The narrative of the individual consumer having the power, having the entire responsibility of regulating the market, and by extension being responsible for the damage to this planet has been overused, or more appropriately; oversold. Please, by all means reduce your consumption and waste. I am doing my part too. But... it won’t be enough in the time we have left. The whales are dying, the animals are dying, the forests are dying. The air, water, soil toxicity levels continue to increase.
The climate continues to become less hospitable to life. We have trashed this planet and more than just skipping the use of a straw or picking up some junk during a beach cleanup is needed to fix these problems. I’m still going to do my part, I’m still trying to reduce my trash footprint, my carbon footprint, I’m still doing beach cleanups... but I’ll be damned if that’s all I do and I don’t yell as loudly as I can (tactfully) at the corporations who are providing the choices we consumers are offered.
I was once an unabashed believer in capitalism, but I now have my doubts. Capitalism needs to be regulated, and it must be done by demand... it doesn’t seem to have any constraints. It needs to have some controls in order to be beneficial to the general population and we must recognize the greed motivation, the monopolistic violence, the manipulation of markets, and the exploitation of the people. These must be kept to a minimum if not completely abolished. But, Capitalism just seems to have been given free reign and the principles of a truly free market corrupted. A free market has an expectation, all things being fair, to evolve into a fair market, but those politically powerful in our corporatocracy destroy, oppress, or withhold competitor's superior products to ensure profit.
Even if we had fair market dynamics, meaning the powerful allowed competition, the consumer takes time to make the choices. The market doesn’t work fast enough, especially as it is currently... the commercials and marketing, the fast fashion and planned obsolescence has perverted spending habits, has made us manipulative to others and corrupted in our own desires... We must demand companies make ethical choices directly, before profit... "Too Big Too Fail" is a free pass to act with impunity. Corporations need to invest according to the triple bottom line, they need to release the patents that they sit on just to prevent progress (so they can keep producing the same crap at lower costs but equally lower quality). We need economies of scale for alternative products and we need it right fucking now. The lack of available products, especially for developing communities, leads to situations where there is no choice...
What we need is a paradigm shift in thinking, not just about what is consumed but also what is provided. The production is not regulated by consumer demand, and that isn't capitalism, that's a manipulated system.
When corporations have the power to dictate law, they use it to enable their growth and to avoid costs. And that growth will come in the name 'investor', even at the expense of the investors health and future. Then we will have a future where investors slowly die of cancer, or whatever else, without adequate medical resources, in a world that reflects the ideal conditions for corporate growth. Corporate growth isn't limited by pollution, or climate change, or cancer rates... in fact, with the right investment, these things can create growth. I look around and see the pollution in the air, on the beach, floating in the water, spoiling my food and deforming my future... I see that world in which corporation growth is exponential and the commensurate political influence just as unsustaintable.
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