System Change
I’m ‘involved’ in (in the sense that I’m a member of) a Blue Dot group on Facebook (yeah, yeah, I know, quit FB already — I can’t help it, sometimes it’s fun to pointlessly fight), and the group is regularly inundated with people trying their minimalistic best to be better by looking to direct their spending in more liberal ways.
But continuing to engage in the system in the same way, using equally extractive companies that are better only in that they parrot more friendly talking points, just maintains the system as it is. We need more than that…
I think we’re facing the current system’s most effective self-defense mechanisms: limiting our options so even any resistance to it causes collateral damage to people we care about. When workers depend on these systems for survival, they’re essentially taken hostage against any meaningful change. Change is messy, and systems won’t change without disruption. We absolutely do need to acknowledge this reality, but you also can’t use it as a reason for inaction. The question isn’t whether we can change anything without negative consequences - we probably can’t. But doing nothing just locks in the negative consequences of the system we have now.
We should be building support networks to ensure that working people won’t bear the entire burden of change. How? I wish I knew. But THAT’S the conversation we should be having rather than trying to figure out which store is the best store to shop at…