SHOP 'TIL YOU DROP vs. DON'T SHOP; DON'T DROP

BY Carol Henning
Co-Chair, Editorial Board

The holidays are here, by golly. Disapproval would be folly, might be the 21st century update of the classic Tom Lehrer song about Christmas. Holiday catalogs crowd mail boxes. We have everything you need for a simply magical holiday, claims one lavishly produced catalog. Has a certain someone been EXTRA GOOD this year? This is the question presented across from a page featuring an ultra-slim, long-legged model showing off a distressed lamb three-button blazer. (I'd be distressed too if someone made a jacket out of my skin.) This unique, unexpected gift is the good girl's reward-sure to bring ooohs and ahhhs on Christmas morning.

Less is More

Perhaps it is time, though, to substitute sighs of relief for the ooohs and ahhhs. Whence comes the relief? It comes as a result of not having to find closet space, drawer space, cupboard space or shelf space for more stuff. It comes from not having to figure out how to reuse or recycle all that paper and ribbon. It comes from not having to cram nonrecyclable packaging into your trash cans. It comes from giving land-fills, your credit cards, your tires and your energy a break this holiday season.

But We Also Hear That Shopping Is Patriotic

After 9/11, a time when the feeling of patriotism in this country was at a peak, we were exhorted to demonstrate that patriotism by heading for the malls. Holiday shopping is especially patriotic. This time of year, TV and radio newscasts are replete with anxious reports on retail spending. It's up. It's down. It's higher/lower than anticipated. Many businesses depend on holiday shopping each year to keep them solvent. A Planet Money report on National Public Radio warned that: Changing from a spending nation to a saving nation will cause severe, severe pain. When the health of the U.S. economy is tied to retail sales, this creates a paradox.

A Country Conflicted

We want businesses to succeed and for everyone to be happy (especially during the holidays), but this outcome depends upon persuading people to buy more stuff-most of which they do not need, most of which was not made locally or even in this country. The manufacture of this stuff contributes to global climate change; the eventual disposal of it enlarges landfills; some of the discarded packaging ends up in our oceans.

On the one hand, patriotic Americans make haste to the malls and the big box stores, credit cards at the ready. On the other hand, our consumption of energy and goods means that if every human in the world adopted a U.S. lifestyle, we would need six planet Earths to support us.

Definition of Patriotism Dependent on Oval Office Occupant

Michael Moore's new film, Capitalism: A Love Story, includes archival footage of President Jimmy Carter speaking somberly about rampant materialism and pointing out that there is more to life than the constant accumulation of stuff. Moore's narration observes that Americans didn't want to hear Carter's admonition.

Jimmy Carter put solar panels on the White House. Ronald Reagan took them off. Why limit our consumption of goods and energy? It's Morning in America. We can have it all. We deserve it all. This was the message Americans preferred.

Would Americans be more receptive today to what President Carter was saying 30 years ago? I wondered. Thus, when I had a recent opportunity to ask President Carter a question, this was the one I chose. His answer was honest and direct. I'm afraid not, he said. He talked about the growing gap between the rich and the poor, in the U.S. and on the planet. A billion people in the world live on less than one dollar a day, and, every 3.6 seconds, a person dies of starvation.

Alas, we cannot mail our holiday feasts to the hungry. (The fruitcakes would probably survive the journeys; the latkes would not.) However, we can give our friends gifts of memberships in organizations like the Angeles Chapter that promote conservation. In honor of our friends, we can make donations that will result in forest restoration, and defense of endangered species. Knowing that one of our fellow creatures or that our planet has been helped a bit is the best holiday gift of all.