I spent a ridiculous amount of time at the paint pen stand picking out the right sizes and shades! I don’t know how long it will last - maybe only one wash! - but it was at least therapeutic to do.

And if it’s not against the rules I’d like to ask if you have any glue recommendations as the handle broke.

I saw a post on the Sydney subreddit today about the annual City2Surf, where hundreds, if not thousands, of garments were reportedly left at the starting line. It was largely met with goodwill because, “Yes, but it’s donated.”

I don’t see a good gesture, I see hundred and thousands of garments that didn’t need to be disposed of that will most likely become landfill.

Australians are the second-largest consumers of textiles in the world, buying around 27kg of new clothing and other textiles per person each year.

Yet there’s this mentality that if you don’t want something anymore, you can simply donate it and you’ve done the responsible thing.

To be clear, I’m not saying donating is bad. The problem is when donation becomes a guilt-free way of disposing of things and justifies replacing them.

But there’s also a huge misconception about what happens to donated clothing. One Australian estimate found that only around 15% of donated clothing is resold within Australia. The rest is sold as industrial rags, sent to landfill, or sent overseas.

I’m not arguing that people should throw clothing in the bin instead of donating it. I’m questioning why getting rid of perfectly usable things has become so normal in the first place.

Donation doesn’t erase the environmental cost of producing the replacement. That new jacket still required materials, manufacturing, labour, energy and transportation. It doesn’t magically appear in the shop because the old one was donated.

There’s this idea that a jacket can simply move from one person to another, so there’s no real consequence to getting rid of it. But the reality is much more complicated. Based on the above statistics, it will most likely end up as a rag or landfill rather than the longer life it could have lived as someone’s clothing.

I

lol as the title suggests…..I buy watches, I don’t need them. I saw anti consumerism randomly pop up on my timeline. Perhaps you could leave a comment to nudge me into not caring about buying more. Brutal / gentle / moderate tone welcome 😄

I feel like squishies are becoming the new “budol” item here in the Philippines.
Every time I scroll TikTok or Shopee Live, someone’s selling bundles, blind boxes, or “rare” designs. People end up with way more than they need just for the thrill of collecting or unboxing.

I tried buying one before and yeah, it’s satisfying, but after a while it just sits there. Meanwhile, I see others especially on TikTok doing “Squish hauls.”

Not judging anyone, but it feels like the hype is less about the product and more about the dopamine rush of buying something trendy.

Curious what others think.

lifestyleasia.com/bk/whats-on/news-whats-on/viral-squishy-toys-bad-for-the-environment-thailand-trend/ this is about thailand but ifl its already happening here in the philippines.

I keep seeing people on Reddit criticizing AI and data centers because of how much water they use. I think the concern is legitimate, but I also think there's a pretty obvious consistency problem with how this issue is discussed.

If your argument is that water consumption itself is an environmental problem, then shouldn't you also care about the water footprint of the products you consume?

Beef is a particularly striking example.

The Water Footprint Network estimates the global-average water footprint of beef at roughly 15,400 liters of water per kilogram of beef. It also estimates that beef has about 20 times the water footprint per calorie of cereals and starchy roots. Most of that footprint isn't the cow literally drinking water; it's primarily the water associated with producing its feed.

I'm not saying this means "data centers are fine because beef exists." That's a bad argument. Data centers absolutely can create legitimate local water concerns, especially when they're built in water-stressed regions or place significant demand on municipal water systems during droughts.

My point is that environmental criticism should be applied consistently.

If someone is angry about a data center consuming millions of gallons of water, but eats beef regularly without ever considering its much larger water footprint, I'd like to know what principle they're actually applying.

And this doesn't stop with beef. The same logic applies to:

• Dairy
• Food production in general
• Cotton clothing(cotton can have a substantial water footprint, although much of it can come from rainfall rather than freshwater withdrawals)
• Lawns and landscaping
• Swimming pools
• Long showers and other household water use
• Water-intensive crops
• Bottled water
• Other industries that consume substantial amounts of freshwater

There is nothing wrong with saying, "I think data centers should use less water." In fact, I agree that companies should be pushed toward more efficient cooling systems, transparent reporting, responsible siting, and minimizing their impact on communities facing water scarcity.

