Affluenza: The All-Consuming Epidemic

🎀 Highlights

“Affluenza is an engagingly conversational, thought-provoking look at where we have perverted the American dream. Though the nature of books like these is to preach to the converted, Affluenza offers enough support to the arguments and enough depth to the solutions to have a good chance of reaching the unconvinced.” —DETROIT FREE PRESS

“If you sometimes suspect that American life has become a nightmare, but you dare not admit the truth to yourself or talk about it to others, take a peek inside Affluenza. The way to end a nightmare is to wake up, and this book is an alarm clock. We have created a world that dishonors all that is honorable, good, and meaningful. There is another possibility.” —PAUL HAWKEN, AUTHOR Ecology of Commerce AND Natural Capitalism

“The material basis for the American way of life is not sustainable here and is not replicable elsewhere. Our feverish mindset is burning up the natural systems that support us.

What I hadn’t figured on was timing, timing. Affluenza was aired in the late 1990s, a time when more Americans were feeling fatter bank accounts—and more hollowness inside. Shopping and stock market speculation were becoming the genuine national pastimes.

Affluenza respects those perfectly human desires and seeks to create ways that make comfort, elegance, and enjoyment more genuine and durable than purchasable, perishable commodities.

On the plus side, there are now numerous organizations touting simplicity, conscious spending, fiscal responsibility, sustainable lifestyles and livelihoods, green consuming, and more.

Even highly commercial ventures are now guaranteeing simplicity if you buy their products—from magazines to cars to computers to hair dye. The Simplicity Forum members have puzzled over this development. . . does this mean we are succeeding, or succumbing to a voracious commercial machine?

John and I, along with other authors, artists and activists on simplicity issues, started the Simplicity Forum (www.simplicityforum.org).

The savings rate in the United States is almost zero, and household debt is rising.

A recent study showed that the average American can identify fewer than ten types of plants but recognizes hundreds of corporate logos.

“From a marketer’s perspective, billboards are perfect,” she says. “You can’t turn them off. You can’t click them with remote control.”

George W. Bush signed the Do Not Call legislation in 2003, and we signed on, we’ve stopped getting those irritating dinnertime calls from people who want to clean our carpets or sell us something we don’t need.

Apparently, even market-worshipping legislators were tired of having their dinners interrupted.

“Advertising encourages us to meet nonmaterial needs through material ends,” Mazur says. “It tells us to buy their product because we’ll be loved, we’ll be accepted. And also it tells us that we are not lovable and acceptable without buying their product.”

We live in what Susan Faludi calls an ornamental culture, which “encourages people to play almost no functional public roles, only decorative and consumer ones.”

in 1958, a prominent conservative economist and staunch defender of the free enterprise system warned that the twentieth century might well end up being known as “the Age of Advertising.”

The problem is that they’re dancing on top of an old septic

Author and “adbuster” Kalle Lasn tells a tale about a large wedding party that takes place in a spacious suburban backyard. The party oozes affluence and “the good life”: the live music is great, and everyone dances with abandon. The problem is that they’re dancing on top of an old septic system, which causes the pipes to burst. “Raw sewage rises up through the grass,” writes Lasn, “and begins to cover everyone’s shoes. If anyone notices, they don’t say anything. The champagne flows, the music continues, until finally a little boy says, ‘It smells like shit!’ And suddenly everyone realizes they’re ankle deep in it.”1 How many million Americans are wheezing with affluenza, yet remain stubbornly in denial?

“Those who have clued in apparently figure it’s best to ignore the shit and just keep dancing,” Lasn concludes. Meanwhile, the companies liable for the damages admit the pipes have cracked but try to convince us there’s nothing to worry about.

There seem to be as many quacks and spin doctors out there as real doctors. With a strict policy of concealing their funding sources (as well as their planets of origin), the quack scientists do their best to make the world “safe from democracy.” The first step is to encourage us to do nothing, to just keep ignoring the symptoms. They tell us in voices that sound self-assured, “Go back to sleep, the facts are still uncertain, everything’s fine. Technology will provide. Just relax and enjoy yourself.”

‘TOXIC SLUDGE IS GOOD FOR YOU’

John Stauber, the coauthor of Toxic Sludge Is Good for You, comments,

John Stauber, the coauthor of Toxic Sludge Is Good for You, comments, “Few people really understand the other dimension of marketing—an undercover public relations industry that creates and perpetuates our commercial culture.”

“The best PR is never noticed”

The weapon of choice is a kind of stun gun that fires invisible bullets of disinformation. You can’t remember how you formed a certain opinion or belief, but you find yourself willing to fight for it.

sometimes PR firms are hired to infiltrate the ranks of everyday life and “talk up” products in casual conversation.

Sony Ericsson, which hired sixty actors in ten cities to appear in public places and ask strangers, “Would you mind taking my picture?”

most effective and powerful PR tactics is to fund “front groups” and give them very friendly, responsible-sounding names, like the American Council on Science and Health, whose experts defend petrochemical companies, the nutritional value of fast foods, and pesticides.

American Council on Science and Health is funded by Burger King, Coca-Cola, NutraSweet, Monsanto, Dow, and Exxon, among others.

Front groups are staunch defenders of the rights of Americans, such as the right to smoke (the National Smokers Alliance); the right to have employee accidents (Workplace Health

Front groups are staunch defenders of the rights of Americans, such as the right to smoke (the National Smokers Alliance); the right to have employee accidents (Workplace Health and Safety Council, an employer organization that lobbies for the weakening of safety standards); the right to pay more for less health care (the Coalition for Health Insurance Choices); the right to choose large, fuel-inefficient cars (the Coalition for Vehicle Choice); and the right to dismantle ecosystems for profit (the Wise Use Movement).

Government agencies are supposed to be watchdogs, but too often they are more like lap dogs.”

As the average underpaid journalist knows, public relations—not journalism—is the profession to be in if you want to live in one of “those” neighborhoods. “Journalism students—even at the best colleges and universities—are more likely to graduate and work in PR and business communications than as journalists,” Stauber says. “The schools combine PR and journalism classes as if they were one and the same.” Fact is, the kids are going where the money is.

PR pioneer Edward Bernays in 1929: “On the surface it seemed like an ordinary publicity stunt for ‘female emancipation.’ A contingent of New York debutantes marched down Fifth Avenue in the 1929 Easter Parade, each openly lighting and smoking cigarettes, their so-called ‘torches of liberty.’ It was the first time in the memory of most Americans that any woman who wasn’t a prostitute had been seen smoking in public.”

“In a world of manufactured reality, the perception of a hazardous product or accident is what needs to be managed, not the hazard itself,”

became standard procedures of the PR industry. “In a world of manufactured reality, the perception of a hazardous product or accident is what needs to be managed, not the hazard itself,”10 Beder explains.

A similar tactic was used in the 1920s to promote leaded gasoline (ethyl). The mission was to boost both automobile performance and the profits of General Motors, DuPont, and Standard Oil.

American public’s justified

soothed and massaged the American public’s justified fear of leaded gasoline by performing health-effects research in-house, with precedent-setting approval from the federal government.

Word from the corporate labs was “no problem,” even as factory workers making ethyl were dying by the dozens. A 1927 ad in National Geographic urged, “Ride with Ethyl in a high-compression motor and get the thrill of a lifetime.” The overt message was “Don’t let others pass you by,” but the hidden tag line was “. . . even if it kills you.”11

Americans dodge 3,000 commercial messages, each of them shouting louder or purring more seductively than the last. Sound bites, fun facts, and bad-news nuggets also compete for our attention, along with the million words a week some of us process at work. Getting just the information we need is like trying to take a sip of water from a fire hose.

affluenza—the economy is programmed for sickness. Drug companies teach us how to overcome depression, and pesticide companies tell farmers how much pesticide to use. In the mania of media, good news is no news because it doesn’t “work” on TV.

The complexity of global warming makes a third of the information unavailable even to scientists, who tell us they don’t know enough yet about the relationships among oceans, biomass, and atmospheric physics. They do know without any doubt that CO2 levels have already increased by about 30 percent since the Industrial Revolution began, and that the decade from 1990 to 2000 was the warmest on record.

