Despite the societal progress that some measures of sustainability have made over the past decade, to a certain piece of the populace the message still falls on deaf ears–perhaps now more than ever. Not long ago a poll by the Washington Post revealed that a rising group of sympathetic perspectives was countered by the core resistance being even more entrenched. The voice of the advocates, having long since drifted into desperation, has tried the approaches of educating, illuminating, protesting, pleading, scolding and denouncing. At this point, the tactic is in need of its next stage of evolution. In order to pierce through generations of cultural norms and social constructs, the migration towards sustainability needs to be discussed in a different dialect that focuses less on blame and more on solutions. Continue Reading…
Archives For consumerism
[Editor’s Note: Below is a guest post from colleague, blogger and fellow architect Brandon Specketer. With years of experience in sustainable architecture and graphic design, Brandon is currently a resident of New York City’s Upper West Side and works as an Associate at Cook+Fox Architects.]
A question has been rattling around in my head because of the holidays – is our current consumerist culture incompatible with the larger goals of sustainability? While the atmosphere of the holiday season has subsided, what remains among the drifts of accumulated snow are piles of trash. Bags filled with empty boxes of computers, clothes, books and other gifts that had been given and received. All of this is because of the heavy influence cultural conventions have on our behavior. While the consumer culture may be the elephant in the room when it comes to bigger environmental and social discussions, I do believe that there are businesses like the Paris shop Merci that use consumerism to serve larger environmental or social goals. Continue Reading…