# Why doesn't "ethical consumerism" work? **URL:** \ **Category:** Great Debates\ **Created:** [April 15, 2020, 12:12pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-doesnt-ethical-consumerism-work/851846 "2020-04-15T12:12:27Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 11\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![D\_Anconia](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/67e7ee/32.png) [@D\_Anconia](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/D_Anconia)\ **Post date:** [April 20, 2020, 2:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-doesnt-ethical-consumerism-work/851846/21 "2020-04-20T14:46:59Z")
> [@Ulfreida](#): > > I’m just trying to say the reason ethical consumerism is a bust is because our government has a problem with mandating ethics at the corporate level. More enlightened governments don’t have such qualms. Mandated ethics are not ethical. ---
**Author:** ![Chingon](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/chingon/32/17645_2.png) [@Chingon](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chingon)\ **Post date:** [April 20, 2020, 2:53pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-doesnt-ethical-consumerism-work/851846/22 "2020-04-20T14:53:59Z")
So religions aren’t ethical then? ---
**Author:** ![Esprise\_Me](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/esprise_me/32/2947_2.png) [@Esprise\_Me](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Esprise_Me)\ **Post date:** [April 20, 2020, 4:06pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-doesnt-ethical-consumerism-work/851846/23 "2020-04-20T16:06:05Z")
Ethical consumerism isn’t going to be a complete solution for the reasons already stated. But it’s something we can all do to some extent, and those actions can make a difference. Even if we can’t bring the big corporations to their knees, each person who buys from a smaller company makes a difference in their ability to make their products and services available to more consumers. Every person who buys a more ethical product from a company offering multiple choices gives them a reason to keep offering it. The more we do what we can, the more we’ll be able to do. Vegetarian and vegan foods are a good example of this. It used to be a lot harder to find a vegetarian meal in a regular restaurant, to say nothing of an all-vegetarian restaurant. Now there’s almost always something plant-based and tasty to eat, and there are some options so good that even meat-eaters choose to order them. Meat is still available, of course, and most people eat it often. But because a small number of people steadfastly refused, now we all have options that don’t feel like such a sacrifice. ---
**Author:** ![Buck\_Godot](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/buck_godot/32/6573_2.png) [@Buck\_Godot](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Buck_Godot)\ **Post date:** [April 20, 2020, 5:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-doesnt-ethical-consumerism-work/851846/24 "2020-04-20T17:04:26Z")
Part of the problem is the cost vs return for an individual consumer. My not buying my individual pair of shoes from Nike, is not going to have much of an effect on the working conditions in China, but it will have an immediately noticeable impact on me in that I will won’t get the nice shoes I want. So when faced with a vague incremental change to someone I’ve never met versus an immediate effect to myself the scale is quite unbalanced The bus Boycott had several advantages in this regard. The benefits that the Boycott was trying to achieve were going to be felt directly by those who were doing the boycotting. Those participating in the Boycott could directly see the effect they were having in the form of empty buses driving along their streets, and there was a strong social pressure to participate in the boycott. So there was a direct incentive to the individual to participate or face ostracism from their community. ---
**Author:** ![Really\_Not\_All\_That\_Bright](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/e8c25b/32.png) [@Really\_Not\_All\_That\_Bright](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Really_Not_All_That_Bright)\ **Post date:** [April 20, 2020, 5:24pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-doesnt-ethical-consumerism-work/851846/25 "2020-04-20T17:24:31Z")
I’m not sure in what sense it doesn’t work. Lately - which I define as “within the social media age” - we see more and more corporations behaving ethically, even when it results in a net loss of goodwill. Consider the [boycott](https://www.reuters.com/article/us-north-carolina-lgbt/seeking-end-to-boycott-north-carolina-rescinds-transgender-bathroom-law-idUSKBN1711V4) of North Carolina over the “bathroom bill,” or DSG’s broad elimination of [gun sales](https://www.cnn.com/2020/03/10/business/dicks-sporting-goods-remove-guns-from-440-stores/index.html), or Nike’s [Kaepernick](https://www.fastcompany.com/90399316/one-year-later-what-did-we-learn-from-nikes-blockbuster-colin-kaepernick-ad) ads. You can certainly say that these were just cynical ploys designed to increase sales in the long run, and they may very well be, but the point is that they were all consumer-driven. ---
**Author:** ![Odesio](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/odesio/32/20003_2.png) [@Odesio](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Odesio)\ **Post date:** [April 20, 2020, 5:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-doesnt-ethical-consumerism-work/851846/26 "2020-04-20T17:31:03Z")
> [@Telemark](#): > > Actually, it does. If that’s not ethics, I’m not sure what possibly qualifies. What boycott isn’t an example of ethical consumerism then? ---