PR firms and the PR environmental offices of oil, mining, and automobile companies have a different story to tell—a story that sends a large portion of the information flow into a calculated whirlpool. Their mission is to craft “customized” information to create doubt, confuse the public, and protect the client’s profits.

What’s Up with the Weather?, one fossil-fueled scientist summarized his stance on global warming: “Americans are moving to the Sun Belt by the millions,” he said, “which proves we like warm climates.” The question is, do we also like the spread of tropical diseases, drought, hurricanes, and economic disruption, and a rising sea level?

Greening Earth Society, the industry-funded program begins with dramatic narration: “The year 2085. The atmospheric level of carbon dioxide has doubled to 540 parts per million. What kind of world have we created?”

“A better world,” answers a corporate-funded scientist. “A more productive world. Plants are the basis for all productivity on earth. . . .

much more efficient when the earth is warmer”.12 (Never mind that two thousand of the world’s most eminent scientists signed a statement saying global warming will be a catastrophe and that a 2004 UN report projects a temperature rise of up to 10 degrees Fahrenheit by 2100.)

maybe ferns three stories tall and, someday, the reappearance of dinosaurs—wouldn’t that be cool? Well, no, not really. Street theater recently performed in Australia illustrates why: melting ice sculptures of kangaroos and koalas are symbols that the warmest decade in recorded history is taking a heavy toll on the world’s ecosystems,

we need to be sensitive to scientific signals—“feedback”—or we risk crashing our civilization into a brick wall. Meadows compared our world to a speeding automobile on a slippery road: “The driver goes too fast for the brakes to work in time.”

we need to be sensitive to scientific signals—“feedback”—or we risk crashing our civilization into a brick wall. Meadows compared our world to a speeding automobile on a slippery road: “The driver goes too fast for the brakes to work in time.”16

Our “pedal to the metal” economy is based on beliefs that resource supplies are limitless and that the earth can continually bounce back from abuse. These beliefs are in part scripted by public relations and advertising experts, just doing their jobs.

we may be overlooking an obvious, and ominous, concept: The car will still achieve racecar speeds as always, even if the tank is almost empty.

We suggest that you start by taking our affluenza self-test, an admittedly unscientific, but we think useful, means of determining whether you’ve got affluenza, and if so, how serious your case is.

Are you making a living or making a dying? –JOE DOMINGUEZ

“When I was on Wall Street,” he said, “I saw that people who had more money were not necessarily happier and that they had just as many problems as the folks that lived in my ghetto neighborhood [in Harlem] where I grew up. So it began to dawn on me that money didn’t buy happiness, a very simple finding.”

of people would ask me, How did you do it?” Joe recalled. “How did you handle your

“How did you handle your finances so you’re not an indentured slave like the rest of us?”

The book, Your Money or Your Life, was published in 1992 and soon became a best seller that has sold nearly a million copies. If the letters from readers that Joe and Vicki have received are to be believed, Your Money or Your Life has transformed countless lives.

It’s about how to handle your existing paycheck in a much more intelligent way that creates savings instead of leading you deeper and deeper into debt. It’s the stuff our grandparents knew but we’ve forgotten or been taught to forget.”

Making peace with your past. Calculate how much money you’ve earned in your life, and then what you have to show for it, your current net worth. You may be shocked at the total you’ve squandered, what we might call the toll of affluenza.

When you’ve got the flu, go to bed. When you’re walking off the edge of a cliff, step back. When you’ve got affluenza, stop and think it over.

despite their six-figure income, the Roys lived simply and often had to weather teasing from their friends about their old clothes and used bicycles. They went backpacking on their vacations. Once they took their children to Disneyland—by bus, walking with backpacks through the streets of Anaheim,

Dick and Jeanne Roy’s study groups take the battle against affluenza into unexpected places. Until he reached the age of fifty-three, Dick Roy had been a leader in the most traditional fashion: president of his class at Oregon State University, an officer in the Navy, and finally, a high-priced corporate attorney in one of America’s most prestigious law firms, with a thirty-second-floor office overlooking all of Portland.

But he was also married to Jeanne, a strong environmentalist and a believer in frugality. So despite their six-figure income, the Roys lived simply and often had to weather teasing from their friends about their old clothes and used bicycles. They went backpacking on their vacations. Once they took their children to Disneyland—by bus, walking with backpacks through the streets of Anaheim, California, from the bus station to their motel.

Jeanne, in particular, found many ways to reduce consumption: using a clothesline instead of a dryer; sending junk mail back until it stopped coming; carefully saving paper; buying food in bulk, and using her own packaging.

she reduced the amount of landfill-bound trash the Roys produced to one regular-size garbage can a year!

Dick raised a few eyebrows at work by putting in the fewest billable hours of anyone in the firm so that he could spend more time with his family.

In 1993, Dick Roy left his job to live on his savings and devote his time to saving the earth.

WIDENING THE CIRCLES He founded the Northwest Earth Institute in Portland (www.nwei.org), an organization that promotes simple living and environmental awareness by running discussion groups in existing institutions.

Roy’s corporate connections helped him bring workshops—"Voluntary Simplicity,” “Choices for Sustainable Living,” and “Discovering a Sense of Place"—into many of Portland’s largest corporations.

The measure of a civilization’s growth is its ability to shift energy and attention from the material side to the spiritual and aesthetic and cultural and artistic side.”

Arnold Toynbee’s “law of progressive simplification.”

The Las Vegas Strip is ranked the number-one “scenic drive” in the country. One fourth grader, asked if he preferred to play indoors or outdoors, replies, “Indoors, ‘cause that’s where the electrical outlets are.”

JUST SAY KNOW Thirty-four percent of Americans polled in 2003 ranked shopping as their favorite activity, while only 17 percent preferred being in nature.

“Indoors, ‘cause that’s where the electrical outlets are.”

Another child pokes a stick at a dead beetle, commenting to her friend that the insect’s batteries must have run out.

Naturalists urge us to reintroduce ourselves to the real world by becoming familiar with our own backyards and county open spaces. This will help answer a question that lingers in the back of our minds: Where exactly are we? Can you identify a few key species that live in your region and the natural events that take place there?

lions are as lazy as your housecat, sometimes sleeping twenty hours a day. Even so, footage of two lions mating is predictably followed by “cubs, tumbling out after a two- or three-minute gestation, full of

The reality is, lions are as lazy as your housecat, sometimes sleeping twenty hours a day. Even so, footage of two lions mating is predictably followed by “cubs, tumbling out after a two- or three-minute gestation, full of play.

Besides, television nature is often scripted nature—as fake as a paper ficus. Spliced together from hundreds of nonsequential hours of tape, a typical nature program filmed in Africa zooms in on a majestic lion,

“We believe that we live in the ‘age of information,’ that there has been an information ‘revolution.’. . . Yet vital knowledge that humans have always possessed about who we are and where we live seems beyond our reach.”

In one hundred hours of programming, he found very little to enrich his life. On McKibben’s daylong hike, however, all kinds of things were happening.

when we lose touch with the origins, habits, and needs of our earthly housemates, we lose our biological sense of balance. As psychologist Chellis Glendinning writes, “We become homeless, alienated from the only home we will ever have.”3

“ecophobia"—a symptom characterized by an inability to smell, plant, or even acknowledge the roses. “Ecophobia is a fear of oil spills, rain forest destruction, whale hunting, and Lyme disease. In fact it’s a fear of just being outside,”

In the book Beyond Ecophobia, he describes the magic of overcoming “timesickness” and regaining a more natural pace.

I went canoeing with my six-year-old son Eli and his friend Julian. The plan was to canoe a two-mile stretch of the Ashuelot River, an hour’s paddle in adult time. Instead, we dawdled along for four or five hours.

We netted golf balls off the bottom of the river from the upstream golf course. We watched fish and bugs in both the shallows and depths of the river. We stopped at the mouth of a tributary stream for a picnic and went for a long adventure

We looked at spring flowers, tried to catch a snake, got lost and found. How fine it was to move at a meandery, child’s pace!6

One summer night, twenty years ago, Dave’s family was abruptly wrenched from sleep by an eerie, piercing sound that cut through the night like a Bowie knife.

