Living in a disposable society: an addiction to garbage

We live in a world where the mass production of everyday household items is leaving our land littered with broken junk. The products are losing quality, so they are available at a low price. This is creating a disposable society, a world filled with unwanted items.

Long ago, families bought household essentials to keep for a lifetime. Even as an heirloom to pass on to future family members. Things were produced with care and with quality in mind. In other words, they were built to last. Minimalist lifestyles were the norm.

Today, for conglomerates to get rich, expiration dates on many of our everyday products are deliberately applied to force us to buy the same thing over and over again. It is a paradox. a contradiction On the one hand, we worry about pollution and a growing concern for our future planet, but we fill our homes with more devices (some absolutely useless) than we will ever need. We buy cheap tools, kitchen utensils, personal items that have a very short lifespan. This is due to the poor quality of the materials used in the manufacture. The industry has learned that people are more likely to buy a shoddy two dollar screwdriver, rather than a ten dollar Sidchrome screwdriver that will last for decades.

Take a moment and open a kitchen drawer. How many can openers do you have? How many vegetable peelers? Flip flops? Need I say more? We are all guilty of this affliction. We are drawn to buy products that we think we need, we use them once or twice, and then they sit in the back of a drawer for who knows how long.

Do you want our children and grandchildren to inherit a better planet? So don’t fill it with garbage. The next time you shop online or visit a mall, think carefully. Buy well. ask yourself:

• Do I really need it?

• Is it of a quality that will last?

Up-selling seems to be another business norm. The old “buy 2 get 1 free” trick. Who really needs a three pack of vegetable peelers? You just need a good one.

Two-dollar stores are flourishing, and the internet is littered with e-commerce websites with page after page of quaint knick-knacks, trying to sell a plethora of goods on the cheap. We are easily convinced. We are bombarded with offers from everywhere and on a daily basis. The media, the world wide web and on our phones. Very few websites are ad-free. There are an overwhelming number of attractive links that urge us to buy. The end result: houses full of broken gadgets.

Before this post gets too lost in itself, I want to make your point clear. Buy Quality. Spend an extra dollar or two and buy things that will last. You don’t need a house or garage full of broken tools and household implements. You just need a good rake, a good shovel, quality knives and kitchen implements, and well-made furniture that lasts.

Using the excuse that quality costs money is a poor justification resource. Why? Because you’ll be replacing cheap quality over and over again, you’ll have spent the same amount on junk in the end anyway. Shell out an extra buck or two, buy it once, and don’t fill your life with junk.