everything is connected
When talking about sustainability, everything is connected. From social responsibility to business, empathy to money, politics to education, living to economics.
As a part of an inseparable cycle we all have a duty within ourselves as humans. We need to understand we should and can have (if we work for it) the ability to maintain a rate of production that sustains people, places and things. We also need to have empathy for others, to understand each other’s feelings and perspectives so we can understand and recognize what’s wrong so we can act against it and guide our own actions. This way we are working together towards gaining more power.
Even in fashion, society plays a huge role. Society dictates what the industry is allowed to do or not. Morally and ethically. “If one wants to change society, one needs to understand the logic of how it operates”. Knowledge is power, so as consumers we need to do our research before purchasing in order to know who makes our products and under what circumstances. If these workers are being payed fairly or being exploited. It’s our money when purchasing these items that will contribute for exploitation or for a positive change, where people are treated with dignity. “With each purchase we make, we are voting for or against humanity, for or against equality, and for or against our planet, and the only way to promote positive change is to vote with your dollar.”
Having lectures about these issues really opened my naive eyes. Though I’ve always knew there’s still a lot of people being exploited, I had never realized or given the thought that I was contributing unconsciously for this existing inhuman problem just by buying clothes to companies that where trendy and I could afford. Unconsciously, because I didn’t take the time to investigate into these companies. All I knew till these lectures was that everyone used to purchase in them and so they had to be (I thought naively) human’s rights friendly. Turns out, a lot of them aren’t. Exploitation happens closer to me than I thought and through me. Through my friends, family, people I know.
All of us who choose to go the easier and cheaper way or because its trendy and forget or ignore to research brands and their positions towards these issues are allowing inhuman problems like in this case exploitation to keep happening and being normalized. We, society, definitely need to understand how powerful our actions are and how they can either make a difference or not.