Just say “NO” to crap!
- March 19, 2008 by Fox | Comments: 20
I’m launching an anti-crap campaign. I want you to say “NO” to buying crap. I can’t think of a better way to improve one’s wealth, health, and self than to kick the crap habit. Like any drug, crap has a cost. Crap hits your wallet, abuses the environment, and needles your health both mentally and physically. The sources of crap are vast and deep. But the most insidious forms of crap are financial crap, food crap, and consumer crap.
Financial crap encompasses all those terrible investment products which make dealers big money and bleed investors dry. Investments like mutual funds with high MERs, principle protected notes (PPNs), segregated funds, and whole life insurance.
Food crap is all that packaged processed product displayed prominently in grocery store aisles, vending machines, and the freezer section. It seems the food scientists and product marketers have hijacked our health and sold us on packaged portions of phony foods.
Consumer crap can been seen on any suburban street bursting out of homes and spewing across yards. Consumer crap includes the gadgets, toys, and pretty plastic things filling our land fills and cluttering our homes.
I want you to get high on life, not crap. Here are five reasons to kick back at crap.
1. Crap is “whack”:
Most of the stuff out there is crap. Go to any store, turn on any television, or surf any web page and chances are you will be whacked in the face with crap. Crap permeates and seethes into every market imaginable. I see consumer crap in shopping malls, I smell food crap in grocery stores, and I hear financial bull crap on business television. Learn to smack the crap before getting whacked.
2. Crap rots your brain:
This is your brain. This is your brain on crap. Marketing machines are mavericks at getting your brain hooked on crap. They know how to appeal to your senses, your emotions, your desires, and your bank account. They make crap sound important, needed, and affordable. Musical marketing messages get under you skin and into your veins by mapping your brain to buy crap. Marketers needle their way into your wallet by launching crap, unveiling crap, and convincing you to upgrade crap. The hit is quick, pleasurable, and intoxicating.
3. Crap kills:
Crap kills our environment and rots in our landfills. Look everywhere and you see the causalities of crap corroding our landscape. Crap food kills people by rotting our arteries and poisoning our blood. Crap food fails to nourish and causes disease and obesity.
4. Crap is addictive:
Ever notice why you buy crap? Crap is bought to perhaps help feel emotionally better one day, fill a short-term desire, or as an unplanned splurge. You get a crap fix, the rush heightens, and then you need another hit to bring the warm feelings back. For some reason we hoard our crap until we’ve stuffed our bodies and homes full of cluttered mess. Perhaps this crap collecting is a throw back from our hunter and gather days when we needed to store and stash our stuff for times of scarcity. Perhaps crap collection is something we’re hard-wired to do and we don’t have a sense of being stuffed.
5. Crap is disposable:
Something weird happened to the value of stuff from my grandparents era to today. Back then, stuff was honored, maintained, shared, and passed down from generation to generation. My grandparent’s stuff lasted and was expected to be useful year after year. Today, stuff doesn’t endure the test of time. It becomes obsolete, discontinued, deprecated, and abandoned. We garbage and consume crap quickly and fiercely. Crap is a disposable and insatiable addiction.
Just say “NO” to crap!
Just say “NO” to buying crap. Say no to the shopping stupor, the toxic food cravings, and the promise of financial bliss. Stop chasing the crap dragon. It’s possible to kick the crap habit by investing in quality products and whole foods. We vote with our dollars. The more we vote for quality and the less we vote for crap the better our health, our wealth, and our self.
Pings:
- Carnival of Personal Finance #145 : Carnival of Personal Finance March 24th, 2008
- Highlights From the World of Personal Finance Blogs at Beyond Paycheck to Paycheck March 24th, 2008
- Monroe on a Budget » Blog Archive » Carnival of Personal Finance at Million Dollar Journey March 24th, 2008
- Recommended Carnival Reading « Finance Gets Personal March 25th, 2008
- Monday Morning Link Time « Are You Going To Be This Way The Rest of The Time I Know You? March 31st, 2008
- 10 Bloggers Share Their Best Post Ever April 10th, 2008
- Delicious Links - 20 links - google, blogging, wordpress, twitter, lifehacks « // Internet Duct Tape April 12th, 2008
- Fab Quotes Of The Week: Week 3 | Catherine Lawson April 27th, 2008
Comments:
Crap is whack. You are punny.
Wow…so true. the one that i found most interesting was “crap is disposable”…that the concept and quality of “stuff” changed over time.
I’m with you. I’m saying “NO” to crap!
Awesome post. Sure gives you something to think about it!
Upgrading the crap: this is such a curse, isn’t it! Just when you find a *good* item, they discontinue making it, and the ‘newer, shinier’ model is inferior or incompatible with what you already have. Electronic crap is an endless cycle of upgrading. Arrgh.
I’ve noticed that even companies which used to make durable furniture, appliances, etc. seem to be trading on their good reputations to sell cheapened versions, some even designed to be non-repairable! I find it ironic that I can buy very sturdy older furniture for a few dollars at the Habitat Re-store, while the newer mass-market furniture (mostly veneered particleboard) costs a lot. Style and fashion trends seem to take precedence over quality. Television is probably influencing this trend… superficiality is everywhere. And speaking of TV’s, just imagine how many old ones will hit the landfills when the signals switch to all digital.
Well said. Separating the crap from the things that hold true value to us is probably the greatest step we can take toward both financial freedom and personal happiness.
Yes! Preach on! I’ve been trying to say the same thing about crap lately to my family and coworkers but they just look at me like i’m nutty.
I love your blog. Your food ideas are wonderful, that’s the way I’ve been trying to eat for the past year. It requires a lot of forethought, but really that’s so much better than shoveling crap into our bodies mindlessly. Keep on bloggin!
Chickadee - I think simple economics explains why producers are switching for durability to disposable product production. Supply and Demand. Consumers are switching their preference from durable goods (when it was tougher to make a buck) to ‘up with the jones’ quantity and flair. These quality products stay on the store shelves while the people head to Walmart and Target to get their crapola cheap.
It is said to be successful you either have a product that can’t be copied or a market that has very difficult entry restrictions. Barring that you better be the low-cost producer because it is price that wins our hearts today.
Another factor that plays in here is our utility (satisfaction). I think there has been a continual shift in this area over the last little while as people gain less and less satisfaction from purchases. I would assume girls loved getting that next pair of shiek shoes but now all they think about after they buy the one pair is that they should have got the pair on the shelve at payless right beside it.
You should search for local auctions in your neighbourhoods and surrounding areas. That is where you get top quality for rock bottom prices!!!
Nice post. I leave my crap at work (http://stupidmoneyhacks.com/?p=4).
Do you have a picture of what my brain on crap would look like?
Found you via Skelliewag. Love, love, love this post!
Simple Mom: HUGS! Thank you! I always wanted to write this post, but finally felt empowered when Skellie challenged her readers to write a Trump Card Post. Writing this post took forever. I drove my “better half” nuts. I drove myself nuts. I am beyond thrilled she included me in her list, 10 Bloggers Share Their Best Post Ever.
Mr. Stupid: I don’t have a specific picture of your “brain on crap”, although I am certain you’ve experienced hundreds and thousands of marketing messages in your life.
When I wrote about marketing wiring and hooking our brains on crap I was alluding to the use of marketing Mind Share. One can see blatant “Mind Share” in action in children who can identify product marketing slogans, logos, and mascots with ease. Makes me cry, actually.
Looks like you have taken no prisoners.
After this, if anyone buys crap, they do so at their own risk.
Great post.