Ecotopia Revisited

In Ernest Callenbach's semi-utopian 1975 novel Ecotopia, advertising is strictly regulated. Ads can only give factual information about products. No psychological warfare arm twisting victims into buying things they don't need in the name of profit in this sustainable society.

I could love this book for that alone, but it has so much more to offer. It serves up a working model of what-could-be, an alternative to our current race to extinction. It has answers for the person looking at what consumer capitalism has done to our planet, and asks "what can I do?"

In 1981 he wrote a prequel called Ecotopia Emerging, in which he describes how society began to be changed from one in which "Toxic contamination of air, water, and food has become intolerable. Nuclear meltdowns threaten. Military spending burdens the economy. Politicians squabble over outdated agendas while the country declines."

Hmm, sounds familiar. Ecotopia Emerging is on my reading list, but it feels like I am living it every day. This is our reality. Will we evolve to a sustainable, cooperative society in time?

Callenbach returned his component parts to the Earth in 2012, but his legacy carries on in millions of readers and admirers. Many people are already living Ecotopia lifestyles, and it is only a matter of time before everyone else will be forced by necessity to adopt one-planet living.

A document was found on the computer of Callenbach after his death. In it he addresses his audience to open the essay.

"To all brothers and sisters who hold the dream in their hearts of a future world in which humans and all other beings live in harmony and mutual support -- a world of sustainability, stability, and confidence. A world something like the one I described, so long ago, in Ecotopia and Ecotopia Emerging."

Hey! He's talking to us.

Toward the end of the piece he writes,

"Since I wrote Ecotopia, I have become less confident of humans' political ability to act on commonsense, shared values. Our era has become one of spectacular polarization, with folly multiplying on every hand.

That is the way empires crumble: they are taken over by looter elites, who sooner or later cause collapse. But then new games become possible, and with luck Ecotopia might be among them."


Again, sounds eerily familiar. But as he points out, when things break down, new possibilities emerge, and we should therefore seize the day and make sure that all economies move toward sustainability as soon as possible.

"Let us embrace decay, for it is the source of all new life and growth."

We can all help manifest a better world through our behaviours, habits, and expectations. Ecotopians are building an alternative to the madness - a sustainable society in which all living things benefit mutually.

"So it behooves me here to gather together some thoughts and attitudes that may prove useful in the dark times we are facing: a century or more of exceedingly difficult times. 

How will those who survive manage it? What can we teach our friends, our children, our communities? 

Although we may not be capable of changing history, how can we equip ourselves to survive it?"

 Read the rest of Ernest Callenbach's last essay at "Common Dreams".

Snapping Turtle Nest

Ever since seeing my first Snapping Turtle in July two years ago, I have wanted to see a Snapping Turtle nest. This year, while on an October hike in the woods, I got my wish.

At first I was not sure what I was seeing. My eye was drawn by white bits on the trail. Upon closer inspection, they turned out to be creamy white ping-pong sized shell remains, exactly as described in my online research of these large turtles.

Sure enough, close by was the nest, the hatchling hole. It was in a well-drained, south facing site, perfect for incubating 25-30 turtle eggs.

Next October, or perhaps in the spring if a nest overwinters, I hope to see the event as it is occurring. What a sight to see a new generation starting out, the individuals of which could live 40 years in these woods.

Go little turtles, Go!

Cathedrals of Consumerism Losing Their Congregations

Is this the beginning of the end of consumerism?

I never did like shopping malls much. Therefore, now that they are an endangered species, I am not mourning, despite having a twinge of nostalgia when I think about them.

"Corridor of nothing."

When I was a young dungaree-wearing hooligan, my friends and I would congregate at the new mall in my hometown for "something to do". But then, as now, I was not buying anything. It was more about the social aspect, and staying one step ahead of mall security.

 “Two million square feet of echo.”

Because malls were for shopping, not loitering. Not buying anything? Get out. What a difference a few decades make - now hardly anyone is buying anything at the mall.

