In recent years I’ve thought too much about consumerism and what it is about people buying especially things they don’t really need.
I wonder what it was that we used to do that gave us a kick like buying something does today? You know – retail therapy? What did we have before that? Apparently it’s dopamine, a drug that gets released by your brain that makes you feel all soft and fuzzy inside when you buy something. Unfortunately, as with a lot of drugs, when the high wears off you then crave it even more. In fact the thing about dopamine is that it gets released in the anticipation and excitement of being about to buy something. At least that’s what it says on the interweb.
Once the purchase has been made, chances are you might even feel a bit down because the moment of excitement has passed.
Presumably it harks back to a better time when we were popping out to find the largest fruits in the forest, or to hunt and catch the biggest beast. Obviously as things are now, fruits and beasts are becoming extinct as we focus on the more self-important issue of consuming things we don’t need to make us feel good fleetingly, before crashing to a new all-time low and in the process making other people and corporations richer, while the world’s resources dwindle.
I admit that frankly I get more of a thrill by finding something I don’t really need for free. It might be finding something on Freecycle or Trash Daily – both are available in the Hastings and Rother areas – among other things, I got hold of a perfect and nearly new luxury John Lewis couch.
Perhaps I’ll pick up a useful demijohn or two at one of those Swap Shops – which is like an orderly jumble sale but everything free! You also get to take all the stuff you want to get rid of and items that aren’t taken by others are taken off to be recycled. Swaps Shops happen every other month or so in most Transition towns, which Rye and Hastings both are. Actually so do Green Drinks. Green Drinks happen in every town on the 15th of the month regardless and are an opportunity to go and talk to like-minded and often wise people about green issues and share both anxieties and optimism.
Well, what better way to enjoy a healthy dopamine fix than embracing the anticipation and excitement of buying a paper-free ticket for my show? What is more, the show is all about environmentalism and trying to give less of a damn. Plus the money goes to a good cause, namely yours truly. This way I get to carry the burden of buying something else so you don’t have to! It’s a win/win situation.
My show, FFS!!, about eco-anxiety and other worries, told through a glittering array of rock, blues, joyous eco-woe and talky bits where, according to Lyn Gardner of the Guardian, I will “tease and not preach” to the converted, and instead “satirise the middle classes” – which is frankly just what they deserve.
FFS!! is at the Printworks Hastings next Wednesday, November 22 at 8pm. Tickets are £20 and available online at or on the door. In the meantime, be green: reduce, reuse and recycle and for goodness’ sake don’t have children if you can possibly avoid it!
Photo: courtesy Tim Redfern
Image Credits: Justin David .