Individual's Guide to Sustainability

As I mentioned in my earlier posts, there are plenty of people that will push back against my choices. One such push back came in a GEG class quite unexpectedly. It was simply an off handed comment by my professor. I do not believe he intended as a slight against me in any way, but it really made me think about how people view my choices in protecting the environment.             I believe were talking about the impacts of disposable diapers and my professor said, “just wait until you have kids, things will change.” It really struck me in that moment that people see environmentalism as a trend. Something to be put on hold or given up when life gets in the way. To be clear, I was in no way offended by his comment, quite the opposite in fact. I took his comment to mean that I have work to do. Maybe I should give more credit to advocating for changes in the law. That would provide more legitimacy to the changes I ...

Everyone blames coal and oil companies for the current situation regarding climate change. There is always seems to be this focus on companies who care for nothing more than their bottom line. As I have said previously, everyone is so willing to place the blame on someone else in an attempt to avoid actual change themselves.             Now I am not a great defender of big oil, but I argue that they are not the ones we should be blaming. The ones at fault are us, the consumers. If there was not a market for these resources, no one would be selling them. There is a reason you will not find cassette tapes at Walmart.             If we the consumer want change, then we have to ask for it. We have to make conscious choices about the things we purchase. This means we are going to have to really understand the brands we are choosing to support. Brands follow the ...

In GEG we had several discussions about the ways to protect the international environment. Most common comments were about strong regulation, better technology or having the global north subsidize the global south. Now I did not disagree with all of those points, but I do disagree with one quite ferociously.               I find the desire for “better” technology to be a way to get around the actual problems we face. I believe people use this as an excuse to exempt themselves from having to make any serious changes to their own life style. For example, I have heard we need more efficient energy use or for better battery technology to store electricity. How about using less? That is not something people in GEG seemed open to doing.             On the other hand, I am obviously an advocate for changing consumer habits; buying less stuff, eating vegetaria...