About Consumerism // The True Cost

Here comes another post about consumerism...

...I wrote a post about consumerism back in February and since this topic is still one I think of every single day, I decided to write another one. 

When I watched the movie The True Cost I came across the term "fast fashion" and I want to share a few thoughts on this term and the whole topic behind it. 

The movie The True Cost is basically a summary of why the way most of us consume, namely using clothes as disposables, is everything but sustainable. 

The main problem is our approach to fashion, to fast fashion. Too many of us buy a new dress for every party! The documentary elaborotes on the topic; on the effects of genetically modified cotton (and why 250.000 cotton farmers comitted suicide in the last years), the use of pesticides which bears the blame for thousands of disabled children in the Punjab area in India (and other areas in the world), the working conditions of garment factory workers (and beatings by bosses who resent unionization and requests for higher wages), the different collapes and fires of garment factories (with thousands of deaths), and the effect our used clothing has on the local factories in countries of the Global South (e.g. Haiti and different African countries) - since they local industry has no chance to compete with the much cheaper imported second hand clothes. 
Furthermore, the movie explains the environmental impact of the fast fashion industry (additionally to the impact of genetically modified cotton and pesticides), with emphasis on the enormous amount of trash and chemicals.

In my opinion the documentary is not very well made (chaotic, no real order, difficult to follow different arguments, difficult to understand the connections when you do not have a certani background knowledge) but it still is great food for thought and I wish everyone out there will watch it (or has already watched it!?)

At least, it made me (once again) think of my behaviour as a consumer. I am thinking about this a looooot in years already, but sometimes its good to watch a documentary like this one to remind myself why again I am thinking so much about it. Its like with me being vegan. Sometimes I just have to read a little bit on the environmental effects of eating animal products, or I have to watch a documentary on the topic, to remind myself why I am vegan and why it is the only sustainable diet. 
So this documentary certainly reminded me again, why I want (in theory) to consume less and more sustainable. 

In practice, I find this really difficult to be honest. I tried so often to stop shopping, to buy second hand only, to buy organic only, etc. but I failed, failed and failed again. I am making the My Purchases posts here on my blog to be able to analyse and criticize my shopping behaviour and to be aware of how much I buy. Well, also this did not help much so far (in contrast, in May and June I bought more than ever...). Thats why I decided to watch The True Cost - it made me set new goals once again. 

So, once again, I decided that I want to stop buying cheap clothes, that I want to buy second hand or fair trade and organic only, that I want to buy a lot less and a lot better! I stopped e.g. already a while ago to cooperate with companies like "sheinside" because this is not sustainable fashion at all.
I will continue to use my blog as a reminder to myself and I will continue with the My Purchases posts to be able to analyse and criticize my shopping behaviour. And I would LOVE TO KNOW if some of you have similar thoughts and if you want to share your experiences with me. 

Maybe we can help each other, reminding each other, posting reminder to eachother every once in a while, writing reviews on documentarys or books, sharing stories etc. We could even design a cute little button which says something like "conscious blogger" and put it on our blogs to make us become a little community (or maybe even a big community!? :)).

What do you think? Is anyone out there in? Do you have other ideas? Please share this idea with your followers and lets try to reach as many people out there as possible. We should not forget that we only have this one world to live in and I really want to see my daughter grow up in a beautiful world, not one where more than half of the world poulation is suffering and where the environment is close to collapse.

Lets change this world together :)

Sending much love!