Story of Stuff - Completo e legendado em português

[Music] [Applause] [Music] just have one of these I got a little obsessed with mine in fact I got a little obsessed with all my stuff Have you ever wondered where all the stuff we buy comes from and where it goes when we throw it out I couldn't stop wondering about that so I looked it up and what the textbook said is that stuff moves through a system from extraction to production to distribution to consumption to disposal all together it's called the materials economy well I looked into it a little bit more in fact I spent

10 years traveling the world tracking where our stuff comes from and where it goes and you know what I found out that is not the whole story there is a lot missing from this explanation for one thing this system looks like it's fine no problem but the truth is it's a system in crisis and the reason it's a system in crisis is it's a linear system and we live on a finite planet and you cannot run a linear system on a finite Planet indefinitely every step along the way this system is interacting with the real

world in real life it's not happening on a blank white page it's interacting with societies cultures economies the environment and all along the way it's bumping up against limits limits we don't see here because the diagram is incomplete so let's go back through let's fill in some of the blanks and see what's missing well one of the most important things that's missing is people yes people people live and work all along this system and some people in this system matter a little more than others some have a little more say who are they well let's

start with the government now my friends tell me I should use a tank to symbolize the government and that's true in many countries and increasingly in our own after all more than 50% of our federal tax money is now going to the military but I'm using a person to symbolize the government because I hold true to the vision and values the government should be of the People by the people for the people it's the government's job to watch out for us to take care of us that's their job then Along Came the corporation now the

reason the corporation looks bigger than the government is that the corporation is bigger than the government of the 100 largest economies on Earth Now 51 corporations and as the corporation has grown in size and power we've seen a little change in the government where they're a little more concerned in making sure everything's working out for those guys than for us okay so let's see what else is missing from this picture we'll start with extraction which is a fancy word for natural resource exploitation which is a fancy word for trashing the planet what this looks like

is we chop down the trees we blow up mountains to get the metals inside we use up all the water and we wipe out the animals so here we are running up against our first limit we are running out of resources we are using too much stuff now I know this can be hard to hear but it's the truth so we've got to deal with it in the past three decades alone onethird of the planet's natural resource space has been consumed gone we are cutting and Mining and Hauling and trashing the place so fast that

we're undermining the planet's very ability for people to live here where I live in the United States we have less than 4% of our original forests left 40% of the waterways have become undrinkable and our problem is not just that we're using too much stuff but we're using more than our share we have 5% of the world's population but we're using 30% of the world's resources and creating 30% of the world's waste if everybody consumed at us rates we would need 3 to five planets and you know what we've only got one so my country's

response to this limitation is simply to go take somebody else's this is the third world which some would say is another word for our stuff that somehow got on somebody else's land so what does that look like the same thing trashing the place 75% of global Fisheries now are fished at or Beyond capacity 80% of the planet's original forests are gone in the Amazon alone we're losing 2,000 trees a minute that is seven football fields a minute and what about the people who live here well according to these guys they don't own these resources even

if they've been living there for Generations they don't own the means of production and they're not buying a lot of stuff and in this system if you don't own or buy a lot of stuff you don't have value so next the materials move to production and what happens there is we use energy to mix toxic chemicals in with the natural resources to make toxic contaminated products there are over a 100,000 synthetic chemicals in use in Commerce today only a handful of them have even been tested for health impacts and none have been tested for synergistic

Health impacts that means when they interact with all the other chemicals we're exposed to every day so we don't know the full impact on health and the environment of all these toxic chemicals but we do know one thing toxics in toxics out as long as we keep putting toxics into our industrial production systems we're going to keep getting toxics in the stuff that we bring into our homes and workplaces and schools and duh our bodies like bfrs brominated flame retardants they're chemical that make things more fireproof but they are super toxic they're a neurotoxin that

means toxic to the brain what are we even doing using a chemical like this yet we put it in our computers our appliances couches mattresses even some pillows in fact we take our pillows we douse them in a neurotoxin then we bring them home and put our heads on them for 8 hours a night to sleep now I don't know but it seems to me in this country with so much potential we could think of a better way to stop our heads from catching on fire at night now these toxics build up the food chain

and concentrate in our bodies do you know what is the food at the top of the food chain with the highest level of many toxic contaminants human breast milk that means that we've reached a point where the smallest members of our societies our babies are getting the highest lifetime dose of toxic chemicals from breastfeeding from their mothers is that not an incredible violation breastfeeding must be the most fundamental human Act of nurturing it should be sacred and safe now breastfeeding is still best and mothers should definitely keep breastfeeding but we should protect it they should

protect it I thought they were looking out for us and of course the people who bear the biggest brunt of these toxic chemicals are the factory workers many of whom are women of reproductive age they're working with reproductive toxins carcinogens and more now I ask you what kind of woman of reproductive age would work in a job exposed to reproductive toxins except for a woman with no other option and that's one of the beauties of this system the erosion of local environments and economies here ensures a constant supply of people with no other option global

