I am an environmentalist. I sincerely believe that our current  consumerist society is trashing the earth and robbing our children and grandchildren of the inheritance that we had. They sadly will not inherit an earth in sound health ready to sustain life, fecund with healthy soil, stable climate, clean water and air. I have been a professional craftsperson for twenty years and I always struggle ethically with the idea of making stuff, on the one hand I want folk to buy my tools and woodwork but on the other hand I am very well aware that the world is already too full of stuff.

We in the industrialised West are often judged by how much we consume, the folk that earn and spend the most, have the most stuff, the best tools and the most foreign holidays are seen to be the most successful. The sad downside of that is that in order to keep consuming new stuff we have to dump the old stuff in landfill,
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or ship it off to Asia for someone else to deal with.

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Maybe we just sell it off or give it free to mates. Whatever, that stuff has already taken a lot of the Earth’s precious resources to produce and the answer to the problem for all of us in the industrialised West is to consume a whole lot less. We need to drive less, buy fewer clothes, run our washing machines, air conditioning and heating less, and yes buy fewer tools.

If you really feel you need a particular tool and have given it thought and are sure that it will get long use and help you in the journey to consuming less then the online store will be open again tomorrow but for today I am thinking about the poor and dispossessed around the world whom our consuming is hurting.

 

Author Robin Wood

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