There is inside me growing a battle. A battle between my desire to be frugal and how things I use and buy are produced.
I am no coupon clipper, nor am I one of those ladies that can somehow buy a pair of $100 jeans for $5, but I like to think of myself as a frugal homemaker. Some might say I am cheap (coughmyhusbandcough) and that is probably a better word for me. I will sometimes sacrifice quality for a low price.
But something is beginning to bother me, and it's going to be an issue for cheap me.
I am not well researched in this area, but it is generally recognized that not all companies manufacture or produce their products in ways that are ethically supportable. From human rights issues to animal mistreatment to protecting our planet and health, no two companies are the same and most seem to have little regard for the care of God's creations.
So...I'm still learning and praying, because I feel like this is something that matters. I don't want people to work in sweat shops so I can have a cute top, or chickens to be force-fed in tiny enclosures so that my family can have a chicken dinner.
I don't know what this looks like for our family yet. Buying from thrift stores more? Online shopping from fair-trade companies? Spending that extra 75 cents a pound on chicken? Being willing to spend $15 on one shirt made on a family farm instead of two shirts made in a factory? I'm not sure yet. One thing i do know is that it probably means that we will live more simply with fewer things and less clutter...and there's nothing wrong with that.
Sometimes.... I really think that ignorance is bliss. :p
ReplyDeleteRight now, being on a super tight budget (mostly b/c of Lily's health issues & insurance) means that I can't actually do most of what I would like to, even just for health reasons (ie, getting a baby probiotic to add to lily's milk to counter-influence the antibiotic that she got during her surgery... or getting the good eggs or beef... although dh/our budget was willing to spend the extra to get her the formula that I wanted to supplement her bmilk with, so yay :).
There are certain things that I'm willingly blind to right now - mostly, honestly, things that don't directly impact my immediate family - only because there's really nothing that I can do about it right now and I can't add feeling guilty to everything else... but also, if an article comes up on the dangers of vaccines or how flouride in our water is KILLING us omg or whatever, I will skip over reading it *at this point* because that knowledge won't change anything for how we live (besides adding potential guilt :p). The things that I am aware of and *can* reasonably do something about, I really try to - for example, eating better, baaaaby steps... but how do you strike that balance between awareness/activity and keeping your sanity? Does that make any sense?