57 percent of the women and 27 percent of the men stated that a major goal of the trip was to “come home” to nature;

When we experience nature with our own noses, skin, lungs, and reptilian brains, we feel silly about the stress of obsessive projects and timelines. Self-importance begins to melt into something larger. We see that we’re integral members of the Biosphere Club, and it feels great! Rather than perceiving ourselves as simply human-paycheck-house-car, we finally understand who and where we are. We see that in reality, we’re human-soil-grains-fruits-microbes-trees-oxygen-herbivores-fish-salt marshes, and on and on and on! We begin to question the logic and the ethic of parting out nature like a used-up car.

Lana Porter began to come to her senses. The garden she works in Golden, Colorado, is far more than a lush, reclaimed vacant lot—it’s a biological extension of her self, and a way of life. “I eat very well out of this garden, just about all year round,” she says, “and the organic produce gives me energy to grow more produce and get more energy. It’s a cycle of health that has cut my expenses in half. My grocery bills are lower, my health bills are lower, I don’t need to pay for exercise, and my transportation costs are lower because I don’t have to travel so much to amuse myself.”

People tell me I should take care of my crops more efficiently—with irrigation systems on timers, designer fertilizers, and pesticides—so I could spend less time out here. But that way of growing disconnects the grower from the garden.

Just as laying land fallow is a tenet of the Old Testament, optimizing solar income to prevent global warming should be one of the tenets of the Age of Ecology. But it seems that we won’t protect backyard, bioregion, or planet unless we feel connected.

Nature is not “out there”; it’s everywhere.

“It’s things like this that really excite me, because they instill such a sense of awe and wonder. And I think that awe and wonder are really the things we’re missing today.”

“This aquatic ecosystem is eleven thousand years old. It’s been doing all this for eleven millennia— without any human intervention.”10 “As you stand for a while, things begin to unfold if you are quiet enough to watch and listen. After a full day, you’re still not fulfilled—there’s so much to learn here.

“Perhaps most curiously—in our consumptive society—you come home with your wallet just as full as when you left, and you’ve gotten all this pleasure, education, understanding, peace—for not a single penny.”

If you think your actions are too small to make a difference, you’ve never been in bed with a mosquito. —ANONYMOUS

Our economy and the majority of its products are not designed to save the planet. They’re designed to make money. We can voluntarily cut back and

Our economy and the majority of its products are not designed to save the planet. They’re designed to make money.

Paul Hawken points out, 90 percent of the waste we generate never even makes it into products or services but remains at the point of extraction or manufacture, in slash and slag piles and on-site waste impoundments. Of the materials that do become products, 80 percent are thrown away after a single use.

Catch-22.

To save the world, we need strong individual action, yet for effective individual action, we need to redesign the world.

“We’ve spent the last century working our tails off to make fewer people more productive using more resources. Yet we are doing this at a time when we have more people and fewer resources.”

“The nice thing is, regulations don’t require consumer education or analysis.” Refrigerator standards are one such regulation. “When your old refrigerator gives out, you need to replace it, ASAP. You usually don’t have time to read Consumer Reports.

Geller cited regulations that mandate efficiency. “The nice thing is, regulations don’t require consumer education or analysis.” Refrigerator standards are one such regulation. “When your old refrigerator gives out, you need to replace it, ASAP. You usually don’t have time to read Consumer Reports. You just make a beeline to the department store and get something with enough cabinet space to keep your teenagers alive.”

driving an SUV to the steakhouse is one of the worst consumer actions possible, because automobiles and meat are two primary pathways affluenza takes to infect the earth.

analysis from various agencies and experts to determine that air pollution,

air pollution, global warming, habitat alteration, and water pollution are the most critical consumption-related impacts.

Compared with a nutritionally equivalent intake of whole grains, red meat is responsible for twenty times the land use (because of cattle grazing), seventeen times the common water pollution (because of animal wastes), five times the toxic water pollution and water use (from chemicals applied to feed grains and water

Brower and Leon praise consumer efforts to reduce waste and promote efficiency, but they also urge us to go easy on ourselves. “The demonization of disposable cups, for example, has caused some individuals and groups to spend too much time

An hour of Jet Ski riding, for example, can create as much smog as a car trip from Washington, D.C., to Orlando, Florida, because Jet Ski engines don’t have emission controls. (These small engines are prime candidates for redesign.) The engines of gas-powered lawn mowers, in addition to ruining many an afternoon nap, also create red-advisory pollution right in our neighborhoods. In addition, homeowners apply ten times as much pesticide per acre as farmers, because reading labels is a bother, and isn’t more better?

“Xeriscaping” with water-conservative flowers and shrubs is popular in the arid West and elsewhere, and “lawn busting” with edible landscapes may also become fashionable, as interest in organic produce continues to expand.

An underlying cause of many environmental problems is “high-impact thinking”

The cleaner our houses, the more toxic our environment, from runaway chemicals used to overpolish, oversterilize, and overdeodorize our homes.

“There’s no reason why we shouldn’t be able to manufacture footwear that lasts as long as the foot in this age of high technology,”

“We can move from a hydrocarbon economy, based on nonrenewable petrochemicals, to a carbohydrate economy, based on plant materials,” says David Morris of the Institute for Local Self-Reliance.8

Chappell’s innovative baking-soda toothpaste attracted millions of customers and prompted companies like Colgate and Procter & Gamble to market similar products.

People need to know basic facts about global warming, water pollution, and so on, and understand how their actions can make a difference—without requiring Mission Impossible efforts.

“If this is not my planet, whose is it?

They advance individualistic, not social, goals, and they encourage us to speak the language of

Markets flatter our solitary egos but leave our yearnings for community unsatisfied. They advance individualistic, not social, goals, and they encourage us to speak the language of “I want” not the language of “we need.” —BENJAMIN BARBER,

Gandhi said, “there’s more to life than increasing its speed.”

Gandhi said, “there’s more to life than increasing its speed.” We might add that there’s more to life than increasing its greed.

Buy the luxury car, the ads suggest (over and over!) and the pristine, deserted country roads roll out obediently, like endless swaths of Persian carpet.

The ads are all about “me,” chasing an illusion of personal grandeur. But political scientist Benjamin Barber is skeptical that those roads can take us where we want to go.

neighborhood watches, community gardens, and lively discussion groups—all these activities remind us that we belong to an extended family that needs and values our participation.

In ancient Greece, the word idiot meant someone not involved in public life, but let’s face it, since national politics became a corporate-funded media show in the ’60s, we sometimes have to wonder if we’re all idiots.

Barber argues that there’s much more to citizenship than voting and jury duty. The potentials are limitless for bringing civic energy back to the workplace,

“vidiots”?) Barber argues that there’s much more to citizenship than voting

Barber argues that there’s much more to citizenship than voting and jury duty. The potentials are limitless for bringing civic energy back to the workplace, the health care industry, or the public review of new technologies—all sorely in need of new direction. He even proposes that public meeting spaces become mandated features in malls. How might malls be designed to make space for neighborhood health clinics, speaker’s corners, child care centers, and public art galleries?

affluenza is often an obstacle to those lofty goals, because time-famine and chronic self-absorption limit our participation. We may wish we could look outside ourselves, but we’re just too busy, too uncertain where to start, or too tired. What’s more, we feel guilty about the time, money, and energy we’ve already invested to make things worse!

Jean Elshtain believes that “the

Jean Elshtain believes that “the essential task of civil society, the families, neighborhood life, and community, and the web of religious, civic associations. . . is to foster competence and character in individuals, provide the foundations for social trust, and turn children into citizens.”

“We see participants move from awareness and consciousness of an issue— let’s say the impacts of the automobile—through motivation/inspiration, and intent to change, to action.”

In a stunning reversal of occupation and lifestyle, Fred went back to school and became a massage therapist. He earns about $20,000 a year and lives in a small apartment instead of the big house he once owned.

“I’m thankful now that I was laid off, because I’m doing something that I love. It’s what the Buddhists call right livelihood.

