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paidrestperiod · 6 years ago

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The Degradation We Wear on our Sleeves

I stress about my clothes, greatly. Not so much what they say, or people’s perception of them, I dress pretty conservatively for the most part. I stress about their quality, not only the strength of their fibers but the strength of their morals. I have a huge and real moral dilemma when it comes to buying new clothes, and often this means wearing through the few thrift store finds, watching them age from acceptable to tattered rags. In this essay I wrote for my environmental literature class, I explore the clothing industry through the lens of the concept of “Slow Violence” (See Rob Nixon) (http://journals.sagepub.com/doi/abs/10.1177/0021909613495648?journalCode=jasa) and will hopefully give some context as to why I feel the way I do about clothing.

Bare with me for a moment.

Take a look at the shirt you’re wearing. Inspect it. Look at the stitchings and feel the material between your fingers. What does it feel like? Solid? Bargain? Now ask yourself, where did that shirt come from? No, not the Macey’s or other store where you bought it, but where did it originate? Where did it take shape? In what country did the maker do as you just did and feel the fabric between their fingers as they stitched the lines that hold your garment? A simple turn of the tag may reveal to you probably one of a host of familiarly distant names. But the story that isn’t told through the tag, one even more ingrained in the fabric, is that of the environmental and working conditions that person who created your fancy threads is subjected to as a result of careless consumerism; a mindset that perpetuated in the garment you now wear. This mindset, made acceptable by years of rich consumers demanding more for less, has resulted in these countries that produce our clothing bearing the burden of our demand for cheaper costs. Forced labor, environmental destabilizing, as well as other atrocities are side effects of this floor driving mindset, but one of the worst atrocities of them all is that for the most part, these clearly unethical business practices that we stimulate, go unnoticed or unreported by the mainstream conscious. The fact remains that outside of a handful of interested activists and documentary filmmakers, the issues surrounding our clothing consumption aren’t immediate to our lives and don’t generate enough sensationalist news to create any real long lasting efforts to change our consumer habits, ones that cause the degradation of the environments and lives of garment workers. This distancing of ourselves from the destruction we perpetuate every time we buy bargain clothing, whether intentional or not, puts the effects of our mindless consumer habits in line with Rob Nixon’s theories presented in his book Slow Violence and the Environmentalism of the Poor. The long lasting environmental degradation being done by continually lowering the floor on our clothing prices as seen through practices such as “fast fashion”, the way that so quickly massively destructive instances like the Rana Plaza building collapse disappear from the public consciousness, the unflinching resolve in our mindless consumer habits, these are all examples of how we cognitively disconnect ourselves from the atrocities that make our clothing, and turn any of the issues that result from the practices into issues of “slow violence”.

What is perhaps the most measurable indicator of the “violence” in the “slow violence” of our consumer habits, is the environmental degradation of these industrial countries being funded by our shopping sprees and insatiable need for weekly wardrobe changes. The countries supplying the world with many of it’s clothes, China, India, and Bangladesh, have earned their spots as clothing producing capitals as a result of their extremely low environmental and working standards, allowing them to conduct business with low interference from regulators. This is not news, it’s a well acknowledged fact by most of the public consciousness. But with that information in mind, most consumers still don’t give a second thought as to how their actions could be perpetuating these poor working and environmental standards. People often wax on about the environmental issues facing their local states, in California brown lawns have become a sign of environmental consciousness, while shorter showers and intentionally dirty cars are becoming a popular “statement”. But yet, fewer consider the fact that some 2,700 gallons of water is used in producing an average cotton shirt, as estimated by studies collected from the World Wildlife Fund, and even fewer will take into account that more than 20 percent of the world's clothing is produced in areas deemed “water scarce” by the environmental collaboration Growing Blue. Even more striking is the International Food Policy Research Institute study which Growing Blue cites, stating that due to continued overuse of freshwater, that some “4.8 billion people – more than half the world’s population – and approximately half of global grain production” as well as “45% of total GDP ($63 trillion)” will be at risk of collapsing due to instability caused by water stress by 2050. This means that not only will wasteful practices as a result of our clothing addiction affect our own economy in the future, but by forcing the burden of production on these water scarce countries, we are contributing to an impending catastrophic collapse of these countries economies, all for the luxury of a wardrobe change.

