Ethical Consumption: Do you get a choice?

Most of the time, when I start talking about buying fair trade, and avoiding supporting huge corporations who's only consideration is their bottom line (not the dignity of their workers), I get to seeing the rolled eyes.  I can almost hear my friends and family saying to themselves, "Oh Lordy Lord!  Here goes Casey again on another one of her liberal rants!"  No matter who it is that I am talking to about these issues, especially those people I love, please understand that I am still learning and growing.  I know I need to learn how to better communicate my ideals and concerns with this world's atrocities.  Mostly I need to learn to speak with humility, love and grace - especially when I am trying to communicate the things I feel so passionately about, its too easy to let my emotions take over. 

HOWEVER, I have been thinking about two excuses I was given this past Friday night.

As I was talking about the need to buy fair trade (at this time the only edible goods that can even be certified fair trade (that I know of) are coffee, chocolate, sugar, tea, produce and vanilla), I was first given this excuse by someone who I love to and look up to very much:  "I don't know where to buy it.  The only store I go to is Food Lion and they don't sell it." (In this case, the "it" was fair trade coffee.)  I don't really want to dive into this argument right now because it seems so obvious that another human's dignity and survival is worth the inconvenience of going to a different store - or even better, buy it online then you don't even have to go out of your way!

So instead I will focus on the second excuse I heard Friday night, and that argument was this: Different Christians are called to do different things.  Everyone can't be called to do everything (we are one body, but many parts - 1 Corinthians, Chap. 12).  The excuse included the fact that there are so many injustices in the world, that it just isn't practical to think that one person could take them all into account.

I do agree, with both parts of this excuse.  Yes we are one body, with many parts (the body of Christ), and we are not all called to do the same thing - we have unique gifts and passions.  Also I agree that if one person knew of all the atrocities in the world - the only thing they could be left to do is scream and holler their way into their own literal insanity.  BUT, I do not believe that excuse is even close to being applicable in the case of buying fair trade.

The fact that a product even needs to be certified as fair trade means that there are unfair trade practices taking place.  Fair trade certification is not perfect, but it takes into account paying growers, workers and producers of products a fair price (living wage) in addition to setting up fair social and environmental standards related to the productions of those goods.  The reason we ALL must care whether or not what we buy is fair trade, is because in this case, if you are not being an active part of the solution, you are an active part of the problem.  Every time you buy a shirt from Old Navy, a Hershey's chocolate bar, or a coffee from Starbucks, you are saying that you are okay with the exploitation of other people in the name of your convenience.  It is convenient and trendy to buy a cheap shirt.  It is convenient and yummy buy the same chocolate bar you've always bought.  It is convenient and fun to buy your skinny latte.  But if you are a Christian, the Bible does not give a lot of room for us to compromise on this - and Jesus states many times during His ministry that taking up your cross and following Him will NOT be convenient.

Malachi 3:5
"So I will come to put you on trial.  I will be quick to testify against sorcerers, adulterers and perjurers, against those who defraud laborers of their wages, who oppress the widows and the fatherless, and deprive the foreigners among you of justice, but do not fear me," says the Lord Almighty.

So this puts every American who knowingly and willingly buys unethically sourced goods, on the same level of adulterers, sorcerers, liars and people who oppress widows and orphans.  This is tough stuff.


James 5:4-5
"Look!  The wages you failed to pay the workers who mowed your fields are crying out against you. The cries of the harvesters have reached the ears of the Lord Almighty.  You have lived on earth in luxury and self-indulgence."

This speaks to the idea that people don't want to buy fair trade because it is more expensive and inconvenient.  Perhaps if we got over indulging ourselves on unnecessary luxuries, we could afford to grant justice to the people who grow and harvest our food.


Isaiah 58:3-7
"Why have we fasted," they say,
"and you have not seen it?
Why have we humbled ourselves,
and you have not noticed?"

Yet on the day of your fasting, you do as you please
and exploit all your workers.
Your fasting ends in quarreling and strife,
and in strking each other wtih wicked fists.
You cannot fast as you do today
and expect your voice to be heard on high.

Is this the kind of fast I have chosen,
only a day for people to humble themselves?
It is only for bowing one's head liek a reed
and for lying in sackcloth and ashes?
Is that what you call a fast,
a day acceptable to the Lord?

Is not this the kind of fasting I have chosen:
to loose the chains of injustice
and untie the cords of the yoke,
to set hte oppressed free
and break every yoke?
Is it not to share your food with the hungry
and to provide the poor wanderer with shelter-
when you see the naked, to clothe them,
and not to turn away from your own flesh and blood?

Here, we learn that God doesn't even want our worship if we aren't loving God and loving our neighbors with our WHOLE lives (including the decisions we make with what we buy).  We cannot worship God on the one hand and support the exploitation of workers, His children, on the other.

I have gotten a lot of information and inspiration for my latest blog posts from Julie Clawson's book, Everyday Justice.  So I will end this post with an excerpt from that book:

     "Taking care of the needy, and treating others with love and fairness, are central attitudes and actions in the type of worship God insists on.  Yet how often during our Sunday morning worship services do we even think about such things?  As we clap our hands in rhythm with the latest uplifting worship song, does it ever cross our minds whether or not the coffee served out in the lobby came from farmers who received a fair wage for their work?
     Those might seem like strange questions, but they haunted me as I watched the documentary about Ethiopian coffee growers, Black Gold.  At one point the film shows a family praying that they can sell their coffee for a fair price so that their children can attend school.  It seemed strange to me that our churches can participate in worship as usual while at the same time depriving these workers of their wages.  If I could be the means through which God answers their prayers, by paying a fair price for my coffee, why wouldn't I do that?"