Toy Factory Thinking

[nfotxn]

Gigo01, originally uploaded by nfotxn.

I know I'm a bit late writing about Christmas, which I celebrate for whatever reasons, but here I am. Writing about Christmas on New Year's Day.

I found this HID card on the floor at work. I'd like to think this girl doesn't have to toil in a Chinese toy factory anymore. I'm embellishing this story because it assuages my middle class guilt. She could have been some sort of abusive manager or something, there are a multitude of possibilities.

That doesn't mean that finding this artifact didn't send my mind reeling further on ideas it'd already been processing. The stuff sold to us is so widely made abroad and by people who aren't very happy. This is a known fact, a reality of our unfairly bourgeois lifestyles, that we just accept because we want to buy an iPod speaker system for $54.88. The sheer volume of shit we hire less fortunate people to make for us is astounding. Our cognitive dissonance towards this inequality further confounding. I decided to try and do better.

So this Christmas I sourced locally for the majority of my gifts. I did a lot of shopping at Mixed Media Hamilton, a local arts supply and gift shop. There are a few observations that came out of this process that I think are worth sharing.

The most important thing to point out is that gifts that are locally made or sold cost more. But more is a relative term. They cost more than $20 on average but less than a Nintendo Wii or an iPod.

On the other hand I was able to match people to things I think they would have never thought about. The thought and attention that went into the things I got for people was similar to the attention I was paying to the people I was buying for. Somehow it felt more heartfelt than grabbing stuff off the shelf at a Big Box store.

I also don't want to sound like I'm preaching because we all have busy lifestyles and differing budgets. I guess what I'm trying to hit home is that if you chose to give gifts to people for Christmas it's worth considering what you're getting them. Where it comes from, who sold it, what it's made from and how well the people who made it were paid. The reasons I say this is because you can buy stuff all year. In fact it'll likely cost you less. But for me, in the middle of winter in the cold and snow, the season is about thinking of other people. A magnanimous spirit of cheer and kindness. That's how I wanted to celebrate my holiday. And I did. And it felt wonderful.

Comments

Thinking it over...

[pxtl.livejournal.com]

I've always marvelled that videogames and other software are actually a generally slave-labour-friendly gift. Most of the labour involved in gaming is the software development and art, which is generally a middle-class endeavor and a sought-after career, even if it's done in India... and if you really want to dodge the factory altogether, online distribution means that the whole process was done by knowledge-workers.

Oh, and booze is always a safe bet for buying locally without having to feel like you're paying a premium.

[thafuzz.livejournal.com]

I've had a particular sound bite stuck in my head for days, or a midwestern business woman describing her ilk as "those of us on a budget" (in reference to cheap group health insurance.) But I've attached the image of a rotund modular home goddess in stirrup pants, her fading BoRics perms frizzy and frazzled, escorting her three Jesus-condoned children into WalMart for another shopping spree on the hubby's dime.

Am I a hater?

[nfotxn.livejournal.com]

Yeah I really put that disclaimer in there because I tend to offend people when I speak my mind on these matters. Maybe I'm cracked but I think it's a falsehood for anyone with a home and an income in American, Canada or otherwise to claim to be on too much of a budget to think ethically. We're all just so fixated on having stuff, the same stuff as others. It's like watching chimps socializing it's so basic. Although the marketing gets pretty heavy.

[thafuzz.livejournal.com]

Monkeys pay for sex with grooming

We're rubbing off on the inferior primates!