Live green and save money
With the economy in trouble, can we afford to be green? That's a question you often hear nowadays, but it's a dumb question. We can't afford not to be green. The planet is in peril and there's no time to waste in switching our systems of production and consumption to greener alternatives.
The economic system we've lived under for the past 200 years or so is fundamentally irrational because it requires endless material growth on a finite planet. As a result, the current economic meltdown may help slow down the process of planetary meltdown. Perhaps we should welcome it as a blessing in disguise. If nothing else, it is making business as usual impossible and is creating the opportunity for new ideas and alternatives.
There is another way to live. It is green; it is cheap; and it is good, but to get there requires changing the way we think about almost everything. This blog will expose and explain the historical and current events that have pushed us into this socially dysfunctional and environmentally destructive economic system. It will also explore the ideas, trends and politics of the vast and turbulent transformation that is now under way.
Here is just one example of how cheap green living can happen: Suppose you decide to take a short walk in the woods near your house to get some exercise and improve your health. You take a deep breath, begin to relax, and notice that there are huckleberries growing along the path. They are kind of small and dried up, but you stop and pick several handfuls and eat them. They are high in anti-oxidants and they taste good, even if they are not the big, plump, rather watery blueberries imported from Chile that you can buy in a plastic clamshell at the supermarket in town. How much would it have cost you to buy the supermarket berries? How much would you have spent at a gym to take your walk on a treadmill? Instead you have spent no money but gained in both pleasure and health. You didn't do your duty as a consumer, but there's no need to feel guilty about that!
That's greening your head.
Comments