Elizabeth Cline delves into the mindset that perpetuates careless consumerism in her book Overdressed : The Shockingly High Cost of Cheap Fashion, in which she focuses on the subject of “Fast Fashion”. Fast Fashion she describes as an industry move where retailers put out exorbitants fashionable clothing “constantly throughout the year” as opposed to the traditional seasonal fashions, at a bottom line price “much lower than its competitors” that succeeds only by “selling an unprecedented amount of clothing” and can “only give us low prices if consumers continue to buy new clothes as soon as they’re on the floor.” She points to stores like H&M and Zara as some of the biggest culprits, contributing to our 20 billion a year garment addiction in America alone. These stores that supply us with our clothing fix, not surprisingly, base nearly all of their operations in developing countries like ones mentioned above, who provide clothing at the lower and lower prices that are perpetuated by our fast fashion consumer habits, at the expense of worker and environmental regulations.

This creates a horrible cycle, where a garment manufacturer produces an exorbitant amount of clothing at rock bottom pricing, to be bought up a these fast fashion retailer, only for them to turn around demand a lower price on the already low garments in order for them to undercut their competition, forcing the manufacturer to cut costs again, to produce an even cheaper product, on the back of their “employees” and the the neighboring environment. All the while, we are the ones perpetuating this business practice, funding it, demanding it, without acknowledging the downward spiral which we are sliding. This sort of cognitive dissonance allows for us as a population to turn blind eyes to terrible tragedies such as the Rana Plaza building collapse in 2013, where a Bangladeshi garment manufacturing building, due to negligence by the owners, collapsed and took with it some 1,100 people, more than a third of those killed in the 9/11 attacks. And as if it were any surprise, of the retailers who were being supplied by this particular building? H&M and Zara were some of the biggest buyers. And yet, only some three years removed from this incident, one doubts whether any of the people lined up outside these stores on a daily basis are aware of this, as the story of this tragedy faded from our public attention in a matter of weeks.

This distancing oneself from the clear connection of their clothing and the destruction that it causes, or “willful ignorance” was studied by a group of researchers in a study published in the Journal of Consumer Psychology that asked if “less ethical consumers denigrate more ethical consumers” as a means of justifying their own consumer habits. What they found was that “consumers who willfully ignore ethical product attributes denigrate other, more ethical consumers who seek out and use this information” because of a perceived “self-threat inherent in negative social comparison with others who acted ethically”. This perceived “self-threat” felt by the “denigrators” was also shown to have further consequences in “undermining the denigrator's commitment to ethical values, as evidenced by reduced anger toward firms who violate the ethical principle”, meaning they reacted with ambivalence toward companies who acted unethically in their business model. This unconscious reaction contributes directly to the problem at hand with the unacknowledged ethical travesties being committed in the garment industry. This shows that not only has our clothing consumption and culture come to accept unethical practices as the norm, but also stigmatizes people who choose to shop in an ethical fashion, further hindering efforts to bring to light the problems we create and perpetuate by our mindless spending.

As a consumer culture, it’s imperative that we engage in open discourse about our consumer habits, and the wide ranging effects of our actions in perpetuating environmentally unstable and atrocious living conditions for the people who are forced to work in the factories that make our weekly deals. We need to recognize that we are teetering on the brink is an impending crash, and we are the ones fueling it. We need to see the wastefulness in our mindless consumer culture, and shift our perception of clothing back to where it was 50 years ago, in a time where we bought less and cared more. It is time for us to stand up hold ourselves accountable for our the slow violence we are subjecting these countries to.