Besides nostalgia, I find malls fascinating from a ghost town perspective. There is something to be learned from our futile failed experiments, including this one, that started with the first mall in the 1950s. I consider it a good thing that our cathedrals of consumerism are finally losing their congregations.

"Almost one-fifth of the nation’s enclosed malls have vacancy rates considered troubling by real estate experts — 10 percent or greater. Over 3 percent of malls are considered to be dying — with 40 percent vacancies or higher. That is up from less than 1 percent in 2006." - NYT 

I wish the demise of the mall was because we have decided that overconsumption is so, like, 80s, and we are moving on to a more ecologically aware way of living. Maybe it is. We are going through monumental changes right now when it comes to shopping and our relationship with materialism. We know that the priests of commerce lied, and that salvation can not be bought at the mall. Or anywhere else.

“There’s no customers, but they have a customer-service desk”

Are shopping malls endangered because their parents, consumerism and institutionalized greed, are themselves endangered species? Is humanity, dare I say, evolving into an eco-consciousness the likes of which we have not experienced for a very long time? Dream big, I say.

Goodbye, malls. I won't miss you, or any of that stuff that I didn't buy. Don't worry, it's not you, it's us.

A report issued by Credit Suisse in June predicted that 20 to 25 percent of the more than 1,000 existing enclosed malls in America will close in the next five years.

Ecological Intelligence And The High Cost of Low Prices

Want to make buying things more ecologically and socially responsible? The answer, of course, depends who you ask. Big business would say, "No, that might affect our bottom line." I, on the other hand, am all for it, and I am sure many others are as well.

A free exchange of information would empower the consumer and allow a more mindful participation in the process of consuming. It is all about information. Aren't we supposed to be living in the Information Age?

What happened to the information?

Presently the only thing most people base their purchases on is what is about the only thing that can bet known, and that is the price. Most people will vote for the lowest price possible.

And people are voting, often for places like WalMart.

"Supporters contend that the chain's legendary low prices have democratized consumption, allowing low-income households to afford flat-screen televisions and nine-layer lasagna. 

Critics say those low prices have depressed domestic wages and exported manufacturing jobs to foreign countries, hurting Americans more than helping them." Source

What if you want to know more about things like this? Corporations withhold the information we need, creating an unfair playing field. Until legislators and consumers demand it, this information will continue to be withheld to make sure that price remains the sole bit of information we base our purchases on, to the detriment of the environment and workers.

Just buy it, and never mind the health impacts, or the social and environmental consequences. How can one consume freely otherwise?

By withholding information about the ethical performance of producers, underachievers continue to be rewarded, and those that excel in responsibility do not get the recognition and encouragement they deserve.

GoodGuide is one organization that uses extensive data to rate a variety of products on 3 categories including health, environmental and social impacts. The GoodGuide represents a growing group of people that are trying to uncork the information bottleneck so that the data consumers need flows to them.

Because we are unable to be fully mindful of the life-cycle of our purchases, we can inadvertently cause the very damage we are trying to avoid. GoodGuide recognizes this when they note:

"It is important that for many products and product categories there is a significant gap in public disclosure due to the lack of U.S regulation around many products commonly sold on U.S. store shelves. 

This lack of transparency and disclosure make it extremely difficult to perform a comprehensive health, environmental and social issues evaluation of specific products and companies. The most extreme example of this problem is household cleaning products, where there is almost no disclosure of product ingredients."

Daniel Goleman's book Ecological Intelligence shows how information about the hidden impacts of the things we buy can change our shopping habits, and instigate important Earth-friendlier changes.

"Imagine what might happen if the knowledge now sequestered among specialists like industrial ecologists were made available to the rest of us: taught to kids in school, easily accessible on the Web, boiled down into evaluations of the things we buy and do and summarized as we were about to make a purchase."

