Wednesday, April 2, 2008

Spending Money Cannot Turn Green

In the article, “Being Green Doesn’t Mean Spending More”, the author discusses the fact that the American green movement tends to focus on spending money. This is because we are going to buy the products labeled “organic” or “sustainable”. However, the overconsumption will cause a huge use of resources. Moreover, those products are generally expensive, but we do not know where our money is going. If we really want to live in an environmentally friendly way, it is one of the ecological ways to reuse and recycle what we already have. In the article, she states that green movement never means spending too much money.

Before thinking about our healthier life, we should think about the overconsumption of the limited resources. We also have to consider where our money is going. Last, we should refurbish what we already own.

First of all, we should think of not only nonrenewable resources but also renewable resources. This is because the overconsumption will cause the lack of resources. For example, the soil, which is a generally renewable resource, will turn into a nonrenewable resource if you use too much before the soil is produced again. It is not bad to think about our health, but we have to care about Earth’s health. Therefore, we have to think of our resources and care about them not to use them too much.

Second of all, we have to consider why “organic” and “sustainable” products are expensive. It means that most of us do not know where our money is going. The fact is that we buy these products, but we do not know how our money, which is what we paid for the product, is used for. All we can do is just guessing that it will be used for improving or investing in the farmer’s methods. Although we know it will costs too much to plant the “organic” and ”sustainable” products, we have no idea whether its cost match with our payment. Hence we need to think more about where our money is going.

Finally, we should refurbish what we already have if we really think of Earth. This is because we already have a lot of things, but we are likely to throw them away easily.Instead of buying new things, we can fix or remake old things. It is environment-friendly for our planet and also economical for our lives. Consequently, instead of purchasing something new, we should refurbish what we already own.

The green movement might cause better effects because it keeps being green. However, we have to care about our limited resources. Also we do not need to spend our money too much. We have to doubt that there will be more efficient ways. And before buying new products, we should make sure if it is really wasteful stuff. Nobody cares about spending money for just being green, but there are lots ways to do so if we notice and practice.

Reference

Dunleavey, P.M. (2007, May 5). Being green doesn’t mean spending more. The New York Times. Retrieved March 31, 2008, from Lexis Nexis database

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