*The Hidden Costs of Water” World Wildlife Fund, http://www.wwf.org.uk/what_we_do/rivers_and_lakes/the_hidden_cost_of_water.cfm

*Water in 2050” Growing Blue, http://growingblue.com/water-in-2050/ .

*Elizabeth, Cline, Overdressed the Shockingly High Cost of Cheap Fashion, New York : Penguin Group, 2013, 85-88.

Julfikar Ali Manik,Nida Najar, “Bangladesh Police Charge 41 With Murder Over Rana Plaza Collapse”, “New York Times” June 1, 2015. http://www.nytimes.com/2015/06/02/world/asia/bangladesh-rana-plaza-murder-charges.html

Daniel M. Zane, Julie R. Irwin, Rebecca Walker Reckzek, “Do less ethical consumers denigrate more ethical consumers? The effect of willful ignorance on judgments of others”, Journal of Consumer Psychology, 21, October, 2015. http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S1057740815001011

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paidrestperiod · 6 years ago

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Ten Ways of Seeing Culture at a Bike race (outline)

Prologue: From Wool Jerseys to Ribbed Sleeves

When I first got into cycling seriously, I used to comb the internet for clips of those classic videos such as Hell of the North, and The Stars and the Water Carriers, the nostalgia pornogrophy explicitly showing scenes of professional cycling in the “wool jersey era” of the mid-century. The movies were filled simplistically classic scenes such as domestiques raiding a local cafe for glass bottles of water, which they would promptly open on their chromed cinelli stem and hand to his team leaders. Or riders getting hand ups of fruit from the Toscan countryside, which presumably would serve as their sustenance for the grueling endurance feat. Or even more saucy, the dirt ridden faces of riders such as Felice Gemondi, Franchesco Moser, and the Cannibal himself, as they grinded away at the gears of their lugged bikes over the cobbles of Roubaix, or raced down the turns of the Stelvio, as their Mercedes and Volvo station waggons burned their rubber trying to keep up with the godly, helmetless, perfectly pomaded hair and oiled legged, icons of professional cycling. ----this years tour----Lotto sudal Aero race gel, UCI investigation

From the outside perspective, cycling may be the last place to look when trying to find “culture”. Whatever “culture” may be alive in that dork commuting on his bike with a reflector, I have no interest in THAT.

there is no culture, dead, selling out to markets

This is the obvious response to many of the jaded and usually older cyclists. Many remember a time from a bygone era when to them cycling was about the passion of self-excurition, a test of one’s strength displayed in the most beautiful form possible. The aesthetic and feel of cycling melded with the hardcore, professional ranks of the gritty, savage racers who filled the professional ranks. Now, cycling is split between watt dorks with their over aero accessories and food scales, and the less dedicated but more flashy insta-models who spend more time photographing their bikes and matching kits then getting them dirty.

But this is only half the story, and by diving deeper into the nuances of racing and the domestic scene one will see that culture is alive and vibrant and fluid through all facets of cycling, and not limited to a binary of racers vs non racers.

2. Crowd, but thats the obvious, people who show up etc

3. Environment-Built or otherwise, the race is a display of and component of the nature in each local

4. Relationships- Spiderweb, people and teams, how they are transformed over the years from the different places

5. Race Tactics- How the races is played out by riders and teas of different level of what is acceptable vary from race to race

6. History of each race-Each race has its own histoiry, macro “1975 greg lemond won…’ micro “dude you remember 2009 when rand miller won on a womens bike?’

7. Equipement-Bikes are displays of culture, money, status, preference, display of taste

8. Teams-, history, and race tactics, relationships each team brings a different vibe to a race

9. Oscillations of the Peloton- Literal movement of the peloton as it winds and weaves through different times of the race

10. As Foundation of Stories-Stories make up the life. These stories are the culture of racing and the backbone of how people live their lives.Lifestyle enriched by the act of pedaling a bike.