“I saw that I needed to integrate my life. I needed to become a whole person, and part of that was bringing my financial life, how I spent my money, what I did with it, into alignment with my values and life purpose.”

Joe and Vicki recommend plotting a “fulfillment curve,” which rises as you spend for essential needs, then begins to fall as you spend on luxuries that aren’t that important to you.

Thousands of Americans have found other helpful ways to slow down, cut back, and reassess. They’ve taken personal steps to live better on less income. U.S. News & World Report correspondent Amy Saltzman calls them “downshifters.” A 1995 poll found that 86 percent of them say they are happier as a result. Only 9 percent report feeling worse.

Cecile Andrews first started nearly a decade ago. STUDY CIRCLES CAN SAVE THE WORLD Andrews,

in 1989, when she read a book called Voluntary Simplicity, by Duane Elgin. “I was really excited about it,” she says, “but no one else was talking about it.” She decided to offer

Voluntary Simplicity, by Duane Elgin. “I was really excited about it,” she says, “but no one else was talking about it.”

build networks for tool sharing and other activities that increase their sense of community.

simplicity study circles. Seeds of Simplicity, a national organization she codirects,

simplicity study circles.

participants not see voluntary simplicity as a sacrifice.

“People begin to talk about what institutional changes need to happen so they can find community and stop wasting money and resources,” Andrews says. They talk about open space, parks for their kids, improved public transit, longer library hours, more effective local government.

“Voluntary simplicity is not just a personal-change thing. Study circles can save the world,” Andrews adds with a wink.

2 Afterward, participants told Andrews that her voluntary simplicity workshop had changed their lives. It wasn’t the kind of thing a community college administrator hears every day, she says, “so I ended up resigning my full-time position and devoting myself to giving these workshops.” She also remembered an idea she’d learned in Sweden. There, neighbors and friends organize discussion groups, called study circles, that meet in people’s homes. Andrews began to organize her would-be voluntary simplicity students into such groups. Participants started with a short reading list, but most of the discussion focused on their personal experiences. People began to tell their own stories, “why they were there: that they have no time, they are working too much, they have no fun, they’re not laughing anymore.” Some of the groups that Andrews began in 1992 continue today. Participants give each other advice and build networks for tool sharing and other activities that increase their sense of community. They find ways to help each other out that reduce their need for high incomes. They meet frequently in each other’s homes and share tips, stories, and ideas for action. Everyone is expected to talk, and an egg timer, passed around the room, limits the time each can speak, preventing anyone from monopolizing the conversation. The discussion often moves from the personal to the political. “People begin to talk about what institutional changes need to happen so they can find community and stop wasting money and resources,” Andrews says. They talk about open space, parks for their kids, improved public transit, longer library hours, more effective local government. “Voluntary simplicity is not just a personal-change thing. Study circles can save the world,” Andrews adds with a wink. SIMPLICITY AS SUBVERSION Since 1992, Cecile Andrews has helped start hundreds of voluntary simplicity study circles. Seeds of Simplicity, a national organization she codirects, has started many more. Her

Cecile Andrews has helped start hundreds of voluntary simplicity study circles. Seeds of Simplicity, a national organization she codirects, has started many more.

People help each other figure that out. They learn to meet their real needs instead of the false needs that advertisers create.

They learn to live in ways that are high fulfillment, but low

They learn to live in ways that are high fulfillment, but low environmental impact.”

people don’t understand how radical it is. It’s the

They’re trying to cut back, to live more simply.’ So people don’t understand how radical it is. It’s the Trojan horse of social change. It’s really getting people to live in a totally different way.”

Americans must “live simply so that others can simply live.”

The United Methodist Church has produced a six-part video series called Curing Affluenza, featuring progressive evangelical theologian Tony Campolo, who was a spiritual adviser to President Clinton.

In the late seventies, Duane Elgin conducted a study of people who were choosing simpler, less consumptive lives for the Stanford Research Institute. He found they were “eating lower on the food chain,” tending to vegetarian diets, wearing simple, utilitarian clothing, buying smaller, fuel-efficient cars, and cultivating their “inner” lives—living “consciously, deliberately, intentionally,” mindful of the impacts of their activities.4

“the power of commercial mass media to distract us from real ecological crises and focus our attention on shampoo,” are “creating a mind-set for catastrophe right now.”

the Simple Living Network, a valuable Internet resource; Web sites for dozens of simple-living organizations; list serves and chat groups; radio programs; new books filled with practical tips and inspiration.

Ten percent of the population, Elgin says, is making changes. “For a long time they felt alone, but now they’re beginning to find each other.”

that’s about all the time we have before we run into an ecological wall. “The leading edge of those people choosing a simple life,” Elgin says, “have been relatively affluent. They’ve had a taste of the good life and have found it wanting, and now they’re looking for a different kind of life.”

A ditch somewhere—or a creek, meadow, woodlot, or marsh. . . . These are places of initiation, where the borders between ourselves and other creatures break down, where the earth gets under our nails and a sense of place gets under our skin. —ROBERT MICHAEL PYLE, The Thunder Tree

American culture came indoors, in quest of ever-greater convenience. Imagine Janet Jones talking to her neighbor. “We don’t ever have to be hot again,” she confides as the air conditioning installer pulls into the driveway.

American culture came indoors, in quest of ever-greater convenience. Imagine Janet Jones talking to her neighbor.

In the last decade, the aphorism “Stop and smell the roses” sank to a more cynical “Wake up and smell the coffee.” We didn’t have time for nature anymore. We learned to just ignore the damn roses—let the landscaper take care of them.

widespread, if unconscious, belief that if you make enough money, you don’t need to know anything about nature or have contact with it. Conversely, we suggest that the stronger your bond with nature, the less money you’ll need, or want, to make.

4. Name five native edible plants in your bioregion and their seasons of availability.

7. What animal species have become extinct in your area?

largest wilderness area in your bioregion?

10. What is the largest wilderness area in your bioregion?

8. What spring wildflower is consistently among the first to bloom where you live? 9. What kinds of rocks and minerals are found in your bioregion? 10. What is the largest wilderness area in your bioregion?

One after another, services that used to be provided free by nature have been packaged and put on the market.

Human contact with nature has become a contract with nature.

many educators and thinkers refer to an “extinction of experience” that accompanies our pullback from nature.

the acquired trait of having nature versus the more unconditional being in nature.

Spoiled by the pace and panorama of TV nature, we’re usually looking for the big event, the spectacle. But more often than adults, kids become absorbed in the small details of nature. “Where did you go?” asks the parent. “Out.” “What did you do?” “Oh, nothing,” answers the kid, but he’s got a vivid image in his head

nature is indeed working its magic: 90 percent described an increased sense of aliveness, well-being, and energy; 77 percent described a major life change upon return (in personal relationships, employment, housing, or life-style); 60 percent of the men and 20 percent of the women stated that a major goal of the trip was to conquer fear, challenge themselves, and expand limits; 90 percent broke an addiction such as nicotine, chocolate, and pop; 57 percent of the women and 27 percent of the men stated that a major goal of the trip was to “come home” to nature; 76 percent of all respondents reported dramatic changes in quantity, vividness, and context of dreams after seventy-two hours in the wilderness.7 We know intuitively that nature is beneficial, even if we become estranged from it.

Patients recover more quickly when they have beautiful green views to look at. At the Way Station in Maryland, the suicide rate of emotionally and mentally challenged residents dropped dramatically when a sunny new brick and natural-wood building became their new home.

In a sense, we’re substituting information and awareness for overconsumption, a painless path to take, because not much change is required.

recycling the American mindset.

Most countries in Western Europe now mandate “extended producer responsibility” that includes taking back products at the end of their lives.

if we could get everyone in the country to go through our discussion courses, we could change the culture overnight.” Roy’s beliefs are right on target with research

“We formed a group that’s organized around a physical feature, a ravine that’s in back of twenty-five households in the neighborhood. We put together a neighborhood directory, organized a drop point where a local farmer delivers produce by subscription, and began meeting every Friday night for poker.

