issue #7: tough on China? eh... not if it cramps my style
and will you help me rename the newsletter?
Can you help me rename this newsletter? Tough on China… or send them all our money and brain cells? Big companies being shady because… subpar regulation of capitalism. And me being a big nerd. I can’t help it. It’s my M.O.
Today is…
National Newsletter Naming Day
Ok, I made that up. But I'm struggling to land on a good name for this newsletter. I've been thinking about it for weeks without any luck. So I'm hoping you can help me. It has a name now which I don't love. It doesn't give the vibe I hope to convey, so I need a new direction. Got any ideas?
I'll be super grateful to anyone who can help me brainstorm! Reply to this email or leave a comment in the Substack app if you've got some ideas. I'm looking for something short and sweet with a bit of edgy sass to suit my style.
Next week, we'll return to regularly scheduled programming celebrating other made-up holidays.
sustainable spotlight
Over the last couple of weeks, I’ve highlighted loveBB goods. I asked the owner, Tricia, about some of her favorite features of the products. She highlighted the local beeswax she uses.
Her first iterations used generic beeswax. But as she refined her formulas, she started using beeswax from a local farm in her community. It smells so sweet and has little bits of pollen in it. Isn’t that pretty cool? Don’t worry, it’s not going to set off a sneezing attack for your pollen allergies.
This relationship is a perfect example of how supporting one local business has tentacles and benefits many others in the community. It’s all about the velocity of money and sharing that momentum with others doing great things.
Just like last week, loveBB products like lip balms and cocoa still make great gifts for Mother’s Day. That hasn’t changed since last Thursday. 😉 She’s offering 25% off your first purchase with code JEN25 which you can use online if you’re not in her local area. Order soon to get them for Mother’s Day if this is something the mother figure in your life would adore!
Do we want to give China our money and attention or not?
If you like to shop for sport or have someone in your life with that affliction, you've probably heard about Shein. If not, Shein is a Chinese ultra fast-fashion company. Shein hauls, where people buy giant boxes of cheap clothes that fall apart after a wear or two, litter social media. A few weeks later, most of that clothing litters our landfills.
The Guardian describes Shein's business model saying "aggressive marketing combined with the use of algorithms, which scan social media for micro trends, enable brands to cut production to as little as 10 days. The designer is obsolete and, instead, engineers and sophisticated software allow the production of clothes that are fit for the screen, designed for obsolescence, destined for landfill.”
And Temu
You've also probably heard of Temu, or at least saw their claims that you can shop like a billionaire during their strange Superbowl ads. Vox describes Temu by saying “Like Amazon, the site sells a seemingly infinite range of products, but where Amazon revolutionized easy shopping, particularly for those customers who have a clear idea of what they’re looking to buy (usually some essential item that’s cheapest on the site or hard to source elsewhere), Temu has refined the art of nudging people to make impulse purchases. It does this by accentuating how affordable it is to indulge your every curiosity online.” They also incorporate game theory into the shopping experience to hook you faster.
Temu seems to forget that billionaires buy things like yachts and private jets, not crappy plastic toys and cheap polyester t-shirts. But alas, if buying a bunch of random junk makes one feel like a billionaire, who am I to cramp their style?
And TikTok
When we aren't spending our billions on baubles from China’s Shein or Temu, we're spending billions of hours glued to our phones passing boatloads of valuable private data to China while being bamboozled by the algorithmic whims of TikTok, inevitably subject to ultimate control by the Chinese government due to it’s Chinese ownership (because we know that's how it works in China).
We very willingly open our "billionaire" bank accounts to shop for the knockoff versions of the rich and famous and open our brains to billions of pieces of information and disinformation (controlled by an algorithm influenced by the Chinese government). We’re sending unimaginable amounts of money, power, and influence to China.
but should we be tough on China?
And yet, 89% of Americans consider China a competitor or enemy, rather than a partner, according to a this Pew Research Center survey. That same 2021 survey says 48% of Americans think limiting China’s power and influence should be a top foreign policy priority for the U.S., up from 32% in 2018. Those feelings have grown stronger in the last few years as the relationship between the US and China has grown icier.
The Pew Research Study says two issues that most concern Americans are moving jobs to China and growing technological power. I mean, when we send them so much of our money, data, and attention... are we surprised?!
The job shift to China (and abroad in general) is much larger than Shein and Temu. The technological power shift reaches far beyond TikTok. But if we’re so worried about it, why do we spend so much on garbage from cheap sites like Shein and Temu when there are plenty of other places to buy plastic clothes and toys (or maybe… just don’t buy the crap at all)? Why are people up in arms about TikTok ownership when other platforms can provide essentially the same services without suspect influence from foreign adversaries?
which is it? pick a lane
This is so dumb to me. Are we too stupid to know that we’re perpetuating the very problems we say we’re so worried about? Are we too lazy to care because gluttony gets the best of us? Are we too addicted to consumption to make better choices?
