nice. What Sandra said about stuff, she said, "Have good stuff, not too much, mostly reclaimed." And then she added a coda which said, "Care for it and pass it on." And I think that s pretty succinct, pretty awesome as well. So if we could get that more widely dispersed in the culture, we d be seeing some change.
Jason Bradford
And you know, I think that we've been down on the media a bit in this episode, about how it propagates these sort of consumerist ideals. But there's also subversive elements in the media, you know, sometimes a popular movie. But I want to turn to music. Can you guys think of some music/songs that is anti-consumer?
Rob Dietz
Oh totally. Totally. I had a Sheryl Crow-aissance recently.
Asher Miller
Crow-aissance?
Jason Bradford
She's outstanding. Outstanding.
Rob Dietz
I actually saw her in concert once. It was really good. Anyway, she has that song, "Soak up the Sun," right? My favorite lyric is -
Jason Bradford
"I wanna soak up the sun."
Rob Dietz
My favorite lyric is the, "It's not having what you want. It's wanting what you've got."
Jason Bradford
That's nice.
Rob Dietz
Yeah.
Jason Bradford
Okay, can you guys figure out which song I'm singing? Ready? "What's the matter with the clothes I'm wearing? Can't you tell that your tie's too wide?"
Rob Dietz
That's that Billy Joel song.
Jason Bradford
"Maybe I should buy some old tab collars. Welcome back to the age of jive."
Rob Dietz
How long do we let him go? Stop, stop.
Jason Bradford
It's a good one.
Asher Miller
"It's Still Rock And Roll To Me"
Jason Bradford
Yeah! "Everybody's talkin' 'bout the new sound, funny. But it's still rock and roll to me." It's a great song. I love Billy Joel. Now, here's the deal. That song was a consequence of Billy Joel getting pressure from the music industry -
Rob Dietz
Didn't he record a song called "Pressure," too?
Jason Bradford
Yeah. But they were pressuring him -- this is 1980 -- to like, get into the new wave. Get into, you know, something a little more -
Rob Dietz
Synthesizing?
Jason Bradford
Synthesizing and stuff like that. And he's just like you know, no. Like, this fashiony, you know, gimmicky, fatty stuff, not about that.
Rob Dietz
Let me share one more song because we gotta have something that's from modern history here. Can't all be Grateful Dead and Billy Joel. Even Sheryl Crow. So there was this song that came out, I think in 2022, by a performer named Jax called, "Victoria's Secret." In the lyrics in there, she says --
Jason Bradford
Sings. Why don't you sing?
Rob Dietz
I don't know the tune very well. And I'm not going to perform live like you just did. She says, "I know Victoria's Secret. Girl, you wouldn't believe. She's an old man who lives in Ohio making money off of girls like me. Cashing in on body issues selling skin and bones with big boobs. I know Victoria's Secret. She was made up by a dude."
Asher Miller
That's good.
Jason Bradford
That's pretty good.
Rob Dietz
Yeah. I think that's a really good song. And it's kind of about, yeah, don't fall prey to the deception. Who gives a shit about the Joneses?
Asher Miller
Well and that's the thing is that when you peel back the curtain on it a little bit, you just see that it's all manipulation. Right? And you've got you know, these companies that are basically selling products to fill an emptiness that's in our in our hearts and basically co-opting people that we look up to who maybe were creative and wonderful at one point, or whatever, and then became sellouts.
Rob Dietz
Well, wait til you hear who we have as a sponsor today. Wait til the end to hear that one.
Jason Bradford
Okay, so is anybody doing this? Like, we're saying here we should maybe do this kind of stuff. Where can we turn to for inspiration? There is this Swedish concept called lagom, which sort of means just the right amount, you know? Enoughness. Right? Is that a word, enoughness?
Rob Dietz
Sure. And let me just say --
Asher Miller
You're asking the right guy, "Enough is Enough."
Jason Bradford
Yeah. That's a great book. Great book. Buy it. Give it for Christmas.
Rob Dietz
Yeah. I should put out a Swedish version, "Lagom is Lagom." Yeah, but can I just say I'm proud of you, Asher, for attempting a Swedish accent without doing it muppet-style Swedish Chef. It's less offensive. Way to go.
Asher Miller
It's probably still offensive to our Swedish listeners.
Jason Bradford
Yeah. And sort of there's this social cohesion that happens when like, you don't take too much, you're happy and just have enough. So there's always then a fair share. It's also about thinking about others, not just about yourself/
Rob Dietz
Well and does it tie to what you were just talking about, Asher? The idea of, there's an emptiness?
Asher Miller
Yeah.
Rob Dietz
And so, instead of shopping or you know, having an instant dopamine hit that goes away also instantly, if you can think about how much is enough and be satisfied with that, you're just so much more secure and so much less susceptible to that emptiness?
Asher Miller
Yeah. Yeah, I think that's true.
Jason Bradford
Were there any Abba songs about that?
Rob Dietz
I don't know. My God. There's got to be a modern popular Swedish artist. We don't have to go back to Abba.
Jason Bradford
They had a great Abba tribute band at the Benton County Fair. Anyway.
Asher Miller
You know, there's crossover actually, when you think about sort of indigenous views on enoughness, right. I'm going to quote an article that was back from 2009. But pretty much says the same kind of idea of what you're talking about. I'm quoting here, "An indigenous system is based on prosperity, creation, kinship, and a sense of enoughness. It is designed for sharing, potlatches, giveaways. These involve deliberately accumulating wealth as a person, or as a family or as a clan, for the sole purpose of giving it away. That puts in motion a continual ongoing requirement for redistribution." So it's kinda like flipping it on its head a little bit, and it just reminds me -- I want to give a plug for another podcast that we produce that's called "Holding the Fire," which is interviews with indigenous leaders from around the world, where they talk a lot about their cultures that they come from. And maybe something for us to learn from and take in for sure.
