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From: ryan
Date: Wed May 13 00:20:53 EDT 2009 Subject: interesting video

Responses
kelsea: No Subject (5/13/09)
clrclady: Thanks!!! (5/13/09)
ryan: Ooh, ooh! Jesus is the answer! (5/13/09)
russ: beware (5/14/09)
kelsea: No Subject (5/14/09)
Laelia: No Subject (5/14/09)
rodhugen: right (5/14/09)
ryan: choices (5/14/09)
Responses (sorted by date)
ryan: choices (5/14/09)
Laelia: No Subject (5/14/09)
rodhugen: right (5/14/09)
kelsea: No Subject (5/14/09)
russ: beware (5/14/09)
ryan: Ooh, ooh! Jesus is the answer! (5/13/09)
clrclady: Thanks!!! (5/13/09)
kelsea: No Subject (5/13/09)
The Story of Stuff

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From: kelsea
Date: Wed May 13 11:28:02 EDT 2009 Subject:

I watched this a couple of days ago, then made the mistake of following it up with some Ecclesiastes. I was depressed, but also convicted about the amount of TV watching and shopping I've been doing lately. I haven't watched regular TV since (though I did give in last night to watch Seven Pounds on DVD. Interesting movie...also somewhat depressing.)

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From: clrclady
Date: Wed May 13 17:55:26 EDT 2009 Subject: Thanks!!!

Thanks for sharing this. It is really awesome. I also read around the website and found some interesting things. Out of financial reasons I am buying a lot less, but it has been good just for life.

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From: ryan
Date: Wed May 13 19:56:24 EDT 2009 Subject: Ooh, ooh! Jesus is the answer!

I like the way it's presented. It takes a very complex system and makes it very clear and easy to understand.I'd heard a lot about how US consumption hurts poorer countries but never really understood why... now it makes more sense.

It never sat well with me to believe that to be a good American I should buy stuff to keep the economy humming. I appreciated the narrator's observation that our identities are meant to be something so much more than that of "consumer".

I think that if a video like this exposes a lie to people, that they are not consumers but meant for something better, then this video doesn't scare me. Not at all, it gives me hope. Since if people start looking around and asking what their identity actually is, Jesus can speak to that.

I've been thinking about Eric's assignment in the context of this video. Because overconsumption really disturbs me, and by my behavior I overconsume. Getting one's identity and value from places other than God really disturbs me, and I am constantly looking to other people or things I do or things I believe to give me my identity and value.

So I really think Jesus is the answer to overconsumption and consumer mentality. Kinda like Sunday school, where Jesus or God is the answer to everything, right? :-) Seriously, anyone have some thoughts on how we as Jesus-followers can respond to this? The video's Web site says the video has been watched 5.5 million times... people are listening.

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From: russ
Date: Wed May 13 21:05:26 EDT 2009 Subject: beware

This is an important issue to look at, but I shut the video off when she claimed that we were down to 4% of our original forests in the U.S. That's just a lie.

Google for "percentage of the us that is forest". The very first link (from the US Forest Service) includes an interesting paragraph:


It is estimated that—at the beginning of European settlement—in 1630 the area of forest land that would become the United States was 423 million hectares or about 46 percent of the total land area. By 1907, the area of forest land had declined to an estimated 307 million hectares or 34 percent of the total land area. Forest area has been relatively stable since 1907. In 1997, 302 million hectares— or 33 percent of the total land area of the United States—was in forest land. Today’s forest land area amounts to about 70 percent of the area that was forested in 1630. Since 1630, about 120 million hectares of forest land have been converted to other uses—mainly agricultural. More than 75 percent of the net conversion to other usesoccurred in the 19th century.

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From: kelsea
Date: Thu May 14 00:44:10 EDT 2009 Subject:

Yeah, I agree that a lot of what she says is overstated, and could be seen as somewhat manipulative, especially since the video is supposed to be presented to school-age children.

I still think it's an important point though, that we are stuck in a system that tells us our value is based on how much money we spend. I guess that's why I went to Ecclesiastes, because that book agrees and tells us that the system is meaningless. Unfortunately, it's not the clearest guide for how to respond as a Christian, except to love God, do good work and enjoy life the best you can.

I think responding as a Christian does involve these things though. Do work because you enjoy it and because it's valuable, not because it gets you more money than if you were doing something you really enjoyed. Only buy things if they are going to enhance your enjoyment of the other things God has put in your life, not as an end in themselves. Take a good amount of time to savor life's ups and downs, and appreciate that God gave you so much time to live.

