Laziness and the environment

The bright green blog has a great post on the benefits of personal laziness and the environment.

Here are a few excerpts (links added) -

Every day I come across lots of advice on how to be more green. Start your own vegetable garden. Build a compost bin. Insulate your home. Brew biodiesel in your back yard. Go out in the middle of the night and paint bike lanes on the street.

And every time I see these tips, I ask myself, “Who the heck has the time for that?”

And then I think about all the ungreen things I do, like buying a book on Amazon even though I live a three-minute walk from a bookstore. Or ordering overpackaged takeout instead of cooking my own food. Flying instead of taking a train. Driving instead of walking.

—

I see the spark of a new labor movement here (slogan: Workers of the world, unwind!). What would happen we made a coordinated effort to slack off just a little bit – in an effort to save the planet, of course? Would our businesses collapse? Would America become a Third World nation?

Or would we find that we’re able to get by just fine? Maybe we’d have less stuff, but more time to enjoy the company of our friends and families. More time to pursue hobbies and exercise. More time to spend on being a citizen, not producer or a consumer. Would that be so bad?

-Eoin O’Carroll

Go ahead and read the full post “Go green by being lazy“. You’ve got the time. Be lazy…for the environment of course.