Lets kick start this so-called Information Age, and actually get information out there that really matters. Let consumers become aware of who and what they are supporting, and the effects of their purchases on people and the planet.

Surely the majority of consumers are willing to do the right thing if only they had the information to make more responsible purchasing decisions. As Earthlings, we should all want to be ecologically intelligent because if we aren't, bad things happen.

It is like having a User's Guide To The Planet.

Until such information is broadly and easily available, I suggest doing the research yourself in places like the GoodGuide. But be forewarned - all that work, and the results of your investigation, will most certainly kill your desire to purchase most of what is on offer in the modern marketplace.

Living simply could become an unintended consequence, albeit a good one.


Interested in increasing your ecological intelligence quotient? See under "Web Resources" on our sidebar for more information. I have recently added more links for the ecologically curious.

Our Vision

Not Buying Anything Blog Vision Statement

Our vision is a world where simple, eco-sensitive and joyful lifestyles are the norm.

Big corporations co-opt everything and anything that can turn them a profit. They have even managed to make simple living lifestyles into a commodity, creating a curious conundrum where one buys ones way into the simple life.

So I decided to co-opt something from the corporate world - the concept of a vision statement. How could a succinct, helpful blurb not be useful anywhere, not just in profit-making ventures that push competitive shopping as a way of life?

I am all about wandering, serendipity, and letting life flow unimpeded, and yet, sometimes it is necessary to have an idea of where you are headed. Coupled with focus and discipline, one can go anywhere, achieve anything.

So it is that I share this blogs guiding vision. Along with our recently published manifesto (which is similar to a corporate mission statement, but with a nice anti-establishment ring), our vision statement helps to give our work (and play) focus and intention.

Will we (and by 'we' I mean all of us that are part of this blog, and the simple living community) succeed, and create a simpler, more gentle Earth that provides for everybody, and all of life?

Did Ray Crock think he would sell billions of hamburgers?

What if we DID succeed in helping millions of people adopt a joyful alternative to unchecked consumption and the busy lifestyles that are required to support them? What if consumers turned en masse to voluntary simplicity? Before they were forced to by resource depletion and deteriorating environmental conditions?

For one thing, unhealthy behemoth fast food burger chains wouldn't do as well as they do now.

Saying sayonara to the corporate model, and hello to global cooperation, is definitely part of our vision.

Nature Is Into You

I have loved being in nature for as long as I can remember. I measure my success by how much time I  spend in wild places untouched by the heavy hand of civilization. My relationship with nature has been a passionate, life long affair.

I have had people tell me, "I'm just not that into nature." For a while I didn't know what to say, but I think I have figured it out.

From now on my reply is going to be, "You are lucky that Nature is into you."

So-called 'ecosystem services', otherwise known as 'the gifts of Mother Nature', have been carefully calculated in monetary terms for those who fail to see the beauty and inherent rights of nature to exist over and above what's in it for us.

Seen from the perspective of the bottom line, it is obvious that there would be no economy without nature and the ecosystem services it provides. Anyone saying it is either the environment or the economy should be told that we are voting for the environment.

The numbers don't lie.

"The services of ecological systems and the natural capital stocks that produce them are critical to the functioning of the Earth's life-support system. They contribute to human welfare, both directly and indirectly, and therefore represent part of the total economic value of the planet. 

We have estimated the current economic value of 17 ecosystem services for 16 biomes, based on published studies and a few original calculations. For the entire biosphere, the value (most of which is outside the market) is estimated to be in the range of US$16-54 trillion (1012) per year, with an average of US$33 trillion per year. 

Because of the nature of the uncertainties, this must be considered a minimum estimate. Global gross national product total is around US$18 trillion per year."    - source

I am so into Nature, and I am glad that she is into me. We have been very happy together. She has taught me everything I know, and to acknowledge this fact, I try to do everything I can to help her out.

We are lucky that Nature is into us all, whether we know it or acknowledge it or not. We should try and keep it that way.

