This morning, I received an email urging me to sign a petition to eliminate bottled water. In a slightly tired state, I immediately deleted the message. As a student, I get a number of "support this cause" requests via email and I kind of need to eliminate most of the messages in order to keep on top of my correspondence. As a Community Action & Social Change minor, I realize this makes seem uninterested in social change. Fortunately, today, this was not the case...
I had forgotten about the petition until later that day, when my brother posted a status on Facebook mocking the people who had sent out the petition. I answered that the petition was one step towards reducing our carbon footprint and making water accessible to everyone. His response: Water is accessible to everyone and always has been. Ordinarily, I'm not good at arguing with him because he's able to think on the fly in a way that I struggle with. But, this time, I had ample evidence to back my claims, thanks to Flow and our class discussion.
I told him that water is NOT accessible to every person. In a world of water privatization, those who cannot afford clean water are forced to consume water that is unclean and unsafe. Thousands of people die yearly from water-borne diseases that would not occur in such large numbers if everyone had the same access to clean water. "So what?" he asked. "How does the plight of third world nations have anything to do with bottled water here?" I mulled over my options. I could argue that making a gesture here would send a message to water companies that we will not tolerate water privatization, but that seemed too idealistic. Then, it hit me: Coca Cola in India. Bottling water for a first-world nation was making water supplies unsafe for a developing nation. I, along with a few of his friends, managed to demonstrate that bottling water is not only wasteful, but affects the lives of people far beyond our borders. We live in an era of globalization. I returned to my email, found the petition, and signed it. One signature may not say much, but as I told him, you never know what small action will cause a person to become motivated to contribute to social change.
I suppose the first part of this post is to thank the water privatization team for bringing this subject forth. I must admit, I was a little wary after I got through the readings. I was overwhelmed by much of the economic jargon; I wish I had taken an econ class while in college, since it informs a great deal of what I'm learning about now. But, Flow really left an impression on me. When Robert asked for initial responses to the film, I was speechless. I couldn't believe the amount of injustice that existed around accessing water. There were too many problems to be confronted at once. The world will continue to work on water-related policy with no concrete solution in sight. Still, I'm inspired to learn more about this issue and am considering conducting a project on water privatization for my community action and social change class.
The second part of this post is meant to introduce a subject that will inform a blog post later this week. As part of my final project, I'm looking for examples of products that have been labeled as green, but that aren't actually environmentally conscious. In the midst of green consumerism, there are companies that are making legitimate attempts to promote environmental sustainability, and there are companies that are jumping onto a profitable trend. I've come across a group called Terra Choice, an environmental marketing and consulting firm that helps "genuine environmental leaders" build their market share and make progress towards sustainability. Part of their work is to serve as a watchdog of companies that are labeling their products as "green," whether or not they contribute to environmental sustainability. Essentially, they look for companies that engage in "greenwashing":
Green∙wash (grēn’wŏsh’, -wôsh’) – verb: the act of misleading consumers regarding the environmental practices of a company or the environmental benefits of a product or service.” (from sinsofgreenwashing.org)
As part of their search for "greenwashing," they have developed "The Seven Sins," which are seven common practices used by companies that claim their products support sustainability. You can find them here, but I'll also summarize each one briefly:
http://sinsofgreenwashing.org/findings/the-seven-sins/
Sin of the Hidden Trade-off: Claiming that a product is green based on a narrow set of attributes, ignoring other important environmental issues. The example they give relates to paper: buying paper from a sustainably-harvested forest may not be completely environmentally friendly, considering the non-green processing it takes to make paper.
Sin of No Proof: Claiming that a product is green without reliable evidence. Imagine a coffee sleeve that claims it's made of 65% recycled materials. Is it really? Where's the proof?
Sin of Vagueness: A poorly defined claim that is likely to be misunderstood by the consumer. For instance, calling something "all-natural" may sound nice, but there are lots of things that occur naturally that may not be good for you.
Sin of Worshiping False Labels: Claiming third-party endorsement when no such endorsement exists.
Sin of Irrelevance: Claiming something that is truthful, but that is unimportant or unhelpful for consumers trying to find environmentally-friendly products. Products will often claim to be free of a substance that has already been deemed illegal.
Sin of Lesser of Two Evils: Claiming something that may be true, but that may distract the consumer from the greater environmental impact of the product category. For instance (in a slightly unrelated example), egg producers often label their eggs as "cage-free." While it may be true that the chickens are not kept in cages, they are often kept in housing that isn't necessarily more humane than cages. The consumer is distracted from the fact that egg production is often unfriendly to chickens.
Sin of Fibbing: Making claims that are false. Saying you're Energy-Star certified doesn't mean that you are!
These seven sins are used by Terra Choice to evaluate a number of products and determine the prevalence of "greenwashing." Later this week, I will evaluate one of their recent reports, which claims 95% of products labeled green aren't actually green, as they have committed one or more of the sins.
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