Sustainability and consumption.

To have is to be… is a measure of self-creation, of self-perception, through consumption and possession.  As we continue to consume, so too then must we continue to extract, and increase our industrial production.  This development is indeed perhaps at the root of problem, and its inclusion in the sustainable development.  Consuming will not fix all that is broken with the world, in this consumer-oriented society and lifestyle.  Asking someone to cast off their materialistic tendencies would be akin to asking someone to give up who they are as an individual.  As indicated earlier, our economic system is one of exploitation of resources, and is ingrained in us.  Inertia keeps this moving forward and is part of our identity.  As we consume, differently or newly, we can actually redefine ourselves, and so associate with new individuals and groups who share similar compulsions.

Frustration is not necessary any more.  Why do we continue to do this?  We can see, or at least feel, the impact our consuming has on the environment, so why do we continue at a pace?  We assume that consuming more is somehow improving ourselves, bettering ourselves, looking at achieving perfection.

We’ve hit 7 billion people earlier this year, and the vitality of ecosystems is a measure of our own vitality.  We are a species like all others, indivisible from the natural world.  We have a great capacity to adversely affect natural ecosystems in a very short period of time thanks to our huge population and technologies.  But let us not fall back to that pre-industrial mindset, and let us consider the new clean-tech mindset, where this destruction is not necessarily a given reality.  Rather, let us make decisions now, with far reaching long-term goals that do not meet the wants now, but the needs for later… and our needs are inexhaustible.