Over three decades ago, the BND meme was born. Conceived by artist Ted Dave, the ritual sprang out of the realization that addiction-forming advertising had polluted our mental environment, and it was killing not only our wallets but our culture, our souls, our planet. Hence the one-day challenge to "participate by not participating."
A handful of years later, we rescheduled it to fall on the all-American consumption blitz of Black Friday. Riding the wave of an early viral campaign, soon the annual shopping moratorium was being observed in over five dozen countries. Then, the meme mutated from a single day to a whole season: Buy Nothing Xmas was brought to bear on the emptiness and waste of the modern yuletide holiday.
And then it mutated again. Now, in over 6,500 Facebook groups across 44 nations, millions are living by its tenets every single day. They share tools, clothing and food, hand-made goods, hand-me-downs, and everything in between. Buying, selling, trading and bartering are all strictly forbidden.
Welcome to a cashless, wireless, wasteless world.
From a single day to a season-long tradition to a daily habit — Buy Nothing has evolved from a crazy idea to a widely practiced way of life. No leaders, no capital, no outside meddling: with nothing but numbers and the spark of a great idea, it has revolutionized the lives of millions — and potentially the warming world.
After three generations of Buy Nothing, what will the fourth look like? Will it dig deeper, move further, adapt faster? Can it be wielded with force against climate change, putting humanity onto a sane sustainable path?
The answer starts with a single day.
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Hey America, are you ready for a non-tariff solution for balancing your books?
When Trump declared an all-out trade war with the rest of the world by slapping "reciprocal" tariffs on pretty much every country, his message was: the ATM machine is closed! All these countries are ripping America off! It stops now!
In his view, whenever there's a trade imbalance, there's also a power imbalance — the one who's buying more than they're selling is getting hosed. Tariffs are supposed to restore some fairness. "Trade deficits are subsidies, pure and simple."
But that's not true. Not only is it not true, it's not the point. There's a piece of the story that's missing here, and Trump seems to be the only one who doesn't see it. The reason all these countries are selling too much to America is that America is asking for it. It's demanding more and more and more.
It cannot satisfy its appetites with its own home cooking: it's gotta order out.
There's an obvious way to fix this, and it's not tariffs. It's much simpler. But at the same time it's exponentially harder, because it insults "the American way" — that god-given right to scratch every itch, indulge every whim, put everything on plastic and don't pick up the phone when the creditors come calling.
Swear off clocks.
Instead, tune in to the rhythms of the turning world. Locate yourself in space and time by the feeling you get when you look up at the sky, by the sound of birdsong in the morning. And, later in the day, by the mood of the people around you.
Then slow down. Whenever you're even a little overextended, insert a sacred pause, a micro-Sabbath, right there in your day.
Then declutter. Get rid of your car, your dishwasher, your air conditioner, your electric can opener. Not all at once: take your time. Do it bit by bit when it feels right to make those edits to your life.
Then stop visiting supermarkets and go radically local instead.
Then wean yourself off your phone till you're only on it for a tiny fraction of every day — be more present than ever.
Sounds crazy I know. But is it any crazier than what's happening to us right now — most of us half-assing our way through life with weak stabs at change that don't cut the sadness and anxiety one bit?
Think of the all-in as Plan B — because Plan A isn't working so well — a last-ditch attempt to yank yourself out of the corpo-consumer-capitalist death machine before it totally engulfs you.
Our editor in chief Kalle Lasn sat down with Daniel Pinchbeck to talk about the big ideas from Manifesto for World Revolution, the history of Adbusters, BUMs, Gen Z uprisings . . . how to save the world . . . and how to wobble.
Check it out. Share widely. Grab a copy of Manifesto.
We know it's a long shot but as soon as we have fifty thousand members signed up, we will hold a communal brainstorm and decide what the next step in our evolution should be.
Hot off the press is the newest report of the Global Flourishing Study — an ongoing project managed by Harvard and Baylor which checks in with hundreds of thousands of folks in 22 countries to see how they're doing. "Flourishing" might best be described as truly crushing this thing called life. You're happy, you're healthy, you're at peace. Once again this year, the Scandinavian countries came out on top.
The big surprise was who came out on the bottom: Japan, the UK, and the United States. Countries with among the highest GDP in the world.
WTF?
