Co-Ops, Execs and trains( Was: Not Sainsbury's!)

[Guest guest]

An excellent post! The only thing I wanted to highlight was that by

trying to change the big players by using them for our ethical

products (often termed positive consumerism?), we may actually be

forcing out of business the truly ethical companies. I'd rather that

Tesco's was half as big as it is now, and that there was a just-as-

big " green " chain.

 

 

vegan-network, Mavreela <nec.lists@m...> wrote:

> Well the point of Railtrack giving dividends back to shareholders

is simply

> so that they will be attracted to the company as an investment and

thus it

> will end up with more money to spend. And in case people are

beginning to

> wonder I am not a supporter of capitalism, it is fatally flawed,

but it is

> the system in which I find myself and I have yet to see any better

> alternative. Many of the problems within the current railway

structure

> though result from the lack of cohesion due to the involvement of

so many

> different companies, regulators and the government.

>

> I don't disagree with what you say about a co-operative, but the

relations

> with producers of private company, and the ideas of shareholders,

COULD

> function in the same way. That is why I don't damn the whole

system even

> if it is corrupt now. There are ethical investment funds which

means not

> only do you make money without risking you ethics, it also means

you are

> helping to support the right companies, and possibly encourage more

to be

> ethical.

>

> The original question, which has only been hazily asked, of whether

we

> should use supermarkets but if we don't then they will be happy

enough

> serving the majority of 'unethical customers' and we would all sit

on the

> outside while all this goes on. By visiting them to buy ethical

products

> we are showing that as consumers, and their customers, we want them

to act

> ethically and this will encourage them to be more ethical. Of

course this

> won't be an overnight transformation but a slow change (you

mentioned the

> difference between now and ten years ago). The 'unethical

customers' will

> end up buying ethical products, without knowing or caring, which

they

> wouldn't have otherwise. This can be seen in the rise of products

which

> are made suitable for vegetarians which once wouldn't have been.

>

> >But even if this is not the reason, how many of us can honestly say

> >that the job that we do is because we want to do it, and we feel so

> >passionately about that we just have to do it?

>

> That is my point (the supermarket executive being simply an

example). Of

> course people are executives because they are well paid, but as a

child do

> you decide that that is the career you want? How many executives

always

> wanted to be doing that job? If it is purely for money there are

much

> better decisions you could make in terms of career paths. People

get

> caught up in the 'system' (whatever that is) and seem to put that

in front

> of themselves and their own interests, a very odd thing to do yet

seemingly

> everyone does it.

>

> Michael