**Author:** ![Topologist](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/topologist/32/3208_2.png) [@Topologist](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Topologist)\ **Post date:** [April 20, 2020, 5:45pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-doesnt-ethical-consumerism-work/851846/27 "2020-04-20T17:45:41Z")
I’m surprised nobody has mentioned one of the more successful such boycotts, the grape boycott that started in the mid 1960s, part of the [Delano grape strike](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Delano_grape_strike). Besides taking place 50 years ago, though, it was one part of a well-organized campaign and it took a few years to have its desired effect. Have any recent attempts had that kind of thought and perseverance behind them? ---
**Author:** ![septimus](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/septimus/32/410_2.png) [@septimus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/septimus)\ **Post date:** [April 20, 2020, 6:02pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-doesnt-ethical-consumerism-work/851846/28 "2020-04-20T18:02:33Z")
Unilateral boycott is pointless. The losses to those you’re trying to reform via punishment will be measured in pennies, while you’re imposing expense and inconvenience on your own family. To have real purpose, you should join in, or organize, a wide-scale boycott. > [@Jackmannii](#): > > [This article](https://www.latimes.com/nation/la-na-boycotts-history-20180228-htmlstory.html) cites the Montgomery bus boycott along with boycotts of South African products and refusal to visit/participate in events there, as having success. Several boycotts or strikes have been successful; I’ll mention just one more. On 8 September 1964, Filipino American grape pickers went on strike for higher wages and better working conditions. Normally this would just be the signal for grape growers to pit race against race and hire Mexican Americans as scabs. Certainly neither the Filipinos nor the Mexicans had the organization or popular support for a united strike. But Cesar Chavez, a disciple of Mahatma Gandhi, agreed to join the strike. He organized a boycott of grapes which was very successful. Millions of people, in Europe as well as America, stopped buying, serving or eating grapes. The Delano Grape Strike of 1965-1970 is one of the most successful strikes or boycotts in California history. Many prominent people joined Cesar Chavez on the picket lines: Dr Martin Luther King, Jr., Robert F. Kennedy, and my mother. In 1994, Bill Clinton awarded Chavez the Presidential Medal of Freedom, posthumously. The world is more complicated than it was 50 years ago. Do not expect humanitarian progress to be easy. Real sacrifice and courage will be needed, not piddling gestures. I hope you don’t give up. Good luck! ETA: Ninja’ed by **Topologist**. ---
**Author:** ![DrDeth](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/b487fb/32.png) [@DrDeth](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DrDeth)\ **Post date:** [April 20, 2020, 7:34pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-doesnt-ethical-consumerism-work/851846/29 "2020-04-20T19:34:36Z")
> [@Muddibog](#): > > Ethical consumerism is the idea that we, as working class consumers, can solve existing inequalities simply by choosing to not buy certain things or by opting for “ethical” products. > > Why doesn’t this work in practice? Why isn’t solving inequality as easy as “just don’t buy iPhones and Nike”? Do we simpletons really have any power to reform capitalism just by putting our dollars in the right pockets or simply by hoarding our money?..? Well, if it was actually tried on a large scale in practive, we might find out if it would work. In the original Boycott, it seems to have worked. > **[Charles Boycott](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Charles_Boycott)** > > Charles Cunningham Boycott (12 March 1832 – 19 June 1897) was an English land agent whose ostracism by his local community in Ireland gave the English language the term boycott. He had served in the British Army 39th Foot, which brought him to Ireland. After retiring from the army, Boycott worked as a land agent for Lord Erne, a landowner in the Lough Mask area of County Mayo. > In 1880, as part of its campaign for the Three Fs (fair rent, fixity of tenure, and free sale) and specifically in re... ---
**Author:** ![Omar\_Little](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/omar_little/32/269_2.png) [@Omar\_Little](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Omar_Little)\ **Post date:** [April 22, 2020, 4:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-doesnt-ethical-consumerism-work/851846/30 "2020-04-22T16:52:28Z")
> [@Dewey\_Finn](#): > > So what is ethical is complicated. This ^ Ethical issues are not a bright yellow line. People’s moral compasses have different directions and levels of affront. What you may find as intolerable, may be acceptable to others, and may have different POV’s that you may have not considered. ---
**Author:** ![RioRico](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/f04885/32.png) [@RioRico](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RioRico)\ **Post date:** [April 23, 2020, 6:46am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-doesnt-ethical-consumerism-work/851846/31 "2020-04-23T06:46:37Z")
EthicalConsumer posts a [History of Successful Boycotts](https://www.ethicalconsumer.org/ethicalcampaigns/boycotts/history-successful-boycotts) since 2000. TheStacker lists [Major Boycotts That Changed History](https://thestacker.com/stories/2502/major-boycotts-changed-history). HuffPost advises [Here’s What It Takes For A Boycott To Work](https://www.huffpost.com/entry/do-boycotts-work_l_5d4cb97be4b0066eb70f19fa). SOMEBODY takes boycotts seriously. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/why-doesnt-ethical-consumerism-work/851846.md?page=1)