We the People: Creating Economic & Social Solidarity Around Sustainable Change

On 4 November 2020, the United States officially withdrew from the Paris Climate Accord. Even now with rejoining it on the horizon, government is not the focus of this blog. The focus here is about We the People. It is about our power, unity, and organizing to make all that is important to us valuable and accessible. Very specifically, this is about making sustainable consumer goods and services important, inclusive, and affordable to Main Street. Let’s get to it.

We have power:

In a capitalist system, it is We the people that truly possess real power. We are the engine driving industries to satisfy our specific demands for consumer goods and services that we buy. It is our spending that drives the economy. Let that sink in. This is truly a big deal, and it is power that comes with responsibility. It is a responsibility to realign ourselves with humanity’s best interests.

Wall Street is saying we have a lot of power:

You may have noticed that Wall street is always concerned about our “mood”. The mood of Main Street is measured by our spending. It’s referred to as Consumer Confidence. Even as I write this, Wall Street is predicting a growth bomb “…because consumers have lots of savings [as a result of pandemic lock downs] and pent-up demand [only needing] an increase in consumer confidence to set [it off]” says Economist Jim Paulsen as reported by Bloomberg Businessweek, just last week, on 4 November.

Wow! We the People are being described here as having a capacity for being a “bomb”.

This is not for us to think that there is anything to blow up, rather it is knowing that we are collectively a formidable force that can cause radical growth and therefore, sustainable change also. Let’s make no mistake, we’re being reminded about who and what is fueling the machine that is called the economy. While our spending makes Wall Street happy, what are we getting for it? What about us?

We don’t ask for enough:

Frankly speaking, we’re not asking enough for what we spend. In truth, we are spending too much for what we get in exchange. While consumers today lead with high expectations, the reality falls very short of them. It is within our economic power to require trustworthiness, and to demand that sustainability be built into the intrinsic value in everything we buy. What’s more, it should not be the responsibility of Main Street to shoulder the burden of the cost for industries to behave ethically, transparently, and sustainably. Sustainability is not a trend that is nice to have “if we can afford it.” Our lives and livelihoods, and the hope of future generations depend on it.

Demanding a sustainable economy is for everyone’s benefit:

A sustainable economy isn’t simply about conservation and preservation of natural resources. A Sustainable economy is about elevating our standard of living, eradicating poverty, and fostering economic growth while preserving the quality of the environment for future generations. It involves social diversity, inclusivity, equality, environmental and social justice. It is about sustaining vital economic and natural ecosystems that support biodiversity, agriculture, food security, water supply, climate stability, and human health. Do we need to experience any other kind of global disruption and risk to health and livelihood beyond this pandemic?

We at Truth Alone: For Life & Earth are on a mission:

It would serve us all very well if We the people organize to make sustainable living an economic priority by demanding that it be put within our reach. Herein lies our particular mission. At Truth Alone: For Life & Earth, it is our passion to make sustainability in fashion exciting, valuable, and accessible in service of our customers, the environment, and humanity. We are very focused on affordability, by not passing on the unnecessarily exorbitant sustainability premium to our customers. In parallel, we are fully committed to offering our customers fashion with high intrinsic value. We aim to cause an elevated experience with sustainability that delights, that is lasting, and given to be inclusive so as to proliferate awareness and elevate expectations. What a world of difference it would make if brands, businesses, and industry helped people to “make choices in ways that are informed, thoughtful, and aligned with their values as well as the fragile social and environmental systems they inhabit.”

We as consumers have set a very low bar:

Yet it is our consumption behavior as consumers that gives industry a big pass on doing better or offering us better. In our reaching for more of the same every day, we shirk our responsibility to hold industry and brands accountable. Worse, our transactions endorse their behavior that even disrespects us, our money, their employees and the environment. It would serve us to slow it down, develop mindfulness, think, feel, and act with intention.

2020, A huge pause:

We would probably all agree that 2020 has slowed us all down enough to pause and to think twice about our spending behavior. In today’s world of incredible income inequality, and now economic disruption, frivolous spending is no longer in vogue. 2020 has brought along with it new importance to value and our values. 2020 is the year that enabled a newfound appreciation for empathy recognizing that our lives and livelihoods are mutually bound together in truly fragile ecosystems that we all depend on for our health and living. 2020 has been a year that has left many of us feeling that we all deserve better.

There is a lot at stake within this decade in terms of turning around the tide of climate crisis right now. A lot of it is driven by our consumer choices, no matter how big or small they are. This is an opportunity for us to leverage our incredible economic power and the force of social solidarity to press for sustainable change.

Be motivated, deserve better, pursue it:

While 2020 has left us feeling stuck in place by a pandemic, by politics, by the very real fear for our health and livelihood, there is no time like the present to be motivated by deserving better.

• Make deserving better your personal credo
• It takes a little self-interest, decision after decision, to create an externalized benefit
• Stop reaching for more of the same disposable, wasteful, damaging stuff.

Vote: Your money is a ballot you cast every day.:

• Wield economic power by saying enough is enough to fast forward
• Frivolous spending is throwing your vote away.
• Transform frivolous consumption to conscious decisions
• Sacrifice quantity for quality; buy better, deserve better.
• Choose Sustainable options in your food, your clothing, your services.

Make Sharing Caring:

In an attention-grabbing economy, it has become nearly impossible to see the forest from the trees. Slow it down; take care.

 People and businesses are doing a lot of excellent work around creating a sustainable future, and they depend on your participation and validation to create social solidarity for sustainable change. 

• Organize with your friends to unite as a “growth bomb” for sustainable change
• Pay good vibes forward; Allow your brilliance to shine
• Deepen connections with valuable content as well as sharing Reels and Tik-Tok.
• We love this: “your life is your message”
• We ask for your support by sharing this blog, connect with us on Instagram, Facebook
• Advocate for more affordable sustainability in fashion by signing up on our waitlist, join our newsletter, truthalone-clothing.com

 The Truth Matters:

• Reward the truth; don’t buy the lie.
• Challenge yourselves to pursue the origin of information (who said it) to make more sense of the world and our choices; choices have consequences
• Demand transparency, diversity, inclusivity, equality and justice in all your purchase.
• Hold brands accountable.

 Empathy:

• We are our Brothers’ & Sisters’ keepers, if we’re not looking out for each other then we’re being antisocial and that then becomes characteristic of our future.
• See your face in the faces of others.
• A great example of empathy at work right now is #blacklivesmatters movement. Herein lies unity and organization in action, and feeling each other’s pain.
• Exclusivity divides us; Empathy joins us together.
• Empathy is key to human-environmental relations: “The lack of empathy for nature and for others limits motivations to conserve the environment and enhance sustainability,”

 To sum it all up in the simplicity and famous words of Mahatma Gandhi who said, “My life is my message.” How we live our life is our message. This is about each of us individually, and all of us together, We the people, and our power to be cause in sustainable change. Make this your call to action too.