Americans cry out about not wanting China to have all the jobs, take all the power, and control the American economy. We hear slogans like “America First” to create good American jobs and prioritize the prosperity of the United States, especially at the hands of the growing influence of China. Domestic jobs and limited foreign influence from adversaries are important priorities!
But we download the apps and hand over all our data for their taking. We whip out our credit cards to buy a bunch of cheap crap we don't need from companies like Shein and Temu, sending our money right into the hands of the Chinese. We're up in arms about a TikTok "ban" (which isn't actually intended to be a ban on TikTok but a ban on Chinese ownership of TikTok).
We don't want to hand over American power and prosperity to China. We argue for tariffs to protect American goods. And yet we have no problem handing over billions of our dollars and ownership of a major information outlet (i.e. influence) to a Chinese organization despite all the screaming.
Which is it? If we don't want China to have influence and power over the United States, let’s stop willingly handing Chinese companies so much of our money, data, and attention.
Not to mention, buying all that sh*tty stuff is really bad for the planet.
p.s. bipartisan support is telling
The TikTok “ban” bill passed in the US House of Representatives 360-58. It passed (with many other matters) in the US Senate 79-18. The sentiments around the passage of the TikTok elements of the bill have clear bipartisan support, even distinct from the other national security priorities in the package.
That the TikTok bill has so much bipartisan support in Congress is telling. It’s pathetic, but that level of bipartisan agreement is a rare sight in Washington. It should be a huge indicator to Americans that politicians have important knowledge informing that decision beyond what’s available to the general public.
a few other eco things
Thinking of buying flowers for someone for Mother’s Day? How about buying from a local flower farm? It’s better for the planet and your local economy!
I keep hearing about Moloch Traps, and this article from
helps explain them. She focuses on Moloch Traps related to environmental issues. The same principle applies to cell phone use and social media for kids. I’m bookmarking this one for sure!Political corruption is rampant in the United States. It impacts everything from environmental disasters to school lunches and beyond. I know we feel powerless to do something about it, but organizations like RepresentUs advocate for citizens to take back the power to which we are entitled in a democracy. I LOVE this Instagram account and haven’t figured out why it doesn’t have 160 million followers (my back-of-the-envelope calculation of the adults in this country sick of the shenanigans of government officials who are supposed to represent us). Ok, not all the frustrated adults are on Instagram; that must be the reason... But no one is coming to save us, so let’s save ourselves.
Care to learn how to compost in your garden? Spring has sprung so it's a great time to get started. I have a little (ok, about 50 pages) composting ebook if you want more details about how to start making compost at home without the stress of fancy scientific ratios. Maybe you can even share your compost bin with a friend or family member once you get into a groove.
No big surprise from Big Oil but here are more Big Lies that are a big deal. How do these people sleep at night?
just because
Amazon being shady and unethical again... Who's surprised? Not me.
Feel like your Google results lately have been… meh? Would you Yahoo instead?
I’m currently nerding out Big Time reading Democracy in America by Alexis de Tocqueville** as part of the
Slow Read Book Club. It’s so poignant.
weekly mini eco challenge
Start a list of at least 3-5 local, regional, or national retailers that can be go-to spots to buy what you need instead of sending all your money abroad. Shopping locally (or regionally or even nationally) offers many benefits to our community, which is good for us individually.
Just because the price in your online cart looks cheap doesn’t mean something has a low cost. It just means you are shifting the cost of producing that thing to someone else, in the form of waste, pollution, oppressive employment conditions, unfair wages, and other externalities. There’s no such thing as a free lunch, friends.
Until next time, I hope you’re having the best week available to you. Don’t hesitate to comment or leave questions. I love hearing from you all.
Jen
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Jen Panaro is a self-proclaimed composting nerd and advocate for sustainable living for modern families. Through her writing, workshops, and podcast guesting, she helps others find ways to incorporate sustainability into their everyday lives more easily while appreciating the joy along the journey.
When she’s not writing and creating, she’s a serial library book borrower, a messy gardener, a composting tinkerer. She’s a wife and mom of two boys and spends a lot of time in hockey rinks and other sporting venues watching her boys tear it up for their teams.
I feel like if I can’t find something in a brick and mortar shop (even if that’s a chain like TK Maxx), I probably don’t need it? One month, we tallied what percentage of discretionary expenses were spent locally and tried to increase it. I spent a lot at our local bougie farm shop, the high street cafe, the farm that sells flour, etc, but the money goes to people in our immediate community.