Trading Money for your Soul

At first I thought it would be rather easy to find someone in the Kogod School of Business who had a different viewpoint as I in regards to the severity of the environmental situation. However, it seems as if many agree that the potential of global warming, a continuous population increase, and loss of animal species will lead to many negative effects on our environment. Although they view these situations as serious ones, they still see the money signs in the future and believe that producing more, more, more is what will make our economy continue to grow (along with their wallets).

My friend Julia was nice enough to be as blatantly honest about her thoughts. We talked about the problem of consumption and abundance and why it is important for us to consider design issues in order to fix our problems. I think my most effective argument was discussing what we recently learned through Cradle to Cradle and how we must learn to be more efficient in designing our products, because it is our design flaws that can be changed. However, Julia continued to remind me of the fact that if a product is cheaper to make with toxic chemicals and in a process that would not enable all parts of a product be able to be reused, companies would still likely choose this old-fashioned method.

Julia is finishing her second year at American University, but will be graduating from the Kogod School of Business next spring. I think this is an important note to include, because to Julia - "time is money." Julia has no intent on studying abroad because she doesn't see the point, believing that it will cost her more money and understanding that she can complete her degree in the States. Julia was not turned off by this discussion, but was more than excited to continue it after we had finished our iced teas while sitting on the quad. Julia sees that there may be potential problems with the environment, but since she doesn't see these as threats to her livelihood, doesn't consider them on a daily basis.

I sent her the talk I found on TED: By William McDonough about his idea of Cradle to Cradle design. After watching this video, Julia was more inclined to see my point of view, but continued to turn it to what she knew best - business. Julia showed me that it is best to be proactive in trying to get others to listen to my point of view. If I had simply ended our conversation over coffee, Julia would likely have remained with her mindset. This is not to mean that I changed her point of view, but it did make her consider what I was saying a second time. I do not think you can be successful by being conciliatory. Rather, a more provacative, proactive attitude will get those who are skeptical to think about environmental issues.

Even for myself I have realized that the more extreme a potential situation can get, the more likely I am to change my behavior. By showing statistics and facts to business students, as well as lists of toxic chemicals, constructive change can occur--- it just may take a long time and persuasion from many different angles.