The Corporate/Consumer Gift

The corporate/consumer gift keeps on taking.

The corporate/consumer gift is a glittering package that we have laid at the altar of greed. It is a gift that keeps on taking... and taking and taking. And taking.

A recent Oxfam study has shown that the number of billionaires has doubled since this blog began in 2008. The study also found that the planet's richest 85 individuals have as much wealth as the poorest 50% of the population.

If anyone is wondering how much of the Earth's resources corporations wish to access and consume, I have the answer. They want to take it all.

All the planet's primal forests, all the clean water, all the pristine wilderness, all the sweet smelling air, all the fish in the oceans. Everything. Until it is all gone.

Then what?

The corporate/consumer gift that we have created, and perpetuated to near-planetary collapse, is a stylish brick on the accelerator of society, speeding us along to the point of no return. Riding shotgun are pro-corporate, jobs-at-all-costs governments that smooth the way toward the brink by cancelling current environmental laws and preventing new ones from being introduced.

All so the corporate/consumer gift can keep on taking. Most of the stuff we buy is the same - it takes more than it gives.

In order to tame the beast we have created, and take the brick off the gas pedal, we can think about whether we wish to burden ourselves and our loved ones with additional fetters before buying superfluous stuff. Especially around this time of year.

Happy holidays - two more days and the light begins to return.

Wild Geese And The Family Of Things

"Goose" - Illustrated by Ash Troberg

Yesterday I was doing dishes and looked out the window hoping I would see the woodchuck in the field across the road. I did not see the woodchuck (which is one of 14 types of marmot, which are large squirrels), but I did see a family of 7 geese taking a rest and eating grass.

Later in the day I discovered American poet Mary Oliver's poem called Wild Geese. I have never seen her writing before, but was struck by how much this poem resembles the work of Zen poets.

It also reminded me that we are never alone in the world - we are part of everything around us. We are all members of the family of things, and like everything else we have our part to play.

Just like the woodchucks and geese.



Wild Geese - Mary Oliver

You do not have to be good.
You do not have to walk on your knees
for a hundred miles through the desert, repenting.
You only have to let the soft animal of your body
love what it loves.
Tell me about despair, yours, and I will tell you mine.
Meanwhile the world goes on.
Meanwhile the sun and the clear pebbles of the rain
are moving across the landscapes,
over the prairies and the deep trees,
the mountains and the rivers.
Meanwhile the wild geese, high in the clean blue air,
are heading home again.
Whoever you are, no matter how lonely,
the world offers itself to your imagination,
calls to you like the wild geese, harsh and exciting –
over and over announcing your place
in the family of things.

Mental Madness Monday

Anyone who would claim rampant consumerism is good for the environment has a serious struggle with reality. Whether we want to admit it or not, we are committing ecocide, a tragically stupid thing to do that borders on mass mental illness.

Ecocide is the extensive damage to, destruction of or loss of ecosystems of a given territory, whether by human agency or by other causes, to such an extent that peaceful enjoyment by the inhabitants of that territory has been or will be severely diminished.

Since we are dependent on healthy and functioning ecosystems, committing ecocide is one step removed from committing suicide.

We are choosing self-harm, which indicates this madness runs rampant.

Many that are leading the destruction, not only suffer from delusions of grandeur, but also suicidal tendencies. They should be identified and be involuntarily committed, long term, until they can demonstrate they no longer desire to destroy themselves and everyone and everything around them.

World Water Day 2014

In 2011, 768 million people did not have an improved source of drinking-water,
and 2.5 billion people did not have access to improved sanitation.

World Water Day - How You Can Help

• Capture rainfall in a cistern or rain barrel and use it to water your garden.
• You can save water by conserving electricity, which accounts for 55% of all water use.
• Install a low-flow toilet and plumbing fixtures.
• Lessen stress on your local water system by minimizing use during peak daytime hours.
• Dispose of prescription medicine and other toxic materials through local collection programs, not down the drain.
• If you have to water lawn, do it early in the morning or after the sun has set to reduce water lost to evaporation.
• Landscape with local drought-tolerant species.
• Eat less meat.
• Donate to NGOs working to improve access to clean water and sanitation.
• Shower with a friend.