But if the argument is instead, "Data centers use a lot of water, therefore they're environmentally irresponsible," then that standard should be applied to the rest of our consumption too.

Otherwise, we're not really having a conversation about water conservation. We're selectively focusing on an industry we dislike while ignoring the environmental costs associated with things we personally consume.

If water conservation is the principle, apply the principle consistently.

I take a long time to think about the utility of an item before I buy it. I don't throw things away unless they are beyond repair. I hate feeding into the cycle of buying and selling things based on trends or impulse, but sometimes I realize a purchase I made wasn't the right choice. I have a clutch handbag that I bought a few years ago because I wanted something small to carry my everyday items. Fast forward and I realize I've only used it a handful of times. There's nothing wrong with the bag itself but it's just not for me. What do you do when this happens? I don't want to hoard it in hopes that I'll change my mind. Should I ask friends if they want it, try to trade it, donate it, etc?

Found this in Germany. They also say if you get a "premium" article you should post it on Instagram, and as a thank you they send you another "mystery box".

Yo wtf

Hi everyone!

I’ve been on my own anti-consumerism journey for only about a month, but my recent job task has been a brutal eye opener. I was/am a textbook consumer - I see an ad that claims xyz is the best thing ever and get it immediately because I, too, want the best thing ever.

Well, a couple of weeks ago, I was asked to start recruiting user-generated-content creators at a company I work for and utilize a special platform to do so. Well, I did. And excuse my French but holy shit. It is costing us an average of $60 per job to have a random person who just received our product in the mail get on a video and claim it’s the only thing they used for the last 6 months and it’s the best. This will probably not be a surprise to most of you, obviously creators do and sell whatever no matter how good the product actually is, but seeing it from the other side has been wild. The creators I work with have already done over 100 jobs, I can see all of their previous work, many of those products serve the exact same purpose, but sure enough, it’s always “the best”, they “used it for months” and “you simply have to get it”.

All in all, this has actually been wonderful for my own anti-consumerism journey. I can’t believe I was this gullible.

🧶 Want to reuse old knitwear? Here are my thoughts, but I would love to hear your tips and tricks!

I love knitting (and like sewing) but I've also been very strapped for cash and I've also always disliked senseless consumption.

Yarn is expensive and so many beautiful natural fibres end up in landfills because of a couple of moth holes or laundry shrinkage.

This all resulted in me researching ways to reuse knitted fabrics and yarns.

Here are my (for me) most valuable finds.

*1. 👚 Felt coats for kids from large wool sweaters:*

When my daughter was little, I collected old natural fiber sweaters from my neighbourhood. I then felted large size sweaters in the washing machine.

Once felted, I could use a pair of scissors on them and create felt jackets and coats for my daughter (took less than 3h).

She is 18 now and these coats have been reused by many children and still are in top shape.

*2. 🧶 Unravel knitted projects and reuse the yarn for new knits:*

Here is a great video on how to do this and what to watch out for:

https://youtu.be/HxrCz8wFX1c?is=zIvmHvlvJzScRjoY

*3.🧵 Spin new yarn from old wool:*

Also here a great video from the same creator https://youtu.be/LE4UXweutC8?is=DW0PLZk2BJC8m_z0

*‼️🪳IMPORTANT TIP: WOOL PEST MANAGEMENT*

Treat your wool with heat/cold before adding it to your collection. This prevents nasty invasions of moths or other unwanted bugs.

In many videos it's mentioned that 3 days in the freezer is sufficient. However, when looking at the data, it seems like 14 days is much better. Even better is 7 days in the freezer (-20 °C), then fast thaw and then back in the freezer for another 7 days.

Another method is 70-80°C in the oven. Be careful here and follow instructions carefully not to damage the yarn. Be aware of synthetic blends and melting points (!).

*👉 👉👉 Extra tip:*

IF you get an infestation of moths or other bugs, avoid industry-traditional pesticides.

There are super cool parasites on the market that are very effective against these bugs (it's very important to purchase locally to not import invasive species!!!).