“Affluenza is an engagingly conversational, thought-provoking look at where we have perverted the American dream. Though the nature of books like these is to preach to the converted, Affluenza offers enough support to the arguments and enough depth to the solutions to have a good chance of reaching the unconvinced.” —DETROIT FREE PRESS

“If you sometimes suspect that American life has become a nightmare, but you dare not admit the truth to yourself or talk about it to others, take a peek inside Affluenza. The way to end a nightmare is to wake up, and this book is an alarm clock. We have created a world that dishonors all that is honorable, good, and meaningful. There is another possibility.” —PAUL HAWKEN, AUTHOR Ecology of Commerce AND Natural Capitalism

“The material basis for the American way of life is not sustainable here and is not replicable elsewhere.

“The material basis for the American way of life is not sustainable here and is not replicable elsewhere. Our feverish mindset is burning up the natural systems that support us.

What I hadn’t figured on was timing, timing. Affluenza was aired in the late 1990s, a time when more Americans were feeling fatter bank accounts—and more hollowness inside. Shopping and stock market speculation were becoming the genuine national pastimes.

Affluenza respects those perfectly human desires and seeks to create ways that make comfort, elegance, and enjoyment more genuine and durable than purchasable, perishable commodities.

On the plus side, there are now numerous organizations touting simplicity, conscious spending, fiscal responsibility, sustainable lifestyles and livelihoods, green consuming, and more.

Even highly commercial ventures are now guaranteeing simplicity if you buy their products—from magazines to cars to computers to hair dye. The Simplicity Forum members have puzzled over this development. . . does this mean we are succeeding, or succumbing to a voracious commercial machine?

John and I, along with other authors, artists and activists on simplicity issues, started the Simplicity Forum (www.simplicityforum.org).

The savings rate in the United States is almost zero, and household debt is rising.

A recent study showed that the average American can identify fewer than ten types of plants but recognizes hundreds of corporate logos.

“From a marketer’s perspective, billboards are perfect,” she says. “You can’t turn them off. You can’t click them with remote control.”

George W. Bush signed the Do Not Call legislation in 2003, and we signed on, we’ve stopped getting those irritating dinnertime calls from people who want to clean our carpets or sell us something we don’t need.

Apparently, even market-worshipping legislators were tired of having their dinners interrupted.

“Advertising encourages us to meet nonmaterial needs through material ends,” Mazur says. “It tells us to buy their product because we’ll be loved, we’ll be accepted. And also it tells us that we are not lovable and acceptable without buying their product.”10

We live in what Susan Faludi calls an ornamental culture, which “encourages people to play almost no functional public roles, only decorative and consumer ones.”

in 1958, a prominent conservative economist and staunch defender of the free enterprise system warned that the twentieth century might well end up being known as “the Age of Advertising.”

The problem is that they’re dancing on top of an old septic

Author and “adbuster” Kalle Lasn tells a tale about a large wedding party that takes place in a spacious suburban backyard. The party oozes affluence and “the good life”: the live music is great, and everyone dances with abandon. The problem is that they’re dancing on top of an old septic system, which causes the pipes to burst. “Raw sewage rises up through the grass,” writes Lasn, “and begins to cover everyone’s shoes. If anyone notices, they don’t say anything. The champagne flows, the music continues, until finally a little boy says, ‘It smells like shit!’ And suddenly everyone realizes they’re ankle deep in it.”1 How many million Americans are wheezing with affluenza, yet remain stubbornly in denial?

“Those who have clued in apparently figure it’s best to ignore the shit and just keep dancing,” Lasn concludes. Meanwhile, the companies liable for the damages admit the pipes have cracked but try to convince us there’s nothing to worry about.

There seem to be as many quacks and spin doctors out there as real doctors. With a strict policy of concealing their funding sources (as well as their planets of origin), the quack scientists do their best to make the world “safe from democracy.” The first step is to encourage us to do nothing, to just keep ignoring the symptoms. They tell us in voices that sound self-assured, “Go back to sleep, the facts are still uncertain, everything’s fine. Technology will provide. Just relax and enjoy yourself.”

‘TOXIC SLUDGE IS GOOD FOR YOU’

John Stauber, the coauthor of Toxic Sludge Is Good for You, comments,

John Stauber, the coauthor of Toxic Sludge Is Good for You, comments, “Few people really understand the other dimension of marketing—an undercover public relations industry that creates and perpetuates our commercial culture.”

“The best PR is never noticed”

The weapon of choice is a kind of stun gun that fires invisible bullets of disinformation. You can’t remember how you formed a certain opinion or belief, but you find yourself willing to fight for it.

sometimes PR firms are hired to infiltrate the ranks of everyday life and “talk up” products in casual conversation.

Sony Ericsson, which hired sixty actors in ten cities to appear in public places and ask strangers, “Would you mind taking my picture?”

most effective and powerful PR tactics is to fund “front groups” and give them very friendly, responsible-sounding names, like the American Council on Science and Health, whose experts defend petrochemical companies, the nutritional value of fast foods, and pesticides.

American Council on Science and Health is funded by Burger King, Coca-Cola, NutraSweet, Monsanto, Dow, and Exxon, among others.

Front groups are staunch defenders of the rights of Americans, such as the right to smoke (the National Smokers Alliance); the right to have employee accidents (Workplace Health

Front groups are staunch defenders of the rights of Americans, such as the right to smoke (the National Smokers Alliance); the right to have employee accidents (Workplace Health and Safety Council, an employer organization that lobbies for the weakening of safety standards); the right to pay more for less health care (the Coalition for Health Insurance Choices); the right to choose large, fuel-inefficient cars (the Coalition for Vehicle Choice); and the right to dismantle ecosystems for profit (the Wise Use Movement).

Government agencies are supposed to be watchdogs, but too often they are more like lap dogs.”7

As the average underpaid journalist knows, public relations—not journalism—is the profession to be in if you want to live in one of “those” neighborhoods. “Journalism students—even at the best colleges and universities—are more likely to graduate and work in PR and business communications than as journalists,” Stauber says. “The schools combine PR and journalism classes as if they were one and the same.” Fact is, the kids are going where the money is.

PR pioneer Edward Bernays in 1929: “On the surface it seemed like an ordinary publicity stunt for ‘female emancipation.’ A contingent of New York debutantes marched down Fifth Avenue in the 1929 Easter Parade, each openly lighting and smoking cigarettes, their so-called ‘torches of liberty.’ It was the first time in the memory of most Americans that any woman who wasn’t a prostitute had been seen smoking in public.”

“In a world of manufactured reality, the perception of a hazardous product or accident is what needs to be managed, not the hazard itself,”

became standard procedures of the PR industry. “In a world of manufactured reality, the perception of a hazardous product or accident is what needs to be managed, not the hazard itself,”10 Beder explains.

A similar tactic was used in the 1920s to promote leaded gasoline (ethyl). The mission was to boost both automobile performance and the profits of General Motors, DuPont, and Standard Oil.

American public’s justified

soothed and massaged the American public’s justified fear of leaded gasoline by performing health-effects research in-house, with precedent-setting approval from the federal government.

Word from the corporate labs was “no problem,” even as factory workers making ethyl were dying by the dozens. A 1927 ad in National Geographic urged, “Ride with Ethyl in a high-compression motor and get the thrill of a lifetime.” The overt message was “Don’t let others pass you by,” but the hidden tag line was “. . . even if it kills you.”11

Americans dodge 3,000 commercial messages, each of them shouting louder or purring more seductively than the last. Sound bites, fun facts, and bad-news nuggets also compete for our attention, along with the million words a week some of us process at work. Getting just the information we need is like trying to take a sip of water from a fire hose.

affluenza—the economy is programmed for sickness. Drug companies teach us how to overcome depression, and pesticide companies tell farmers how much pesticide to use. In the mania of media, good news is no news because it doesn’t “work” on TV.

The complexity of global warming makes a third of the information unavailable even to scientists, who tell us they don’t know enough yet about the relationships among oceans, biomass, and atmospheric physics. They do know without any doubt that CO2 levels have already increased by about 30 percent since the Industrial Revolution began, and that the decade from 1990 to 2000 was the warmest on record.

