h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

Yes. Buy Nothing Day advocates get arrested. Zealous shoppers get an award. Still no surprises.

http://thebrooklynink.com/2010/11/26/20346-anti-corporate-activist-rev-billy-arrested-in-midtown/

Entry: Buy Nothing Day - A78788074
Author: Happy Nerd - U8584330

"A78788074 - Buy Nothing Day Post: 1
Posted 5 Days Ago by Happy Nerd
Entry: Buy Nothing Day - A78788074
Author: Happy Nerd - U8584330
Buy Nothing Day, a holiday from conspicuous consumption."
======================================================================
Apologies for exposing my ignorance as a relative newby to h2g2 - but is the above the full article/Original Post?

Why do we need a holiday from conspicuous consumption and is inconspicuous consumption any better?

Okay I find by clicking on A78788074 I arrive at the article. Thank goodness I got in my apology beforehand .

Hi tarantoes,

Nice to meet you, and welcome to this part of hg2g2.


HN

Hi, happy new year to you too. I was doing a little surfing and acclimatising to h2g2. I mainly post on 606 but find it a little restricting at times

Ah, . Well, enjoy your tour through Peer Review. It's always fun to see what's up for review.

This thread is for researchers such as yourself to review the entry I submitted on Buy Nothing Day. The entry is intended for the Edited Guide. It sits here in peer review until all the reviewers who care to comment have done so, and I've done my best to address their concerns and make A78788074 a good entry for the Guide to Live, The Universe and Everything.

Happy New Year.


Happy Nerd

I had never heard of this day before reading your entry.

Like toybox said, there are so many day this/day that I usually disregard them all (if I get aware of them in the first place, that is)!

>>Soon the anti-consumerism event moved to the last Friday of November, known to retailers as Black Friday2<<

Depends where you are. I only know about Black Friday because I remember that guide entry you link to. Maybe write: ...known to retailers in the USA as Black Friday...?

Interesting point about the media. Shows us just how neutral and independent they are, eh?

Good entry.

I'm sure the "Buy Nothing Day" participants will be exploited by the cooporations some how (advertising, fast food sales, increased energy consumption, transport use, newspapers, et cetera) ...

Hmmmm I think I might try to sell a few t-shirts off it

The entry covers everything one needs to know, I would say, but it does rather start in medias res. It could do with a sentence of introduction at the beginning, or more concrete details near the beginning. Especially the fact that it's a US-ian phenomenon (as far as I can tell from the entry)

As to opinions on the subject itself, while I am sure it is a good thing to question spending our money on unnecessary luxury goods, when this money is desperately needed to right wrongs elsewhere in the world, we should also take into consideration the fact that many people rely for our income on the industries which produce and sell these goods.

Or, to give a concrete example: Starting a movement which would lead to a wholesale boycott of, say, MP3-players and various other sound producing gadgets, would put a lot of people out of work.

Personally, I wouldn't even consider working for a company that produced luxury goods,as I would find this rather unsatisfying, but not everyone has that choice.

And, as has been suggested above: where exactly does necessity stop and luxury start?

I would be the first to admit that I have a minimal grasp of economics, but some of this might need thinking through.

For example, you could argue that Toybox could walk or cycle rather than catch the bus. That's OK for one day, but what if he and, say, 10 others decide that it's quite a good idea to walk instead of taking the bus? They continue to do it for a few weeks. Come winter, they may decide that it's too cold, or dangerous to walk, and want to take the bus again. The bus, however, has been discontinued in the meantime, due to lack of demand. Leaving a couple of old people without their connection to the shops, not to mention Toybox and his associates complaining about public transport.

Sorry - it just got me thinking. It might be different in America.

I enjoyed reading your comments, including the emerging debate on the possible impacts of a consumer spending boycott on the various economic sectors.

The entry now reads 'Vancouver, BC' and 'North American retailers' to make it more clear this one-day spending boycott is a Canadian invention.

Rather than add more sentences at the beginning, I changed the title to better orient the reader.

Thanks for your reviews.


HN

I suspect the most effective action a person may take to prevent an increase in consumption is not to have children; the world population today is estimated at 6,891,225,443 and rising. With the rate of development of China and India and other newly industrializing nations consumption per global capita is also increasing. I'm all for Buy Nothing Day but I suspect it will take something more imaginative to make a modicum of any real difference on the global scale.

Hi, tarantoes. I'm looking forward seeing to your Buy Nothing Day t-shirt designs. I'm trying to reply to editorial comments about the essay's structure and discussion-type comments about the subject matter separately, please bear with me.

I can't quite remember the year when holiday shopping became incomprehensibly insane to me; perhaps it was sometime in the late 90s. It was something about people lining up hours, even days, early to get "early bird sales", fighting over who gets to buy the last "must have" toy on the shelf, pushing, shoving, and being generally rude and awful.

This year, we got advertisements for Black Friday sales, plus something new, Black Friday Sneak Peak Sales which started on Thanksgiving. This was particularly repugnant to me. I wondered, do they seriously expect me to cook from the time I get up until I serve the meal, sit down, eat quickly, jump up, and drive to the shops?

No, for apparently I was to have been standing in line for the sale to begin rather than making pie.

While I'm alive, I can't stop consuming, but I can consume thoughtfully and deliberately, not just because some marketing genius tells me what I "must have". For me, deliberate consuming means I think about what I will use, not what the media tells me I should have. Part of that means I have to ask myself "Do I really need this?" rather a lot, using and reusing things, re-purposing things, and generally getting the most mileage out of purchases.

Suppose we take up the idea of those mp3 players as was suggested. Before I buy one, could I make sure the manufacturer has ethically sourced the minerals required? Wouldn't it be cool if I used my buying power to make sure no violent acts were carried out to get the raw ingredients to make that mp3 player?


HN

Good entry on an interesting subject, though the last sentence is a bit odd - why not just have "consider this an alternative." Also, consider linking to A25871141.

Alex

The last sentence reads perfectly well to me.

Thank you Tufty and KB for your reviews.

I used that sentence structure to give a little more punch. I added the link to the other anti-consumerism activity.

And somehow I made the whole thing disappear. Sorry, folks.

Hi Happy Nerd

It&#39;s back now!

I like the last sentence as well. Is this ready-to-go now?


Lanzababy

(13 minutes after last post, from Lanzababy) - it's not there!

Entry: Buy Nothing Day - A78788074
Author: Happy Nerd - U8584330

Hi TC, I can still see it - are you using the new or old version of h2g2? I am in the new version, testing and bug-hunting.