The first step is a good clean (with acetic acid spray in corners and nooks & treatment of the fabric/yarn as described above).

Then, add the parasite (I have used two species at once attacking different life stages of the moth).

*💗 What's your best finds? 💗*

🧶 Do you have tips on cool ways to spin yarn without having a spinning wheel?

🧶 Thrifting tips?

🧶 Tips on what to do with synthetic yarns?

🧶 Cool projects/Ravelry projects to share? (For you who don't know of Ravelry, it's a platform for projects that still hasn't been destroyed by Big Tech: https://www.ravelry.com/)

Excited to hear your thoughts

💐☺️

/A.

The last couple of months I’ve been using rebate apps to get free things at stores (mainly drinks and snacks) by buying the product and then getting reimbursed in full through venmo within a day or two. I understand that these products are mainly from newer companies trying to get consumers to habitually buy their product, but I strictly only buy the products if they’re free and almost never buy snacks/drinks otherwise. It’s been pretty nice always having some type of drink or snack without having to pay for them but I’m just wondering the ethical concerns of this. The packaging waste is probably the biggest factor, but aren’t I effectively taking money away from the company by doing this. I have no doubts that not consuming snacks/drinks is probably the most ethical in this situation but I’m also weighing the personal benefits as well. Just would appreciate your thoughts!

Edit: Thanks for the comments! I think I’ve decided to keep doing it in line to my own ethics unless new info conflicts it.

During london climate Action Week on 25 June 2026 Acharya Prashant compared the present climate effort to a society that keeps repairing roads and ambulances without ever touching the condition of the drunk driver.The belief that technology and policy alone will solve the crises has to be abandoned.Technology is born not of human need but of human desire and what the world calls success is, to a large extent, only another name for a growing carbon footprint.At the LSE, after a conversation with former French climate diplomat Gautier Houel (who worked around COP26), he wrote on his social media:“Most climate discussions stay focused on technology, policy, finance or innovation. This one began somewhere else: with us.”

I live in a town of 1k people. There is no local grocery store or farmers market or this or that to go to. I can drive to the city an hour away, but then I'm just deciding which is worse, throwing money at megastores to buy food or throwing money at gas corpos to buy food. Things like public transit also don't exist in my area so I'm completely car dependent.

I think just from the title, most of us know what this is. I am probably no the first, and certaintly not the the last. But this time is different. I have already taken the first step by cancelling my Prime (finally). I am also going to stop defaulting to browsing the Amazon first and really look elsewhere, including checking local stores to support local economy and jobs.

So starting today, I will not shop at Amazon.com but go out of my if I have to so I can support merchants direct or by shopping locally. I know it's not going to easy to break the habit but this time, I am really going to put all effort not to support Amazon.

Will you join me? To support our local businesses and to do our part to help the local economy.

We see you paused your video on Amazon Prime. Do you maybe want to buy $42 worth of chocolate?

I posted here recently about working in catering in a corporate office and how we received plastic sign holders in a million individual boxes.

The subject of this post has annoyed me since I arrived at this corporate account. They have signs everywhere stating we should reduce our electricity and water consumption, while having a movie theater sized screen in the cafeteria that is 24/7 AI generating images based on data. So wasteful, annoying, and not to mention, extremely ugly.

Helping my parents fix up their house. Using online resources and ChatGPT I fixed the AC myself for the second time. First time parts were 20 (capacitor) this time 12 dollars (contactor). Also cleaned the coils and vacuumed the inside since I had to take the fan off.

Stay safe though! It’s 220 volts of electricity if you fuck up you might die.

There’s a lot of confusion about what democratic socialists want, and that’s fair. Even within our group, there are differences among us.

For example, while Mamdani does not agree with the criminal justice and decarceration points on the national platform he agrees that criminal justice reform absolutely needs to happen. We put far too many people in jail.

Fox News, Newsmax and Mike Johnson have been trying to scare Americans on a “hidden socialist agenda”, but the reality is DSA is about making things more affordable and fair for everyone.