PR firms and the PR environmental offices of oil, mining, and automobile companies have a different story to tell—a story that sends a large portion of the information flow into a calculated whirlpool. Their mission is to craft “customized” information to create doubt, confuse the public, and protect the client’s profits.

What’s Up with the Weather?, one fossil-fueled scientist summarized his stance on global warming: “Americans are moving to the Sun Belt by the millions,” he said, “which proves we like warm climates.” The question is, do we also like the spread of tropical diseases, drought, hurricanes, and economic disruption, and a rising sea level?

Greening Earth Society, the industry-funded program begins with dramatic narration: “The year 2085. The atmospheric level of carbon dioxide has doubled to 540 parts per million. What kind of world have we created?”

“A better world,” answers a corporate-funded scientist. “A more productive world. Plants are the basis for all productivity on earth. . . .

much more efficient when the earth is warmer”.12 (Never mind that two thousand of the world’s most eminent scientists signed a statement saying global warming will be a catastrophe and that a 2004 UN report projects a temperature rise of up to 10 degrees Fahrenheit by 2100.)

maybe ferns three stories tall and, someday, the reappearance of dinosaurs—wouldn’t that be cool? Well, no, not really. Street theater recently performed in Australia illustrates why: melting ice sculptures of kangaroos and koalas are symbols that the warmest decade in recorded history is taking a heavy toll on the world’s ecosystems,

we need to be sensitive to scientific signals—“feedback”—or we risk crashing our civilization into a brick wall. Meadows compared our world to a speeding automobile on a slippery road: “The driver goes too fast for the brakes to work in time.”

we need to be sensitive to scientific signals—“feedback”—or we risk crashing our civilization into a brick wall. Meadows compared our world to a speeding automobile on a slippery road: “The driver goes too fast for the brakes to work in time.”16

Our “pedal to the metal” economy is based on beliefs that resource supplies are limitless and that the earth can continually bounce back from abuse. These beliefs are in part scripted by public relations and advertising experts, just doing their jobs.

we may be overlooking an obvious, and ominous, concept: The car will still achieve racecar speeds as always, even if the tank is almost empty.

We suggest that you start by taking our affluenza self-test, an admittedly unscientific, but we think useful, means of determining whether you’ve got affluenza, and if so, how serious your case is.

Are you making a living or making a dying? –JOE DOMINGUEZ

“When I was on Wall Street,” he said, “I saw that people who had more money were not necessarily happier and that they had just as many problems as the folks that lived in my ghetto neighborhood [in Harlem] where I grew up. So it began to dawn on me that money didn’t buy happiness, a very simple finding.”

of people would ask me, How did you do it?” Joe recalled. “How did you handle your

“How did you handle your finances so you’re not an indentured slave like the rest of us?”

The book, Your Money or Your Life, was published in 1992 and soon became a best seller that has sold nearly a million copies. If the letters from readers that Joe and Vicki have received are to be believed, Your Money or Your Life has transformed countless lives.

It’s about how to handle your existing paycheck in a much more intelligent way that creates savings instead of leading you deeper and deeper into debt. It’s the stuff our grandparents knew but we’ve forgotten or been taught to forget.”

Making peace with your past. Calculate how much money you’ve earned in your life, and then what you have to show for it, your current net worth. You may be shocked at the total you’ve squandered, what we might call the toll of affluenza.

When you’ve got the flu, go to bed. When you’re walking off the edge of a cliff, step back. When you’ve got affluenza, stop and think it over.

despite their six-figure income, the Roys lived simply and often had to weather teasing from their friends about their old clothes and used bicycles. They went backpacking on their vacations. Once they took their children to Disneyland—by bus, walking with backpacks through the streets of Anaheim,

Dick and Jeanne Roy’s study groups take the battle against affluenza into unexpected places. Until he reached the age of fifty-three, Dick Roy had been a leader in the most traditional fashion: president of his class at Oregon State University, an officer in the Navy, and finally, a high-priced corporate attorney in one of America’s most prestigious law firms, with a thirty-second-floor office overlooking all of Portland.

But he was also married to Jeanne, a strong environmentalist and a believer in frugality. So despite their six-figure income, the Roys lived simply and often had to weather teasing from their friends about their old clothes and used bicycles. They went backpacking on their vacations. Once they took their children to Disneyland—by bus, walking with backpacks through the streets of Anaheim, California, from the bus station to their motel.

Jeanne, in particular, found many ways to reduce consumption: using a clothesline instead of a dryer; sending junk mail back until it stopped coming; carefully saving paper; buying food in bulk, and using her own packaging.

she reduced the amount of landfill-bound trash the Roys produced to one regular-size garbage can a year!

Dick raised a few eyebrows at work by putting in the fewest billable hours of anyone in the firm so that he could spend more time with his family.

In 1993, Dick Roy left his job to live on his savings and devote his time to saving the earth.

WIDENING THE CIRCLES He founded the Northwest Earth Institute in Portland (www.nwei.org), an organization that promotes simple living and environmental awareness by running discussion groups in existing institutions.

Roy’s corporate connections helped him bring workshops—"Voluntary Simplicity,” “Choices for Sustainable Living,” and “Discovering a Sense of Place"—into many of Portland’s largest corporations.

The measure of a civilization’s growth is its ability to shift energy and attention from the material side to the spiritual and aesthetic and cultural and artistic side.”

Arnold Toynbee’s “law of progressive simplification.”

The Las Vegas Strip is ranked the number-one “scenic drive” in the country. One fourth grader, asked if he preferred to play indoors or outdoors, replies, “Indoors, ‘cause that’s where the electrical outlets are.”

JUST SAY KNOW Thirty-four percent of Americans polled in 2003 ranked shopping as their favorite activity, while only 17 percent preferred being in nature.

“Indoors, ‘cause that’s where the electrical outlets are.”

Another child pokes a stick at a dead beetle, commenting to her friend that the insect’s batteries must have run out.

Naturalists urge us to reintroduce ourselves to the real world by becoming familiar with our own backyards and county open spaces. This will help answer a question that lingers in the back of our minds: Where exactly are we? Can you identify a few key species that live in your region and the natural events that take place there?

lions are as lazy as your housecat, sometimes sleeping twenty hours a day. Even so, footage of two lions mating is predictably followed by “cubs, tumbling out after a two- or three-minute gestation, full of

The reality is, lions are as lazy as your housecat, sometimes sleeping twenty hours a day. Even so, footage of two lions mating is predictably followed by “cubs, tumbling out after a two- or three-minute gestation, full of play.

Besides, television nature is often scripted nature—as fake as a paper ficus. Spliced together from hundreds of nonsequential hours of tape, a typical nature program filmed in Africa zooms in on a majestic lion,

“We believe that we live in the ‘age of information,’ that there has been an information ‘revolution.’. . . Yet vital knowledge that humans have always possessed about who we are and where we live seems beyond our reach.”

In one hundred hours of programming, he found very little to enrich his life. On McKibben’s daylong hike, however, all kinds of things were happening.

when we lose touch with the origins, habits, and needs of our earthly housemates, we lose our biological sense of balance. As psychologist Chellis Glendinning writes, “We become homeless, alienated from the only home we will ever have.”3

“ecophobia"—a symptom characterized by an inability to smell, plant, or even acknowledge the roses. “Ecophobia is a fear of oil spills, rain forest destruction, whale hunting, and Lyme disease. In fact it’s a fear of just being outside,”

In the book Beyond Ecophobia, he describes the magic of overcoming “timesickness” and regaining a more natural pace.

I went canoeing with my six-year-old son Eli and his friend Julian. The plan was to canoe a two-mile stretch of the Ashuelot River, an hour’s paddle in adult time. Instead, we dawdled along for four or five hours.

We netted golf balls off the bottom of the river from the upstream golf course. We watched fish and bugs in both the shallows and depths of the river. We stopped at the mouth of a tributary stream for a picnic and went for a long adventure

We looked at spring flowers, tried to catch a snake, got lost and found. How fine it was to move at a meandery, child’s pace!6

One summer night, twenty years ago, Dave’s family was abruptly wrenched from sleep by an eerie, piercing sound that cut through the night like a Bowie knife.