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From: Laelia
Date: Thu May 14 01:24:31 EDT 2009 Subject:

1. I liked the part about the poisons in our bodies-that is something I have studied a lot in school and on my own because I am fascinated in a disturbed sort of way by it. (The most interesting facet of that topic for me is how poisons in our food such as pesticides and anitbiotics, mimic hormones in our bodies...GO ORGANIC...at least as much as you can!) The idea reminds me of Nathaniel Hawthorne's "Rappaccini's Daughter"

2. I appreciated that she pointed out our obsession with buying things. It's as if we feel that the world will stop turning if we don't buy gobs of stuff...As if everything will go back to normal if we just dish out money for eveyone to spend...as if our identity lies in how much we consume as a society. Sort of sad.

3. One great example of a closed loop solution that reduces waste and production, but allows us to buy "new" things...
CRAIGSLIST!!!! :D (or similar things like amazon, ebay etc)

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From: rodhugen
Date: Thu May 14 01:21:04 EDT 2009 Subject: right

I caught that, too. And I suspect she is referring to 'virgin forest' which is far different from total number of trees available. Trees are now considered a 'crop' and we harvest and replant, etc. which makes the question, "Paper or plastic?" somewhat easier to answer.

I also don't find the idea of government being here to 'take care of us' very sustainable or palatable. Government, irrespective of its form, I think according to the Bible is ordained to bring about justice and protection for those not able to care for themselves and to provide protection from enemies. God's people were to take care of each other and I don't see the call to make 'taking care of everybody' a governmental duty in Scripture.

She also goes after corporations rather unfairly. Corporations are simply bands of individuals working together with certain legal protections. Most corporations I have worked for have had leaders who cared deeply about the environment and their workers. It also, as my boss at Charlie C. Jones, Inc. often reminded me, makes good business sense to take care of your employees since they are your bread and butter. Sure there are corporations owned by people who are hackers and slashers and they make the news with the evil they do which should not taint all corporations.

Finally, I object to the idea that the US is the big bad raper and pillager that goes and takes the poor little third world countries' natural resources. That can certainly be true, but I suspect most third world nations are at the very least complicit in the raping of their lands. The idea that poor, ignorant people over 'there' are too stupid or too ignorant to know what they are doing violates the premise that all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God. It is 'Great White Fatherism' and is patently untrue. Iowa farms produce enough corn to feed the world, but the problem is corruption in the distribution system. Witness the pirates who took over a ship carrying food and medical supplies to people who desperately need them in Africa. No one people group is innocent. This is where my roots in Calvinism make perfect sense. :)

Those things said, it is an interesting and good reminder that what we are doing is not sustainable. I just wish she had made better arguments and acknowledged other realities. As with most oversimplifications it falls sadly short of the ideal. But it did take me back to all those Economics classes I took to get my business administration degree. Mr. Howard wrote TANSTAAFL on the blackboard on the first day of class and said it was the most important economic truth we could learn. It was an acronym for "There ain't no such thing as a 'free' lunch." The time is coming when we will pay for the lunch we thought we were getting for free. :)

Rod

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From: ryan
Date: Thu May 14 19:14:42 EDT 2009 Subject: choices

I think Rod is right when he suggests that the narrator was actually referring to "old growth" or "virgin" forest. I couldn't find the source of the statistic she cited, but from looking at these maps it doesn't seem like it would be that far off.

I don't know how any video or movie or book could really unpack all the complexity that is our modern economy and way of life, get all the details straight, and be even-handed.

One thing I took away from the video is that my choices impact myself and others in ways I am only dimly aware. The video put this in the context of consumerism, but where it convicts me is in self-centeredness. The treadmill consumption cycle in the video (watch TV, get depressed, buy stuff to feel better, go to work to make money to buy stuff, get tired, watch TV...) exposes what is intrinsically a self-absorbed "Make me feel better" lifestyle... a lifestyle I grew up in and have been struggling to escape on many levels. The video demonstrates how a demand to feel better leads to choices that are both subtle and destructive.

Sometimes I think it's tempting to get overwhelmed and decide that every choice I make is going to hurt somebody or screw something up, so why bother to try and change. I conclude, like Ecclesiastes, it's all meaningless. Thanks Kelsea for that connection, and the reminder that the truth is for us to trust God, savor the life God has given us for what it is, be thankful, and be content.

The narrator wants us to think about the choices we make and think about how to change our lifestyles to be more regenerative than linear. I think this connects strongly with the Christian notion of stewardship. Now we can (and possibly should) buy organic and recycle and bike to work and refrain from taking more than our share, but apart from Jesus these things are meaningless... just like any other good work performed apart from him.

What makes me kinda sad, though, is that the ideas of how to be good stewards, the warnings that `Wait a minute, something is wrong here', aren't coming from God's people. So if someone should become concerned about our unsustainable way of life, where will they turn for answers?

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