Thursday, June 25, 2009

T-shirt angst

A couple of days ago, someone tried to give me a free t-shirt, and I turned it down. I am attending my denomination's annual General Assembly, an event that is full of energy and earnest enthusiasm for Doing the Right Thing. It's an election year this time around; we are choosing the person who will lead the denomination for the next four -- and possibly eight -- years, and that means all the usual campaign folderol. Each candidate has official buttons and t-shirts, given out free to supporters.

Here's the catch: I am not a fan of single- or limited use items, especially not clothing. I am also not a fan of conventional cotton t-shirts made under unknown working conditions. So I passed on the t-shirt. Being a Nice White Lady who is not inclined to lecture enthusiastic, well-meaning strangers, I also passed on the lecture running through my head  (and now into this blog -- oh, well). But if either of these candidates had offered more subtle t-shirt designs, badges or buttons that were made of recycled or sustainable materials, fair trade souvenirs or something other than disposable, wasteful gewgaws, they'd have an edge with me. And stop with the daily campaign newsletters, already.

But I do appreciate the opportunity to use "folderol" and "gewgaws".

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

Sounds like you are a UU! It is sad that their campaigns didn't honor our espoused values re: fair trade, working conditions, etc.

another nice white lady

Unknown said...

You got me! It was during the campaign days at GA when I had to keep saying "no" to T-shirts.