200,000 people a day are moving from environments that have sustained them for Generations into cities many to live in slums looking for work no matter how toxic that work may be so you see it's not just resources that are wasted along this system but people too whole communities get wasted yep toxics in toxics out a lot of the toxics leave the factories in products but even more leave as byproducts or pollution and it's a lot of pollution in the US our industry admits to releasing over 4 billion pounds of toxic chemicals a year and it's

probably a lot more cuz that's only what they admit so that's another limit because Yak who wants to look at and smell 4 billion pounds of toxic chemicals a year so what do they do move the dirty factories overseas pollute someone else's land but surprise a lot of that pollution is coming right back at us carried by wind currents so what happens after all these natural resources are turned into products well it moves here for distribution now distribution means selling all the toxic contaminated junk as quickly as possible the goal here is to keep the

prices down keep the people buying and keep the inventory moving how do they keep the prices down well they don't pay the store workers very much and they skimp on health insurance every time they can it's all about externalizing the costs what that means is that the real cost costs of making stuff aren't captured in the price in other words we aren't paying for the stuff we buy I was thinking about this the other day I was walking to work and I wanted to listen to the news so I popped into a Radio Shack to

buy a radio I found this cute little green radio for $4.99 I was standing there in line to buy this thing and I was thinking how could $4.99 possibly capture the cost of making this radio and getting it into my hands the metal was probably mined in South Africa the petroleum was probably drilled in Iraq the Plastics were probably produced in China and maybe the whole thing was assembled by some 15-year-old in a macador in Mexico $4.99 wouldn't even pay the rent for the Shelf space it occupied until I came along let alone part of

the staff guys salary who helped me pick it out or the multiple ocean cruises and truck rides pieces of this radio went on that's how I realized I didn't pay for the radio so who did pay well these people paid with the loss of their natural resource space these people paid with the loss of their clean air with increasing asthma and cancer rates kids in the Congo paid with their future 30% of the kids in part of the Congo have dropped out of school to mine Co tan a metal we need for our cheap and

disposable Electronics these people even paid by having to cover their own health insurance all along this system people pitched in so I could get this radio for $4.99 and none of these contributions are recorded in any accounts book that's what I mean by the company owners externalize the true cost of production and that brings us to the Golden Arrow of consumption this is the heart of the system the engine that drives it it is so important that protecting this Arrow has become the top priority for both of these guys that's why after 911 when our

country was in shock and President Bush could have suggested any number of appropriate things to grieve to pray to hope no he said to shop to shop we have become a nation of consumers our primary identity has become that of being consumers not mothers teachers Farmers but consumers the primary way that our value is measured and demonstrated is by how much we contribute to this Arrow how much we consume and do we we shop and shop and Shop keep the materials flowing and flow they do guess what percentage of total materials flow through this system

is still in product or use 6 months after their date of sale in North America 50% 20 no 1% one in other words 99% of the stuff we Harvest mine process transport 99% of the stuff we run through this system is trashed within 6 months now how can we run a planet with that level of materials throughput it wasn't always like this the average US person now consumes twice as much as they did 50 years ago ask your grandma in her day stewardship and resourcefulness and Thrift were valued so how did this happen well it

didn't just happen it was designed shortly after World War II these guys were figuring out how to ramp up the economy retailing analyst Victor laau articulated the solution that's become the norm for the whole system he said our enormously productive economy demands that we make consumption our way of life that we convert the buying and use of goods into rituals that we seek our spiritual satisfaction our ego satisfaction in consumption we need things consumed burned up replaced and discarded at an Ever accelerating rate President Eisenhower's Council of economic advisers chairman said that the American economy's

ultimate purpose is to produce more consumer goods more consumer goods our ultimate purpose not provide healthare or education or safe Transportation or sustainability or Justice consumer goods how did they get us to jump on board this program so enthusiastically well two of their most effective strategies are planned obsolescence and perceived obsolescence planned obsolescence is another word for designed for the dump it means they actually make stuff to be useless as quickly as possible so we'll Chuck it and buy a new one it's obvious with things like plastic bags and coffee cups but now it's even

big stuff mops DVDs cameras barbecues in everything even computers have you noticed that when you buy a computer now the technology is changing so fast that in just a couple of years it's actually an impediment to communication I was curious about this so I opened up a big desktop computer to see what was inside and I found out that the piece that changes each year is just a tiny little piece in the corner but you can't just change that one piece because each new version is a different shape so you got to Chuck the whole

thing and buy a new one so I was reading industrial design journals from the 19 50s when planned obsolescence was really catching on these designers are so open about it they actually discuss how fast can they make stuff break that still leaves the consumer having enough faith in the product to go out and buy another one it was so intentional but stuff cannot break fast enough to keep this Arrow afloat so there's also perceived obsolescence now perceived obsolescence convinces us to throw away stuff that is still perfectly useful how do they do that well they

