[corp-focus] The Story of Stuff

[robert weissman]

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The Story of Stuff
By Robert Weissman
December 5, 2007

Right now, representatives of the governments of the world are meeting 
in Bali, Indonesia, to negotiate international agreements to forestall 
climate change.

Necessarily, these negotiations will revolve around technical, arcane 
matters. What targets should be set for reduced greenhouse gas 
emissions? Which countries should adhere to which targets? Should there 
be emissions rights trading, and if so, how should trading systems work? 
What financing mechanisms will be established to help developing 
countries transition to cleaner production methods and leapfrog over 
polluting technologies? Will there be special mechanisms established to 
protect forests? How should global trading rules be altered? And on and on.

The world desperately needs these negotiations to succeed, for 
science-based emission targets to be set, and for principles of social 
justice to shape the allocation of rights, duties and financial 
obligations needed to avert climate catastrophe. And whatever progress 
can be achieved in Bali, the better.

But we also need something else, which will almost surely precede global 
agreements and serious commitments to undertake the massive economic and 
social reorganization that the threat of global warming -- and other 
pending ecological catastrophes -- commands.

That something else is a broad public understanding of how the system 
all fits together. Not just how important it is to change from 
incandescent to compact fluorescent light bulbs or the value of 
recycling -- though these things are vital -- but how the present system 
of making, transporting, selling, buying, using and disposing of things 
is trashing the planet. If we're going to save ourselves from global 
warming, we're going to have to do things differently.

That's where The Story of Stuff comes in.

"The Story of Stuff with Annie Leonard" is an engaging new short film 
that explains the "materials economy" in 20 fun-filled minutes.

Yes, fun-filled.

Produced by Free Range Studios, which developed "The Meatrix" -- an 
animated short about factory farming that ranks among the cleverest uses 
of Internet technologies to deliver a politically progressive message -- 
The Story of Stuff features the wonderful Annie Leonard, amusing 
graphics, lots of humor, and a complicated analysis presented in an 
easy-to-understand conversational tone.

You can watch the whole thing at <StoryofStuff.Org>. You'll have to 
watch the film to enjoy the humor -- there's no easy way to convey the 
playful cartooning with serious purpose. But I guarantee chuckles even 
for the most austere.

The core themes of the Story of Stuff are:

1. The world is running up against resource limits.

"We’re running out of resources. We are using too much stuff. Now I know 
this can be hard to hear, but it’s the truth and we’ve got to deal with 
it. In the past three decades alone, one-third of the planet’s natural 
resources base have been consumed. Gone.
We are cutting and mining and hauling and trashing the place so fast 
that we’re undermining the planet’s very ability for people to live here."

2. Corporate globalization is premised on externalizing costs -- making 
someone other than the companies that make things pay for the 
environmental and human costs of production.

"I was thinking about this the other day. I was walking to work and I 
wanted to listen to the news so I popped into this Radio Shack to buy a 
radio. I found this cute little green radio for 4 dollars and 99 cents. 
I was standing there in line to buy this radio and I was wondering how 
$4.99 could possibly capture the costs of making this radio and getting 
it to my hands. The metal was probably mined in South Africa, the 
petroleum was probably drilled in Iraq, the plastics were probably 
produced in China, and maybe the whole thing was assembled by some 15 
year old in a maquiladora in Mexico. $4.99 wouldn’t even pay the rent 
for the shelf space it occupied until I came along, let alone part of 
the staff guy’s salary that helped me pick it out, or the multiple ocean 
cruises and truck rides pieces of this radio went on. That’s how I 
realized, I didn’t pay for the radio."

Who did? The people who lost their natural resource base, factory 
workers, those who are made sick from factory pollution, and retail 
workers without health insurance.

3. The corporate economy rests on the artificial creation of need -- 
"the golden arrow of consumption."

"Have you ever wondered why women’s shoe heels go from fat one year to 
skinny the next to fat to skinny? It is not because there is some debate 
about which heel structure is the most healthy for women’s feet. It’s 
because wearing fat heels in a skinny heel year shows everyone that you 
haven’t contributed to that arrow recently so you’re not as valuable as 
that skinny heeled person next to you or, more likely, in some ad. It’s 
to keep buying new shoes."

4. Things can be different. And they must be made to be different.

"What we really need to chuck is this old-school throw-away mindset. 
There’s a new school of thinking on this stuff and it’s based on 
sustainability and equity: Green Chemistry, Zero Waste, Closed Loop 
Production, Renewable Energy, Local Living Economies. Some people say 
it’s unrealistic, idealistic, that it can’t happen. But I say the ones 
who are unrealistic are those that want to continue on the old path. 
That’s dreaming. Remember that old way didn’t just happen by itself. 
It’s not like gravity that we just gotta live with. People created it. 
And we’re people too. So let’s create something new."

If you worry these claims are too broad, go to the website, 
<StoryofStuff.Org>. It has supporting evidence and links to a vast array 
of additional resources and materials.

Is The Story of Stuff just preaching to the converted? No. (Though note, 
as a friend says, that there's a reason and rationale for the clergy to 
preach to the congregation every week -- it reinforces, deepens and 
sustains commitment and understanding.)

The Story of Stuff is something you can show to anyone (or ask anyone to 
view online). It's persuasive but not a sermon. It's sophisticated but 
not esoteric. Its tone is light but its content is serious. It's 
narrated by the irrepressible Annie Leonard with passion but no pretense.

Annie, who is a former colleague and good friend, casually mentions at 
the start of The Story of Stuff that she spent 10 years traveling the 
world to explore how stuff is made and discarded. This doesn't begin to 
explain her first-hand experience. There aren't many people who race 
from international airports to visit trash dumps. Annie does. In travels 
to three dozen countries, she has visited garbage dumps, infiltrated 
toxic factories, worked with ragpickers and received death threats for 
her investigative work. Her understanding of the externalized violence 
of the corporate consumer economy comes from direct observation and 
experience.

The Story of Stuff is a short film about the big picture. Give it a 
look, and encourage others to check it out.

If negotiations like those in Bali are ultimately going to succeed, we 
need lots more people to internalize the message of The Story of Stuff, 
and mobilize, as Annie says, to create something new.


Robert Weissman is editor of the Washington, D.C.-based Multinational 
Monitor, <http://www.multinationalmonitor.org> and director of Essential 
Action <http://www.essentialaction.org>.

(c) Robert Weissman

This article is posted at: 
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