57 percent of the women and 27 percent of the men stated that a major goal of the trip was to “come home” to nature;

When we experience nature with our own noses, skin, lungs, and reptilian brains, we feel silly about the stress of obsessive projects and timelines. Self-importance begins to melt into something larger. We see that we’re integral members of the Biosphere Club, and it feels great! Rather than perceiving ourselves as simply human-paycheck-house-car, we finally understand who and where we are. We see that in reality, we’re human-soil-grains-fruits-microbes-trees-oxygen-herbivores-fish-salt marshes, and on and on and on! We begin to question the logic and the ethic of parting out nature like a used-up car.

Lana Porter began to come to her senses. The garden she works in Golden, Colorado, is far more than a lush, reclaimed vacant lot—it’s a biological extension of her self, and a way of life. “I eat very well out of this garden, just about all year round,” she says, “and the organic produce gives me energy to grow more produce and get more energy. It’s a cycle of health that has cut my expenses in half. My grocery bills are lower, my health bills are lower, I don’t need to pay for exercise, and my transportation costs are lower because I don’t have to travel so much to amuse myself.”

People tell me I should take care of my crops more efficiently—with irrigation systems on timers, designer fertilizers, and pesticides—so I could spend less time out here. But that way of growing disconnects the grower from the garden.

Just as laying land fallow is a tenet of the Old Testament, optimizing solar income to prevent global warming should be one of the tenets of the Age of Ecology. But it seems that we won’t protect backyard, bioregion, or planet unless we feel connected.

Nature is not “out there”; it’s everywhere.

“It’s things like this that really excite me, because they instill such a sense of awe and wonder. And I think that awe and wonder are really the things we’re missing today.”

“This aquatic ecosystem is eleven thousand years old. It’s been doing all this for eleven millennia— without any human intervention.”10 “As you stand for a while, things begin to unfold if you are quiet enough to watch and listen. After a full day, you’re still not fulfilled—there’s so much to learn here.

“Perhaps most curiously—in our consumptive society—you come home with your wallet just as full as when you left, and you’ve gotten all this pleasure, education, understanding, peace—for not a single penny.”

If you think your actions are too small to make a difference, you’ve never been in bed with a mosquito. —ANONYMOUS

Our economy and the majority of its products are not designed to save the planet. They’re designed to make money. We can voluntarily cut back and

Our economy and the majority of its products are not designed to save the planet. They’re designed to make money.

Paul Hawken points out, 90 percent of the waste we generate never even makes it into products or services but remains at the point of extraction or manufacture, in slash and slag piles and on-site waste impoundments. Of the materials that do become products, 80 percent are thrown away after a single use.

Catch-22.

To save the world, we need strong individual action, yet for effective individual action, we need to redesign the world.

“We’ve spent the last century working our tails off to make fewer people more productive using more resources. Yet we are doing this at a time when we have more people and fewer resources.”

“The nice thing is, regulations don’t require consumer education or analysis.” Refrigerator standards are one such regulation. “When your old refrigerator gives out, you need to replace it, ASAP. You usually don’t have time to read Consumer Reports.

Geller cited regulations that mandate efficiency. “The nice thing is, regulations don’t require consumer education or analysis.” Refrigerator standards are one such regulation. “When your old refrigerator gives out, you need to replace it, ASAP. You usually don’t have time to read Consumer Reports. You just make a beeline to the department store and get something with enough cabinet space to keep your teenagers alive.”

driving an SUV to the steakhouse is one of the worst consumer actions possible, because automobiles and meat are two primary pathways affluenza takes to infect the earth.

analysis from various agencies and experts to determine that air pollution,

air pollution, global warming, habitat alteration, and water pollution are the most critical consumption-related impacts.

Compared with a nutritionally equivalent intake of whole grains, red meat is responsible for twenty times the land use (because of cattle grazing), seventeen times the common water pollution (because of animal wastes), five times the toxic water pollution and water use (from chemicals applied to feed grains and water

Brower and Leon praise consumer efforts to reduce waste and promote efficiency, but they also urge us to go easy on ourselves. “The demonization of disposable cups, for example, has caused some individuals and groups to spend too much time

An hour of Jet Ski riding, for example, can create as much smog as a car trip from Washington, D.C., to Orlando, Florida, because Jet Ski engines don’t have emission controls. (These small engines are prime candidates for redesign.) The engines of gas-powered lawn mowers, in addition to ruining many an afternoon nap, also create red-advisory pollution right in our neighborhoods. In addition, homeowners apply ten times as much pesticide per acre as farmers, because reading labels is a bother, and isn’t more better?

“Xeriscaping” with water-conservative flowers and shrubs is popular in the arid West and elsewhere, and “lawn busting” with edible landscapes may also become fashionable, as interest in organic produce continues to expand.

An underlying cause of many environmental problems is “high-impact thinking”

The cleaner our houses, the more toxic our environment, from runaway chemicals used to overpolish, oversterilize, and overdeodorize our homes.

“There’s no reason why we shouldn’t be able to manufacture footwear that lasts as long as the foot in this age of high technology,”

“We can move from a hydrocarbon economy, based on nonrenewable petrochemicals, to a carbohydrate economy, based on plant materials,” says David Morris of the Institute for Local Self-Reliance.8

Chappell’s innovative baking-soda toothpaste attracted millions of customers and prompted companies like Colgate and Procter & Gamble to market similar products.

People need to know basic facts about global warming, water pollution, and so on, and understand how their actions can make a difference—without requiring Mission Impossible efforts.

“If this is not my planet, whose is it?

They advance individualistic, not social, goals, and they encourage us to speak the language of

Markets flatter our solitary egos but leave our yearnings for community unsatisfied. They advance individualistic, not social, goals, and they encourage us to speak the language of “I want” not the language of “we need.” —BENJAMIN BARBER,

Gandhi said, “there’s more to life than increasing its speed.”

Gandhi said, “there’s more to life than increasing its speed.” We might add that there’s more to life than increasing its greed.

Buy the luxury car, the ads suggest (over and over!) and the pristine, deserted country roads roll out obediently, like endless swaths of Persian carpet.

The ads are all about “me,” chasing an illusion of personal grandeur. But political scientist Benjamin Barber is skeptical that those roads can take us where we want to go.

neighborhood watches, community gardens, and lively discussion groups—all these activities remind us that we belong to an extended family that needs and values our participation.

In ancient Greece, the word idiot meant someone not involved in public life, but let’s face it, since national politics became a corporate-funded media show in the ’60s, we sometimes have to wonder if we’re all idiots.

Barber argues that there’s much more to citizenship than voting and jury duty. The potentials are limitless for bringing civic energy back to the workplace,

“vidiots”?) Barber argues that there’s much more to citizenship than voting

Barber argues that there’s much more to citizenship than voting and jury duty. The potentials are limitless for bringing civic energy back to the workplace, the health care industry, or the public review of new technologies—all sorely in need of new direction. He even proposes that public meeting spaces become mandated features in malls. How might malls be designed to make space for neighborhood health clinics, speaker’s corners, child care centers, and public art galleries?

affluenza is often an obstacle to those lofty goals, because time-famine and chronic self-absorption limit our participation. We may wish we could look outside ourselves, but we’re just too busy, too uncertain where to start, or too tired. What’s more, we feel guilty about the time, money, and energy we’ve already invested to make things worse!

Jean Elshtain believes that “the

Jean Elshtain believes that “the essential task of civil society, the families, neighborhood life, and community, and the web of religious, civic associations. . . is to foster competence and character in individuals, provide the foundations for social trust, and turn children into citizens.”

“We see participants move from awareness and consciousness of an issue— let’s say the impacts of the automobile—through motivation/inspiration, and intent to change, to action.”

In a stunning reversal of occupation and lifestyle, Fred went back to school and became a massage therapist. He earns about $20,000 a year and lives in a small apartment instead of the big house he once owned.