change the way the St looks so if you bought your stuff A couple of years ago everyone can tell that you haven't contributed to this Arrow recently and since the way we demonstrate our value is contributing to this Arrow it can be embarrassing like I've had the same fat white computer monitor on my desk for 5 years my coworker just got a new computer she has a flat shiny Sleek monitor it matches her computer matches her phone even her pen stand she looks like she's driving in spaceship Central and I I look like I got

a washing machine on my desk fashion is another prime example of this have you ever wondered why women's shoe heels go from fat one year to skinny the next to Fat to skinny it's not because there's some debate about which heel structure is the most healthy for women's feet it's because wearing fat heels in a skinny heel year shows everybody that you haven't contributed to that era as recently so you're not as valuable as that person in skinny heels next to you or more likely in some ad it's to keep us buying new shoes advertisements

and media General plays a big role in this each of us in the US is targeted with over 3,000 advertisements a day we see more advertisements in one year than people 50 years ago saw in a lifetime and if you think about it what's the point of an ad except to make us unhappy with what we have so 3,000 times a day we're told our hair is wrong our skin is wrong our clothes are wrong our furniture is wrong our car is wrong we are wrong but it can all be made right if we just

go shopping media also helps by hiding all of this and all of this so the only part of the materials economy we see is the shopping the extraction production and Disposal all happens outside of our field of vision so in the US we have more stuff than ever before but polls show that our national happiness is actually declining our national happiness peaked in the 1950s the same time that this consumption Mania exploded hm interesting coincidence I think I know why we have more stuff but we have less time for the things that really make us

happy friends family leisure time we're working harder than ever some analysts say we have less leisure time than any time since feudal society and you know what the two main activities are that we do with the scant leisure time we have watch TV and Shop in the US we spend three to four times as many hours shopping as our counterparts in Europe do so we're in this ridiculous situation where we go to work maybe two jobs even and we come home and we're exhausted so we plopped down on our new couch and watch TV and

the commercials tell us you suck so you got to go to the mall to buy something to feel better and then you got to go to work more to pay for the stuff you just bought so you come home and you're more tired so you sit down and you watch more TV it tells you go to the mall again and we're on this crazy work watch spend treadmill and we could just stop so in the end what happens to all the stuff we buy anyway at this rate of consumption it can't fit into our houses

even though the average house side is doubled in this country since the 1970s it all goes out in the garbage and that brings us to disposal this is the part of the materials economy we all know the most because we have to haul the junk out to the curb ourselves each of us in the United States makes 4 and2 lbs of garbage a day that's twice what we each made 30 years ago all of this garbage either gets dumped in a landfill which is just a big hole in the ground or if you're really unlucky

first it's burned in an incinerator and then dumped in the landfill either way they both pollute the air land water and don't forget change the climate incineration is really bad remember those toxics back in the production stage well burning the garbage releases the toxics up into the air even worse it makes new super toxics like dioxin dioxin is the most toxic man-made substance known to science and incinerators are the number one source of dioxin that means that we could stop the number one source of the most toxic man-made substance known just by stopping burning the

trash we could stop it today now some companies don't want to deal with building landfills and incinerators here so they just export the disposal too what about recycling does recycling help yes recycling helps recycling reduces the garbage at this end and it reduces the pressure to mine and harvest new stuff at this end yes yes yes we should all recycle but recycling is not enough recycling will never be enough for a couple reasons first the waste coming out of our houses is just the tip of the iceberg for every one garbage can of waste you

put out on the curb 70 garbage cans of waste were made Upstream just to make the junk in that one garbage can you put out on the curb so even if we could recycle 100% of the waste coming out of our households it doesn't get to the core of the problems also much of the garbage can't be recycled either because it contains too many toxics or it's designed not to be recyclable in the first place like those juice packs where they have layers of metal and paper and plastic all smooshed together you can never separate

those for True recycling so you see it is a system in crisis all along the way we're bumping up against limits from changing climate to declining happiness it's just not working but the good thing about such an all-pervasive problem is there are so many points of intervention there are people working here on saving saing forests here on clean production labor rights fair trade conscious consuming blocking landfills and incinerators and very importantly taking back our government so that it really is by the people for the people all of this work is critically important but things really

start moving when we see the connections when we see the big picture when people all along the system get united we can reclaim and transform this whole linear system into something new A system that doesn't waste resources or people people you see what we really need to Chuck is that old school throwaway mindset there's a new school of thinking about this stuff and it's based on sustainability and Equity things like green chemistry zero waste closed loop production renewable energy local living economies it's already started some say it's unrealistic too idealistic that it can't happen I

say the ones who are unrealistic are those who think that we can continue with the old way they're dreaming remember old way didn't just happen it wasn't like gravity that we just have to live with people created it and we're people too so let's create something new there's a lot of information on this website about groups doing incredible work click around get involved