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paidrestperiod · 8 years ago

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He said “Yes, you have to worry because that makes sense in order to function effectively. However, on the 17th time when you’re worrying about that same thing, maybe ask yourself one simple question: ‘Is it useful?’“ At some point, you have thought it through sufficiently and it’s time to move on. What I have learned how to do as a result of meditation is to draw the line between what I call “constructive anguish” and “unconstructive rumination” and that’s made me a lot happier.

Dan Harris 10% Happier

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paidrestperiod · 8 years ago

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Older Now

My grandmother, a Scottish immigrant who came to America on her own dime, is most prominently remembered by her fierce work ethic, and even fiercer sense of positivity. She embodied that quintessential fairytale attitude of “the sky’s the limit” and often looked me square in the eyes and told me with complete conviction, word for word, the cliche that “you can be anything you want to in this life.”

Maybe she believed this because of her remarkable work ethic, which she assumed was passed down to me. In her eyes if I used the same energies that she did on a daily basis to support her family, then they would no doubt carry me to success- becoming President of the United States would be small fries to her daily routine.

For my grandmother, supporting her family often meant her milk white skin was working mixed with the earthly colored laborers in fields picking whatever seasonal fruits and vegetables grew in the toxic pesticide ridden farming air of the central coast. The backbreaking labor she endured would cripple her in her later life, but she strove through it as a mere consequence of making ends meet, and was noted by her close friends for always being the chipper one in the bunch, seemingly full of energy even after a scorching day in the fields. Even more remarkable than her unwavering work ethic, were the stories that she gained from these jobs. Like how on more than one occasion, she unknowingly followed in running with the crowd of works after someone screamed “La Migra!”. Her reasoning behind this exemplified another one of her outstanding qualities; her dedication to the belief that at their core, everyone embodied a righteously good spirit, so much that when a whole host of illegal workers get up and run from the INS, she joined them thinking it was a cultural routine to boost their energy the way a sleepy person does jumping jacks.

Given these qualities, it’s easy for one to see what made her into the old lady that espoused her grandkids the possibility of their dreams becoming a reality. Through her eyes, it was feasible that anything dreamt up really could be attained through hard work, and the world was a place where compassionate people existed that would recognize your efforts and undoubtedly help you bridge the gap.

Some would call these beliefs a fantasy, the overly positive, Disneyesque optimism that we believed as children. It seems to fit a child’s mentalities. When our imaginations let us see swimming pool as Omaha beach on D-day, or the Oak trees a crow's nest in a tall ship, why wouldn’t that same imagination would allow us to see the world through a more positive, or attainable lens, however unrealistic? Those of us fortunate enough to grow up in a stable environment were allowed to relish in these fantasies, as well as the accompanying “be all you can be” thoughts, because our parents shielded us from the harsh realities that were adulthood. Words such as “failure”, “heartbreak” and “corruption” were only understood on a menial surface level.

You see, when we were kids we couldn’t imagine the reality of a world where evil existed that couldn’t be justly beaten by a superhero or magic power, and even the most creative couldn’t dream up the subtle demons of institutionalized racism or the structures of hegemony that control our destinies. This pure naive innocence characterizes our youth. It was what it means to be young.

This characterization of youthfulness as being naive, or a “dreamer”, often leads many people to associate it naturally with a lack of adult responsibilities. This commonly results in mistaking someone’s progression of maturing as “growing up”. People believe that growing up entails someone taking on responsibilities, in which their childish games are replaced by efforts of attaining an education, profit, and comfortable living. But this is a misnomer. Having responsibilities might make you “mature”, but they don’t make you the opposite of youthful, or “grown up”.