“I’m thankful now that I was laid off, because I’m doing something that I love. It’s what the Buddhists call right livelihood.

“I saw that I needed to integrate my life. I needed to become a whole person, and part of that was bringing my financial life, how I spent my money, what I did with it, into alignment with my values and life purpose.”

Joe and Vicki recommend plotting a “fulfillment curve,” which rises as you spend for essential needs, then begins to fall as you spend on luxuries that aren’t that important to you.

Thousands of Americans have found other helpful ways to slow down, cut back, and reassess. They’ve taken personal steps to live better on less income. U.S. News & World Report correspondent Amy Saltzman calls them “downshifters.” A 1995 poll found that 86 percent of them say they are happier as a result. Only 9 percent report feeling worse.

Cecile Andrews first started nearly a decade ago. STUDY CIRCLES CAN SAVE THE WORLD Andrews,

in 1989, when she read a book called Voluntary Simplicity, by Duane Elgin. “I was really excited about it,” she says, “but no one else was talking about it.” She decided to offer

Voluntary Simplicity, by Duane Elgin. “I was really excited about it,” she says, “but no one else was talking about it.”

build networks for tool sharing and other activities that increase their sense of community.

simplicity study circles. Seeds of Simplicity, a national organization she codirects,

simplicity study circles.

participants not see voluntary simplicity as a sacrifice.

“People begin to talk about what institutional changes need to happen so they can find community and stop wasting money and resources,” Andrews says. They talk about open space, parks for their kids, improved public transit, longer library hours, more effective local government.

“Voluntary simplicity is not just a personal-change thing. Study circles can save the world,” Andrews adds with a wink.

2 Afterward, participants told Andrews that her voluntary simplicity workshop had changed their lives. It wasn’t the kind of thing a community college administrator hears every day, she says, “so I ended up resigning my full-time position and devoting myself to giving these workshops.” She also remembered an idea she’d learned in Sweden. There, neighbors and friends organize discussion groups, called study circles, that meet in people’s homes. Andrews began to organize her would-be voluntary simplicity students into such groups. Participants started with a short reading list, but most of the discussion focused on their personal experiences. People began to tell their own stories, “why they were there: that they have no time, they are working too much, they have no fun, they’re not laughing anymore.” Some of the groups that Andrews began in 1992 continue today. Participants give each other advice and build networks for tool sharing and other activities that increase their sense of community. They find ways to help each other out that reduce their need for high incomes. They meet frequently in each other’s homes and share tips, stories, and ideas for action. Everyone is expected to talk, and an egg timer, passed around the room, limits the time each can speak, preventing anyone from monopolizing the conversation. The discussion often moves from the personal to the political. “People begin to talk about what institutional changes need to happen so they can find community and stop wasting money and resources,” Andrews says. They talk about open space, parks for their kids, improved public transit, longer library hours, more effective local government. “Voluntary simplicity is not just a personal-change thing. Study circles can save the world,” Andrews adds with a wink. SIMPLICITY AS SUBVERSION Since 1992, Cecile Andrews has helped start hundreds of voluntary simplicity study circles. Seeds of Simplicity, a national organization she codirects, has started many more. Her

Cecile Andrews has helped start hundreds of voluntary simplicity study circles. Seeds of Simplicity, a national organization she codirects, has started many more.

People help each other figure that out. They learn to meet their real needs instead of the false needs that advertisers create.

They learn to live in ways that are high fulfillment, but low

They learn to live in ways that are high fulfillment, but low environmental impact.”

people don’t understand how radical it is. It’s the

They’re trying to cut back, to live more simply.’ So people don’t understand how radical it is. It’s the Trojan horse of social change. It’s really getting people to live in a totally different way.”

Americans must “live simply so that others can simply live.”

The United Methodist Church has produced a six-part video series called Curing Affluenza, featuring progressive evangelical theologian Tony Campolo, who was a spiritual adviser to President Clinton.

In the late seventies, Duane Elgin conducted a study of people who were choosing simpler, less consumptive lives for the Stanford Research Institute. He found they were “eating lower on the food chain,” tending to vegetarian diets, wearing simple, utilitarian clothing, buying smaller, fuel-efficient cars, and cultivating their “inner” lives—living “consciously, deliberately, intentionally,” mindful of the impacts of their activities.4

“the power of commercial mass media to distract us from real ecological crises and focus our attention on shampoo,” are “creating a mind-set for catastrophe right now.”

the Simple Living Network, a valuable Internet resource; Web sites for dozens of simple-living organizations; list serves and chat groups; radio programs; new books filled with practical tips and inspiration.

Ten percent of the population, Elgin says, is making changes. “For a long time they felt alone, but now they’re beginning to find each other.”

that’s about all the time we have before we run into an ecological wall. “The leading edge of those people choosing a simple life,” Elgin says, “have been relatively affluent. They’ve had a taste of the good life and have found it wanting, and now they’re looking for a different kind of life.”

A ditch somewhere—or a creek, meadow, woodlot, or marsh. . . . These are places of initiation, where the borders between ourselves and other creatures break down, where the earth gets under our nails and a sense of place gets under our skin. —ROBERT MICHAEL PYLE, The Thunder Tree

American culture came indoors, in quest of ever-greater convenience. Imagine Janet Jones talking to her neighbor. “We don’t ever have to be hot again,” she confides as the air conditioning installer pulls into the driveway.

American culture came indoors, in quest of ever-greater convenience. Imagine Janet Jones talking to her neighbor.

In the last decade, the aphorism “Stop and smell the roses” sank to a more cynical “Wake up and smell the coffee.” We didn’t have time for nature anymore. We learned to just ignore the damn roses—let the landscaper take care of them.

widespread, if unconscious, belief that if you make enough money, you don’t need to know anything about nature or have contact with it. Conversely, we suggest that the stronger your bond with nature, the less money you’ll need, or want, to make.

4. Name five native edible plants in your bioregion and their seasons of availability.

7. What animal species have become extinct in your area?

largest wilderness area in your bioregion?

10. What is the largest wilderness area in your bioregion?

8. What spring wildflower is consistently among the first to bloom where you live? 9. What kinds of rocks and minerals are found in your bioregion? 10. What is the largest wilderness area in your bioregion?

One after another, services that used to be provided free by nature have been packaged and put on the market.

Human contact with nature has become a contract with nature.

many educators and thinkers refer to an “extinction of experience” that accompanies our pullback from nature.

the acquired trait of having nature versus the more unconditional being in nature.

Spoiled by the pace and panorama of TV nature, we’re usually looking for the big event, the spectacle. But more often than adults, kids become absorbed in the small details of nature. “Where did you go?” asks the parent. “Out.” “What did you do?” “Oh, nothing,” answers the kid, but he’s got a vivid image in his head

nature is indeed working its magic: 90 percent described an increased sense of aliveness, well-being, and energy; 77 percent described a major life change upon return (in personal relationships, employment, housing, or life-style); 60 percent of the men and 20 percent of the women stated that a major goal of the trip was to conquer fear, challenge themselves, and expand limits; 90 percent broke an addiction such as nicotine, chocolate, and pop; 57 percent of the women and 27 percent of the men stated that a major goal of the trip was to “come home” to nature; 76 percent of all respondents reported dramatic changes in quantity, vividness, and context of dreams after seventy-two hours in the wilderness.7 We know intuitively that nature is beneficial, even if we become estranged from it.

Patients recover more quickly when they have beautiful green views to look at. At the Way Station in Maryland, the suicide rate of emotionally and mentally challenged residents dropped dramatically when a sunny new brick and natural-wood building became their new home.

In a sense, we’re substituting information and awareness for overconsumption, a painless path to take, because not much change is required.

recycling the American mindset.

Most countries in Western Europe now mandate “extended producer responsibility” that includes taking back products at the end of their lives.

if we could get everyone in the country to go through our discussion courses, we could change the culture overnight.” Roy’s beliefs are right on target with research

“We formed a group that’s organized around a physical feature, a ravine that’s in back of twenty-five households in the neighborhood. We put together a neighborhood directory, organized a drop point where a local farmer delivers produce by subscription, and began meeting every Friday night for poker.