Rob Dietz
Yeah, I like that idea a lot. And even just kind of putting it into practice a little bit where I live is the whole idea of sharing with your neighbors and being able to give away like, when I have something that I don't need, or I have extra produce that I've grown or whatever, like that kind of stuff happens a lot. And I think our culture unfortunately has sort of like shied away from that in a sense. But I've gone the other direction. Like I am completely okay with asking anybody in my neighborhood for anything of theirs.
Jason Bradford
That's great. Yeah, cup of sugar.
Rob Dietz
Maybe they think I'm, you know, there's something's wrong with me or . . . No, seriously, I'm like, "Do you have us a miter saw that I could use? Can I use your lawnmower? I don't want to buy all this crap, and I don't need it for much.
Jason Bradford
That's good.
Asher Miller
That's the thing is we were talking about dopamine earlier. The dopamine you get from buying something or unpacking something -- I would say the dopamine of giving something, of lending something, it's got to be at least as high.
Jason Bradford
It's a true dopamine hit.
Asher Miller
Yeah, this is going to be like such a trope, but another thing to keep in mind is just the three R's, right, r educe, reuse, recycle as a hierarchy. I know we've heard it ad nauseam. But, you know, it's there for a reason. And I think it's a pretty sound -- you talked about rules earlier -- I think it's a pretty sound one as well. And, you know, then buy stuff to last. I mean, I talked about that a little bit earlier. You know, buying things are made out of quality, buying things that you can actually repair. There are efforts underway now to push back against the fact that most of the things you buy now you cannot repair, right? Disassemble them, or whatever. And there is starting to be a push back against that. Learn how to sew yourself, you know, you gotta . . . I know that you were looking for a pair of crotchless panties for yourself, Jason. Just sew your own. .
Rob Dietz
Why? Why?
Asher Miller
I can ask why.
Rob Dietz
No, not why is he . . . Why do you have to bring this up?
Asher Miller
Just a great example.
Rob Dietz
It's imagery no one needs?
Asher Miller
Real world example.
Jason Bradford
No one needs.
Rob Dietz
Well look, at the societal scale, besides, you know, sort of in your own household, I think there are things that we can support as well. In looking for some ideas for this episode, I came across a book by Wendy Woloson. She's a professor historian. And she wrote a book called, "Crap: A History of Cheap Stuff in America."
Jason Bradford
Nice.
Rob Dietz
Yeah. And she had this, I listened to her on a podcast, and she had this pretty cool summary of how things used to work with clothing. And she said, historically, clothing would be refashioned over time. So I have an outfit, and it would get worn. So the first thing you do is you would re-dye it, get the color back up to snuff, and you would re-sew it if there's any anything that needs that. And then over time, that would get kind of worn out. And so then what they would do is they would take it apart. You would take the stitching out, and you would re-sew an article of clothing for a smaller person. And then when that got worn out, there were people who were rag dealers who would come around and you would sell this used piece of clothing to a rag dealer who would then get it converted into paper or another usable thing. Now, we might not be able to get back to that.
Jason Bradford
No, but I think you know, there is that Patagonia kind of movement, right? Where they're actually selling their own clothes that have been worn before. The Worn Wear Program. And they do some repair and they do a lot of recycling. If it really is worn out they'll try to recycle it into something new. So that's -- upcycling as the other term for that.
Asher Miller
Yeah. I mean, Patagonia has been known for a long time as being sort of the vanguard of efforts to rethink what a corporation does, right? You think about a company that's selling apparel products, changing the entire business model. There needs to be more of them. Interface, the carpet company, that's another one that people have talked about. We need a lot more of them obviously to do that. But it's great to have those those examples from the corporate world. I think it's worth talking about what people are doing on a policy level as well. And gotta go to the most brilliant country on Earth, the French.
Jason Bradford
Really?
Rob Dietz
Certainly can't stay in America for good policies on consumerism.
Asher Miller
So, a couple of things. In 2016, they passed a law in France that forced supermarkets to donate expired food. We had a whole conversation about waste food, right? As long as there wasn't a safety risk with that food. And three years later it appeared to be working. Donations to food banks were up 20%. In 2020, they passed an anti-waste law for a circular economy.
Jason Bradford
Wow.
Asher Miller
And you know, I think it's early days yet but some of the key things that were put into that law was no destroying unsold or returned items. We talked about that with the fashion industry, right? All plastic needs to be recyclable by 2025.
Jason Bradford
That's coming up.
Asher Miller
50% reduction in single use plastic bottles, phasing out of paper receipts, fast food takeout restaurants have to stop using plastic containers, I guess, by last year. I wonder how they did. Informing consumers about repairability of their products, what we talked about earlier. Helping them make decisions about longevity, environmental impacts of their products. So really trying to push on incentives and regulatory structures, you know, to shift that.
Rob Dietz
Well, if there's one thing that Americans like it's the French.
Asher Miller
Yes, to learn from the French.
Rob Dietz
Following the French example.
Melody Allison
That's our show. Thanks for listening. If you liked what you heard, and you want others to consider these issues, then please share Crazy Town with your friends, hit that share button in your podcast app, or just tell them face to face. Maybe you can start some much needed conversations and do some things together to get us out of Crazy Town. Thanks again for listening and sharing.
