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Cory Doctorow here is arguing in favour of getting organized rather than just doing things on a personal level like "careful shopping". he says the latter won't change systemic problems, whereas an organized boycott could.
The problem with "conscious consumption" is that it comes out of the neoliberal tradition in which every political matter is supposedly determined by your individual actions, and not your actions as part of a union or other political institution that works as a bloc to overthrow the status quo.
that sounds like the same problem i have with this famous "personal carbon footprint" vs. institutional measures for co2-reduction like adequate laws e.g.. i feel this is shifting the blame towards me, and i can't do anything on the level of a well devised general speed limit on the german autobahnen.
solely focussing on it might even be bad for any cause. it brings out the orthodox apodictics with their social tendencies to become a blockwart.
its practitioners inevitably decide the reason they're not seeing the change they yearn for is that their allies aren't shopping carefully enough. This turns the careful shopper into a cop who polices other people's consumption, demanding that they stop eating some foodstuff or using Twitter or watching HBO Max. Squabbling over whether using a social media network makes you a Nazi generates far more heat than light â so much heat that it incinerates the solidarity you need to actually fight Nazis.
but of course "conscious consumption" isn't all bad and fruitless. you just must not mistake it for political action. buying ecologically produced bread (if you can afford it) does not replace the necessity to vote for people who can introduce ecological measures into bureaucracy, politics and legislation.
oh, and i didn't know, doctorow was fighting cancer. i wish him all the best with that!
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CoryDoctorow 
I am on record as being skeptical of the notion that if you shop very carefully, you can make society better. "Conscious consumption" is not a tool for structural change.
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If you'd like an essay-formatted version of this thread to read or share, here's a link to it on pluralistic.net, my surveillance-free, ad-free, tracker-free blog:
https://pluralistic.net/2026/01/22/optimized-for-unoptimizability/#dystopia-of-rules1/