If we understand growing up as the antithesis of youth, this means that “grown up” tendencies mirror the aspects of youthful ones in an inverse way. If we associate as earlier the innocence and a positive “dreamer” outlook with youthfulness, then the opposite, a hardened cynicism and a brutal knowledge of the world must be associated with the “grown up” perspective. This progression from childhood pureness to “grown up” reality is a predictable one. After a while, it doesn��t take a genius to show that your place of birth in a socioeconomic structure has a huge factor in determining if your dreams become a reality, and that there is an awful lot of evil that exists in the world that wants nothing more than to break you down. Coming face to face with these experiences lead many people into the path of being stripped of their pure trust in the world, and in turn, their youth.

This hardening of resolve, the facing of reality, this is what it is to “grow up”. Instead of living in the fantastical nature of their wild ideas and dreams, “grown ups” have replaced them with more sensible and logical realities. They’ve realized that being an astronaut isn’t in the cards, and settle on a sales rep. They choose to scoff at the fairytale endings of what were once their favorite cartoons, and instead only point out the underlying misogynistic or imperialistic tendencies, missing the point of them completely. They grow out of daydreaming, and into the limiting confines of predetermined logic, in the process editing out all the fantastical or other-worldly symptoms of their youth.

Yes, the process is inevitable, and eventually parts of your innocent youth is replaced with a “grown up” logic or worldview, but how one deals with this process, and how much of that data we choose to adhere to, this struggle of individual courage transforms the youth into the well formed Being.

Let’s unpack courage for a second, and separate it from its usual counterpart of bravery. The original French word Corage, derived from the latin root Cor, meaning heart, was meant as to tell the story of who you are with your whole heart, your innermost feelings. To show Corage was to express your deepest convictions and desires, whatever they may be. In a modern take, an act of courage is an expression of emotion not fueled by empirical data or rational thought, but at the same time, does not fly in the face of it. To show courage can be understood as recognizing the worldly expectations and boundaries to your dreams, and yet despite them, express your youthful desires and hopes from your inner core as demonstration of agency. An act of courage deconstructs the binary of empirical world experience ( “growing up”) versus the inexplicable desires and untempered emotions of the heart (youthfulness). Thus, showing that the existence of one does not preclude the other, and that both can be simultaneously understood and expressed.

This may be a bunch of mumbo jumbo, but what it boils down to is that while given the “growing up” process is inevitable, showing courage in the classic sense is our way of simultaneously accepting it, and combating it. Acts of courage, expressing your deepest innermost desires with the knowledge of their irrational nature, are what create connections in the world around us, and bring to real life creativity and possibility the way that our dreams once did when they played out in our minds. Asking someone on a date while realizing that you could be turned down, believing you’re worthy of compassion and belonging despite what past relationships and the flood of media have told you, telling someone you love them, while accepting you could be hurt in the process, choosing a career path in something you’re passionate about instead of something that will make you money, committing to a long distance relationship with someone you love deeply in spite of the many warning voices telling you it won’t work, the acceptance of uncertainty, the ability to be vulnerable to others, these are the acts of courage that define our character, our ways of actualizing on the dreams of our youth. This is how we live on in our “grown up” state.

My grandma, despite being a widower of an abusive husband, living under the poverty line the whole of her life, as well as a whole host of worldly shit, expressed courage as a routine. She choose to live an actively happy life, instead of wallowing in her misery despite her situation. She imparted on her grandkids the importance of never judging someone by anything but their character, in spite of the many racially fueled gangs that plagued her town. She decided, that even with the cancer that had been eating away at her for some 10 years and eventually took her life, to be a constant source of joy for those around her, taking time out of her day to show genuine interest in everyone she talked to whether it be the clerk at the store or her best friend, and her compassion for all things living was visible in the zoo of animals that she adopted in her lifetime. And even when I grew older, I never doubted her genuineness when she told me I could be anything I wanted, because she served as a living proof through her unending compassion that just because you “grow up” and become attuned the harsh conditions of the world, does not mean your life has to be one hardened by the realities of the space you live in. I could learn from her example, I could be like her and choose to be truly happy in a world that had only showed her pain. A feat still reserved for the fairytales and books of our childhood.

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