Story of ... more stuff

Its been almost a year since I wrote a blog post about a wonderful initiative started by Annie Leonard called ‘The Story of Stuff project’. I’m sure many of you are familiar with these names by now but may be many of you still aren’t. So I thought of taking this opportunity of writing a follow up post about this project today. A lot has happened since the last post and Annie has managed to really expand her little story into something fairly widespread and influential.

‘The story of stuff’ (SoS for short, released Dec 2007) was a 20 minute, well-researched and well-presented documentary that showed us the real picture behind our consumerist lifestyle and how it eventually affects us, or more correctly, our children and grandchildren. As the name suggests, it is the story about all the ‘stuff’ that we buy, use and throw away from its cradle to its grave. I will not go into its details here as I have already done so in my earlier post and I strongly recommend you read that post. After SoS got an overwhelmingly positive response from the people world over Annie decided to expand on her more than 10 years worth of research.

To the day she has written a book with the same title as her first documentary SoS and has produced 2 more hard-hitting documentaries, Story of bottled water and Story of Cap-n-Trade. To further enlighten us of our irresponsible behaviour and of our responsibilities she’s coming up with Story of cosmetics in July 2010 and Story of electronics in Fall 2010. Even though all these documentaries focus mainly on trends and statistics in the US I believe they’re globally applicable as every country is trying to imitate US in their lifestyle. Also it does feature the third world countries as they’re the ones that suffer from the waste produced by materialistic living in the developed countries and their own. So it is a must watch for everyone. And the best part about all these wonderfully informative and thought-provoking documentaries is that they’re all available online for free for everyone to watch! However I will go ahead and say that they’re definitely worth buying the DVDs so you can have them in your homes to show others and educate them.

‘The story of bottled water’ (released March 2010) tells us how the whole world has been fooled into thinking the tap water is not good for drinking and that the bottled water is a better option. It is a great example of ‘manufactured demand’, one of the bigger devils in our consumerist culture. It turns out that not only all bottled water isn't of better quality than tap water but its also much more expensive, tastes worse and its manufacture is one of environmentally most damaging processes. Hardly any of the bottled water comes from those pristine mountains and waterfalls that the labels show. Most of it (if not all) is just plain old filtered tap water. Recycling of those bottles is another scam that just throws your won garbage into someone else’s backyard. Annie found out that the plastic bottles thrown in recycle bins in the US ended up in huge mountains of them in India only to be ‘downcycled’ into some other product that will later end up in landfill anyway. Another interesting fact that the documentary brings forth is the reason why the local water gets polluted in the first place. It is the industries like the bottle water manufacture that are the culprit.

‘The story of Cap-n-Trade’ (released Dec 2009) is meant specifically to explain what the so called solution for climate change involves. This documentary was made around the time of the much hyped COP15 summit. I think it does a good job at explaining in layman terms what Cap-n-Trade means, not just on the paper but for the common folk around the globe and for the capitalists and industrialists. It becomes very clear why this is being touted as the best solution to the climate change when it is not. As usual the rich people who govern all the big businesses in the world have much at stake if the real measures are taken. Stopping the use of fossil fuel and finding alternatives is the only way to reduce the ppm of CO2 in the atmosphere from current 387ppm to the required, safe 350ppm. However Cap-n-Trade is being used as a mere quick-fix distraction from these real, long term solutions. As with anything else in consumer goods and services the devil is in the details in this case as well. Annie explains the 3 biggest ones in her documentary. A similar system has already been employed and has failed in the EU. So why would we want to think it will work anywhere else in the world?

The upcoming ‘story of cosmetics’ looks at how we’re never given a choice of buying safe products as everything that is on the supermarket shelves is unsafe. And we as consumers are never given any say in the decision of what should go on these shelves. I will simply copy and paste what the website itself says about ‘The story of electronics’.

A few documentaries that open our eyes to our own devils but don’t just do the finger pointing. They also give some solutions. And mainly, they show us how we all are part of the problem AND of the solution.

The Story of Electronics (working title), expected in Fall 2010, employs the Story of Stuff style to explore the high-tech revolution’s collateral damage—6 billion tons of e-waste and counting, poisoned workers and a public left holding the bill. Host Annie Leonard takes viewers from the mines and factories where our gadgets begin to the horrific backyard recycling shops in China where many end up. The film concludes with a call for a green ‘race to the top’ where designers compete to make long-lasting, toxic-free products that are fully and easily recyclable.

A few documentaries that open our eyes to our own devils but don’t just do the finger pointing. They also give some solutions. And mainly, they show us how we all are part of the problem AND of the solution.