PFJ: IG vs Reality
Let’s talk about this “crock of shit,” a phrase coined by Polly Barks.
Of course I did the damn thing because as a friend once told me in 8th grade, “You can’t make fun of something until you have tried it.”
LOL, that’s how I ended up trying out for cheerleading.
So for the first year and a bit we used a mason jar. It was hard, it was fun, it was weirdly illuminating but it was also a crock of shit. It was like throwing the parking brake on while still at full speed, it was, dare I say jarring.
The one thing I did love about this was the trash audit that became second nature. I still do them quarterly because I need to account for lifestyle inflation. You know, like when life gets away from you and if you don’t check in it gets real messy real quick. No, just me?
Zerowaste is an idea made for businesses not individuals and it was co-opted into somehow putting the onus on the individual. Bit of a fail.
Your plastic packaging waste doesn’t matter, that being said, I think using the tool of zerowaste to get a scope of your own overconsumption habits is invaluable to those that have never had to investigate their own privileges. Yes, that means the target audience is white folks in the Global North & should be as we have the most and consume the most, generally speaking.
To those that hate ZW & Plastic free July, I get it, but also I cannot always agree as it is a gateway to more. Many start investigating their own lives to realize the impact needs to be in community – we have little free pantries, community gardens, mutual aid, collective buying / swapping, etc that have come back into Vogue.
ZW should start to permeate your entire life, making you question wages, food systems, politicians, supply chains, travel, inequalities everywhere, and for that it’s like a giant spotlight on those little privileges some us did not know we had working in our favor.
Marisa
with love