Trade As One

This is part 3 in a 3 part series on consumerism. The first post can be viewed here, the second post can be viewed here.

So in the first two posts I’ve written a bit about the systemic consumerism that dominates our culture, and what I see as the possible antidotes: gratitude and generosity. In this brief post, I want to present a few steps that we can all take to address consumerism and its effects in our own lives.

Before I begin, I want to note that all of this is contingent upon our the ability to be honest with ourselves. It starts with asking hard questions, searching for the answers, and not shirking the responsibility that comes with those answers. I know this isn’t easy. I still wrestle with the actions that have come as a result of asking myself these questions. My hope is that in sharing them here, we can begin asking the same questions together.

- What are the major sources of the greed and fear-based advertising hype that you are exposed to? Decide what to do about them. Get rid of the TV? Stop buying that magazine? There are people who are actively pursuing ways to manipulate you into buying, wanting, needing, and fearing. We need to take this seriously and take bold steps to counteract these effects.

- What practices will you cultivate to teach yourself more gratitude and practice generosity? What habits can you start that constantly remind you of the simple joys of living?

- This Christmas, could your gifts say something about how you are looking down the pyramid at the billions of others less well off than you instead of trying to climb higher all the time? Could Fair Trade gifts help you tell others about a different way of living in our consumer society?

- If you are a member of a church, take a look at what our friends at Advent Conspiracy are doing and consider using your influence to get others to celebrate differently.

We are getting a lot of questions about what it means to be a Fair Trader with Trade as One. The common thread running through all of our Fair Traders is a desire to make a tangible difference combating poverty, HIV/AIDS and slavery. The uniqueness of each Fair Trader is the method chosen to spread the word. Our Fair Trader events range from a significant conversation amongst friends to a home party featuring Trade as One products and educational materials to participation in local holiday shopping boutique.

It is always more powerful to hear from the individuals most involved, so we have asked Jodi Mulder, a Fair Trader in Evanston, Illinois to share about her experience.

When I first considered hosting a Trade as One Fair Trade Party, I wasn’t really sure what to expect.  Of course, we all think of Tupperware or Pampered Chef parties when we hear about hosting a home party. But, I can now say that hosting a Fair Trade Party is much, much more than…

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This is part 2 in a 3 part series on consumerism. The first post can be viewed here. The last post will go up later this week.

My own personal journey away from consumption is one that is far from over. I write this as someone continuing to wrestle with these ideas, and struggling to live in the tension that my own convictions demand. As I’ve dealt with the empty hangover that consumption leaves me with, I’ve searched for something of a solution. Here’s where I am landing:

The antidotes to the neuroses that consumerism fosters are gratitude and generosity. More than anything else, they take me outside of my own self-absorbed world where ‘rational self interest’ rules and where my perceived needs are at the center of my own little universe.

To learn gratitude we have to let go of the notion of entitlement. To understand…

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Over the past few years, we’ve loved partnering with thought-leaders in the American Church.  Lynne Hybels and Nathan George worked together to bring Fair Trade to Willow Creek Community Church, and built on that shared experience to explore the connections between our spending and the poverty that dominates much of our world, and to discuss ways for the church to be a catalytic force for poverty alleviation through Fair Trade. They’ve coauthored a chapter in the new book “The Justice Project,” which was just released by Baker Books.We’re including an excerpt from their chapter, titled “Buying Justly,” below:

 

Anita, Bangalore

Even in the stifling heat, even indoors, Anita wore a long scarf wrapped around her face and neck. Six months earlier her alcoholic husband had walked out, leaving her pregnant and indebted to a loan shark. When her baby was barely a month old, the men came to collect the money she did not have. After abusing Anita verbally and physically, they seized her infant son as collateral on the $70 loan. Alone and afraid and certain she would never see her precious baby again, Anita had covered her head with gasoline and set herself on fire. But women from a small, local ministry heard about Anita and became advocates for her. Now, six months later, she was in a loving Christ-centered community that had re-united her with her son and given her a job making cotton bags for a supermarket in the UK so she could pay off the loan and build a future. Beneath the scarf her horrific wounds were beginning to heal.

Annette, anywhere in America

As Annette tossed the plastic bag onto the seat beside her and slipped the key in the ignition, her throbbing headache gave way to a dull sense of despair. She looked at the scattered contents of her shopping bag and wondered why she had bought any of it. She had come for a single item—a housewarming gift for her best friend, Beth. But as always, the colorful displays stacked floor to ceiling and the clever marketing messages transformed every gadget, every bauble she saw, into a life-enhancing necessity. And now her house, her life was full of them: trinkets for her to dust and re-arrange and sell in another stress producing garage sale; cheap and unappreciated toys for her kids to break; plastic water bottles and disposable plates and Styrofoam packaging to fill her trash can. And for what? So a hot shot in a big city office could pay a poor peasant across an ocean a pittance for his backbreaking labor? So a corporate PR department could finance a cover-up of a production process that mortgages our planet’s future? So Annette and her comfortable friends could spend more money, time and energy decorating their empty lives? But why bother to think about it? wondered Annette, as she maneuvered her car into traffic. What’s the alternative?

Half the world faces the crisis of extreme, dehumanizing poverty. The other half faces a crisis of meaning. The church, we would like to suggest, is the caretaker of the answer to both crises.

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In April 2008, Willow Creek Community Church in Illinois combined these principles in….

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