Less

2011-10-04T17:34:00.000-07:00

/lɛs/
noun
a small amount or quantity
adverb
to a smaller extent, amount, size or degree

Less is perceived as a lack of some form. Less food translates to starvation, less money means poverty, and less things somehow point to a lack of fulfillment; a measure of dissatisfaction.
Things like satisfaction are tricky to define though. If I even attempt to generalize what should be considered satisfactory and what is downright incredulous, I'm sure JustStop! is bound to get some hate mail [or even the occasional threat if I really break it down] in the next few hours. So to keep matters calm, I won't. Instead, I urge you to define it for yourself.

But on a side note, imagine an unadventurous Friday night at home when you seem to be flipping between channels and constantly complaining how nothing "good" is ever playing, and yet you continue to torture your eyes by watching 3 second previews of what's coming on HBO, or CBS, or [if things really seem to be down in the gutter that night] even the Discovery channel. When suddenly you see this ...

"Whoa! This is so awesome!" "This **** is crazy!" "I WISH I HAD A COOKIE JAR TOO!" ... might be one of the million expressions that might come out of your mouth after watching this. I definitely had a rather maniacal glint in my eyes and a definite growling in my stomach after seeing the hoard of food in the "bunker". But even as I was struggling to continue watching the show while the need for a midnight snack built up gradually, something kept bothering me. I tried to get rid of it and although a large number of distractions, namely Facebook, Twitter, tvduck.com, the never ending world of megavideo, msn, etc were at my disposal, the little tick would not go away.
And as luck would have it, the show ended and all my friends were too busy to talk [yes, they are all busybodies on a Friday night. Doesn't make them any cooler, mind you ... does it? ... anyways] I was forced to think about what I had just witnessed. Hundreds of people who are featured on this show and many more who use coupons to go shopping and buy a large amount of things for much less seems like a dream come true in the midst of economic crisis and employment instability. As a student, this might even be your ticket out of eating ramen every night for dinner. But as the title suggests, Extreme couponing really does take its toll. Storing is an anthropological phenomenon, humans do it after the harvest, ants do it for the winter, you get the point. But is all of THIS really necessary?

What good is a room full of cookies and snacks going to do for you? Other than maybe increase the tendency to eat, and eat, and eat even more! What good is a basement full of laundry detergent going to do? Help you do 150000000 loads of laundry, save you a trip to the store ... I think its unnecessary to make yourself believe that spending $8 instead of $2000 [oh yes, this happens fairy often on the show] is an accomplishment. Economically, maybe. Keeping in mind that you exist as an entity independent of all others walking this Earth will bring you the satisfaction and definitely a lot more meals on the table for a lot less money. But this behaviour is delusional according to me. We are all a part of something bigger ... the universe DUH! No seriously, focus! The key to understanding why I am even bothering to ramble on about a random show on TLC that nobody probably even watches is to reflect back on what is it exactly [if there's anything at all] that you find incredibly ridiculous in the behaviour we have instilled into ourselves. Our way of living, consuming and disposing is at large a perfectly good reflection of what we think about each of these issues.

Sitting at home and critiquing this show is simply not enough. This is the "extreme" version of what we do on a daily basis. It is our negligence and ignorance towards matters of consumption which has given rise to a behaviour like this, our ignorance [however small scale you think it is] has resulted in the generation of millions of dollars for TV shows, for grocery stores, for the print media, and for who knows how many other sources.

This doesn't mean that we should all stop using any form of discounts and starve, given the current prices of food and other commodities; I just want to point out that we have made consuming a lot easier and thinking about it twice as hard. Anti-consumerism is not the way I'm inclined, just considering there may be just a rare possibility that you don't actually need to stock up on food where a double door fridge is not enough; differentiating between what and more importantly HOW MUCH you need is the key. Consuming wisely and proportionally is the key!

To JustStop! less means more! What does it mean to YOU?

This is not a clever end to a pointless rant. Think about this and tell us what you think! Keeping it to yourself might do you good, but sharing it will take us a step closer to redefining less.

Email us at: juststop2011@gmail.com
or join our Facebook group: Just $top

- H

Natural Disasters of 2011

2011-07-08T10:51:00.000-07:00

What more do we have in store for this year??!!

By George from Really: Natural Disasters 2011

<http://baleta.blogspot.com/2011/03/natural-disasters-2011.html>

We are PRO-stuff, not ANTI!

2011-01-31T20:58:00.001-08:00

As Victor Lebow (1955) 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, worn out, replaced, and discarded at an ever increasing rate.”

Post World War II in order to increase the standard of living and collective contentment, the above theory by Lebow was adapted by governments and big corporations. By making over-consumption our way of life, our economy grew and an industrial world came into power. And just as Lebow had predicted, the target of promoting materialism succeeded. At present, according to Consumers Report website (2008), an average North American is bombarded with approximately 250 commercial messages per day. The goal of most of these advertisements is to make consumerists reach their satisfaction in a materialistic world. The media and the entertainment world are major sources of imposing new fashion trends onto our consumerist society. People need to step out of their roles as consumer puppets misguided by the pre-planned government and corporation conspiracies. They need to realize their true role as citizens of a democratic society and understand the future impacts of their actions. Just Stop not only wishes to unveil the truth behind over-consumption that has been part of this society since Victor Lebow, but also to touch upon other conspiracies such as perceived obsolescence and planned obsolescence. Planned obsolescence is a policy of deliberately planning and designing products in such a way that they become out-of-date or useless within a known time period. The team operating this group is a mix of students who believe in taking good care of their things, making them last as long as possible, resist the upgrade- don’t throw it out just because a slightly newer version is available. Just Stop is not anti-stuff but rather PRO-stuff.

Just Stop!

Less

Natural Disasters of 2011

We are PRO-stuff, not ANTI!