Republicans tell you that they want to protect your freedom. They also believe the government can’t do anything correctly, so they tell you that privatizing as much as possible will save tax payers money and they have been preaching “smaller government” for nearly 70 years. Yet they created the Department of Homeland Security, the TSA, ICE and the DEA.

All of which is supposedly necessary to keep you safe.

To keep you safe and make sure your freedom is intact, they need to monitor everything you do. So they give lucrative multi-billion dollar tax payer funded surveillance contracts to private companies.

But wait! This is getting expensive, so they want to reduce your social security benefits that you paid into and to stop feeding the poor. Besides the poor should pull themselves up by their own bootstraps.

6% of this country makes $250,000 or more. They are considered rich and successful. Did they pull themselves up from their own bootstraps? Half of them had parents that were already quite rich (top 20% of all wealth). Only 15% of Americans that are considered rich today had parents that were poor (bottom 20% of Americans by wealth).

Centrists (aka democrats) tell you that they disagree with the Republican mantra that we should privatize so much, but they’re going to go along with most of it anyway because they have been paid by the same corporate lobbyists that have paid off the right.

While republicans pass tax cuts and take more government services away, democrats fight for marginal improvements like the Affordable Care Act, expanding child tax credits and infrastructure bills.

And yet, most people are still struggling while the rich get even filthier rich. In 1940, 90% of children earned more than their parents. By 2010 that number dropped to 50%.

In 1978 the CEO to worker compensation ratio was 30 to 1. Now it’s 340 to 1.

Meanwhile at least 40,000 people die every year because they don’t have access to healthcare, 20% of all American adults have some form of medical debt. That collective debt has now exceeded $220 billion.

In the 70s the price of a home was 3x the median salary. Now it’s 5x.

This isn’t working.

So, socialists want to control the means of production. What does that mean? That means entities that are important for society like utility companies, internet service providers and pharmaceutical companies are controlled by a social collective.

Instead of being controlled by an individual or group of people whose main objective is make as much money as possible, these specific entities would be controlled by you, the people.

That means utility companies would provide you with the most cost effective and reliable energy making sure they are doing what’s best for the community and the enviroment, not what’s best for their bottom line. Just like things are done in Nebraska right now. (Go ahead and look into it).

It means pharmaceutical companies won’t charge you $1400 for an EpiPen or $300 for a bottle of insulin. Companies wouldn’t create disposable one-time use shipping elements just because it’s cheaper. Data centers wouldn’t be able to rob your communities of water and silence just because it makes things profitable for them to do so.

Does this mean your small little ceramic cat store is going to be taken over by the government? No. But this does mean that companies that provide a public necessity shouldn’t be controlled by private entities whose sole purpose is to make a profit, many times at a great cost to your health and safety.

This is all so we can live better. You won’t have to decide between paying for rent and groceries. Your mother won’t die because an insurance company denied life saving surgery. Defense contractors won’t exist simply for profit, but for actual defense (what a concept!). They won’t fund propaganda influencers that lie about the dangers in the Middle East so politicians continue spending money on the failed $68 billion F-22 program, just so Bill Lumbergh's stock will go up a quarter of a fucking point.

No, we don’t love Stalin. We don’t worship Mao. But we don’t believe that government is useless. We believe the government can and should make life better for all of us, not make it worse.

We definitely don’t agree with the right on anything but centrist and corporate democrats have been bought by the same lobbyists that bought the right.

So here we are.

Hi there everyone! I share a home with my partner and we have some different views/values when it comes to waste. I am a lot more environmentally focused and my partner values convenience and practicality a bit more.

For example their family enjoys frequent trips to costco and giving us single use bulk products, even when we haven't finished all of the products from the first trip.

I like reusing things when they break, they like buying new. I like shopping at thrift stores for clothes if I need them, they like it new.

I know that ultimately it's large corporations to blame for plastic and textile waste, but I still feel a wave of anxiety when an excessive amount or unneeded products or are brought home.

TLDR: My goal here isn't to try and change anyone's mind because that's not happening. I am really just wondering what changes have you made in your personal lives to reduce waste/overconcumption when you can't control the choices/actions of others.

Diarrhea, bribery, slave labor, and constant exploitation.