Wealth Means Waste

Municipal solid waste (MSW) production, kg per person per day, World Bank 2012.

Wealth is synonymous with waste. If you want to know how much waste a country produces, all you really need to know is how wealthy it is. In an emerging global phenomena, increasing wealth means increasing consumption and increasing waste production.

The affluent produce a lot of effluent. They produce a lot of solid waste, too.

Solid Waste Wisdom

• Developed countries produce more waste per capita because they have higher levels of consumption. 
• These countries consume more than 60% of the world industrial raw materials, but only comprise 22% of the world's population. 
• Per capita waste generation in developed countries increased by 14% since 1990, and 35% since 1980.
• USA, the wealthiest nation, unsurprisingly tops the list for the production of rubbish, with 4.5 pounds (2.04 kg) of MSW per person per day, fifty five percent of which is contributed as residential garbage. 
• Urban residents produce twice as much waste as their rural counterparts.

- Source

"Income level and urbanization are highly correlated and as disposable incomes and living standards increase, consumption of goods and services correspondingly increases, as does the amount of waste generated."

Our flagrant waste goes against the basic laws of ecology. It is no surprise that humans are the only species on earth that produce toxic waste products that can not be used.

Basic Laws of Ecology

1. Everything is connected to everything else.
2. Everything must go somewhere.
3. Nothing comes from nothing.
4. Nature knows best (therefore mimic nature)

Barry Commoner, who wrote the four laws of ecology, warned that any major human-induced change in a natural system would likely be detrimental to that system, and ultimately to humans. He thought that following nature would lead us in the right direction.

In nature there is no final waste - the waste produced in one ecological process is recycled in another.  Any "waste" product from one thing is rebranded as a "resource" when it is used by something else.

To mimic nature we have to "close the loop" and develop cyclical manufacturing processes. This involves the redesign of resource life cycles so that 100% of materials in products can be recovered and reused. The process adopted is one similar to the way that waste products (resources) are reused in nature.

Another obvious and important way to approach zero waste is to reduce consumption. It does not matter how much money we have in the bank - we still can not afford to consume and waste like we have been.

"Waste is worse than loss. The time is coming when every person who lays claim to ability will keep the question of waste before him constantly. The scope of thrift is limitless." 

- Thomas A. Edison

The Four Laws of Ecology

Although nature is complex, the basic rules that keep everything running are simple. Here is a set formulated by physicist and ecologist, Barry Commoner, in The Closing Circle, 1971.

The Four Laws of Ecology   

1) Everything Is Connected to Everything Else.  

Humans and other species are connected/dependant on a number of other species. There is one eco-sphere for all living organisms and what affects one, affects all.

2) Everything Must Go Somewhere. 

There is no "waste" in nature and there is no "away" to which things can be thrown. No matter what you do, and no matter what you use, it has to go somewhere. For example, when you burn wood, it doesn't disappear, it turns into smoke which rises into the air, and ash, which falls back down to the earth. 

3) Nature Knows Best. 

Humankind has fashioned technology to improve upon nature, but such change in a natural system is likely to be detrimental to that system.

4) There Is No Such Thing as a Free Lunch. 

Exploitation of nature will inevitably involve the conversion of resources from useful to useless forms.

Never mind the laws that flawed humans dream up. You know the ones - they allow the rich and privileged unchecked access to exploit their fellow humans, and the environment. They are the ones that allow big banks to commit fraud without penalty.

Those laws were dreamed, and will one day soon be undreamed.

The laws of ecology however, are immutable. No amount of denial, lies, or ignorance will change them, or the impact they will have on us if we ignore them further.

The laws of ecology are the laws we should be following.