I have a question for you folks who are decrying corporations...

[burythehatchet]

when will you consider stopping doing business with them? When will you close you bank account, get rid of your cell phone, cancel your cable, and so on.

Seriously, this is not an invitation to fight, I have a great disdain for corporate America, having lived there for 25 years.

In fact, every passing day I think of little adjustments in my life so that I will be prepared when the corporate powers turn on us completely.

[Orrex]

1. If you and I and everyone you and I know stopped shopping at Wal*Mart, they wouldn't even notice

The individual has no power. None. So getting rid of one's cell phone or closing the bank account will do nothing but inconvenience the individual.



And "corporate powers turned on us completely" over a century ago.

[ayeshahaqqiqa]

2. Not decrying corporations, but how the government treats them

They are given the same rights as a person, which imho is wrong. Corporations and non incorporated business needs to be regulated so that they don't abuse their workers and the environment and health and safety laws.

[burythehatchet]

5. We are 100% in agreement. The point is that they are misbehaving badly yet we

continue to fund them because as the poster above said our actions do not amount to making much difference, a sentiment with which I completely disagree. I feel empowered whenever I become a little bit less of a consumer.

[Jackpine Radical]

3. To the extent it is practical, I avoid large corporations.

We mostly use credit unions instead of banks. We buy our heating fuel and much of our gasoline from co-ops. Things like that.

[burythehatchet]

9. Awesome. I think this may be a market that many of us who are between jobs

ought to look at. New (old) ways of food distribution.

[Jackpine Radical]

18. We also make regular use of our local farmer's market

and buy a lot of bulk foods from a local "Amish" (actually Old Order Mennonite iirc) store. Most of our meat is from free-range critters raised by local farmers, who deliver it frozen to fill our freezer once a year.

And--reminded by a post further down--we get our electricity from a rural co-op, but although we are happy this is so, the choice was dictated by where we live, not by any particular action on our part.

[LWolf]

4. I don't know if it's possible to do a blanket boycott of corporations.

I'm lucky to live where I can get my electricity from a co-op.

I bank with a credit union.

I shop from small business and independent sellers whenever possible.

That doesn't mean that the products that they got from wholesalers weren't produced by corporations.

All motorized transportation would come to a halt if there were no vehicles designed, manufactured, and sold by corporations.

I'm willing to choose local small business whenever possible. Distant small business when local isn't possible.

What else do you suggest?

[burythehatchet]

8. You don't need my counsel; you've done a great job with your actions.

My goal is to get rid of my cable tv (should be easy but its a psychological barrier) and reduce my overall consumption/dependence even further

[LWolf]

13. My cable company

provides my internet connection, so I'm not going to get rid of them. ;)

I don't know if there is an internet connection that DOESN'T go through a corporation in some fashion.

When I lived 1000 miles to the south, in another state, I spent 29 of the 30 years I lived there refusing to deal with the cable company. They had a terrible, and well-deserved, reputation for customer service. I used dial-up, then DSL, through the phone company (still a corporation,) and satellite tv (there were no signals coming through an antenna.)

Here, there is no dsl, I don't want dial-up, and the cable tv company is, while a franchise of a larger corporation, smallish, responsive, and efficient.

I think the real thing is to find independent and local providers whenever possible, and to accept that it won't be possible for some products or services. Then decide how essential those products and services are.

[pnwmom]

16. You couldn't. For one thing, a one man company could be a corporation.

The name "corporation" doesn't tell you anything about the size of a company, it merely denotes a certain legal structure.

[LWolf]

17. That's true,

although of course, that's not the connotation used in this context.

[The_Commonist]

6. I do as little business as possible...

...with big corporations.
Some of it is inevitable, of course, but I try to keep it simple.

I don't have cable TV, my cell phone company is Working Assets (now called Credo), my bank is local, my wife's is a credit union, I don't own a car, I never eat fast food or shop in a mall, I keep the thermostat pretty low, ETC.

Every little bit helps.

[burythehatchet]

10. Wow. a lot of of people seem to doing a lot of great stuff. I'm impressed

and getting some good ideas from you all.

[hlthe2b]

7. Can't do away totally, but you can become selective...

*Treated badly by Comcast or its predecessor cable companies--cancel it (I did 4+ years ago)
*Treated badly by Qwest or some other telephone provider--cancel it (I did 3 years ago and now rely on cell only--with minimal extras)
*Treated badly by DSL or Broadband provider-- concider relying on a wireless plan through your cell provider until more competition/options open)
*Treated badly by a chain department store or restaurant? Politely complain to management and/or up the chain... Is this a pattern?
-Inform them you will no longer do business with them and go elsewhere...
-Try to influence local businesses a bit more and show a bit more patience if you can... Losing them hurts more

*Show some restrain and abide by your principles.
I know this is where I'll get some heat, but I can not help but be depressed when I think back to all the lively,heated discussion about the
role of AT&T in voluntarily setting up a wireless surveillance shop for the US GOvernment and giving over our private information
voluntarily. A lawsuit is still pending for those who continue to follow this. How many DUers vowed then never to use AT&T again. But, guess
what happened when AT&T was announced as the only carrier for the Iphone...:eyes: While I feel similarly about WalMart-- I know for many
there are not a lot of options--for basic needs. Somehow, though I don't view an AT&T-contract IPhone to be in a similar category.

[burythehatchet]

11. just a moment to savor to the sweet memory of when I fired Comcast

mmmmmmm

[emilyg]

12. When the Comcast installer showed up 8 hours late

at my house - and then told me he forgot his tools - it gave me great pleasure to say - BYE FOREVER.

[The_Commonist]

19. And that is the only reason I don't have an iPhone

Everyone I know has an iPhone, and having one would help me out a lot in my business.
I have several Macs, and would love an iPhone, but as long as it's locked to AT&T, I won't buy one.
I've told Apple this too. For what that's worth..

[hlthe2b]

20. Me too...

I'd like to have one and could have purchase one, but I simply will not deal with AT&T... My father worked for years for one of the precursor of AT&T, back in the day. It makes me sad to say I will probably NEVER deal with them again.

[readmoreoften]

14. Our power isn't in the boycott. It's in the strike.

Our power isn't in withholding what we earn, it's in shutting the system down. Boycotts rely on the consciouses of atomized, isolated people doing 'the right thing'--usually because they can afford to. Strikes shut down the system by doing something together, by taking care of each other, by public action, by shutting the system down and reminding corporate power of our OWN power. Our power is in our work, not in our paycheck.

What we need is a very specific demand to strike over. I'm sure the upcoming Great Depression will give it to us.

[bread_and_roses]

15. Yes. And your point about "able to afford to" is well-taken.

While I'm all in favor of reducing consumption and dealing local whenever possible (and do both myself), I don't fool myself that in and of itself that is effective action. I also know that were I poorer, with a family to feed, I'd be buying my groceries at Walmart.

Like all tools, boycotts have a use, but it is limited. It exercises only our "power" as consumers. It's like buying "green" products from Johnson & Johnson - maybe a better choice than buying non-green from J&J, but it challenges neither the status of consumer as our primary role in society, nor J&J's making other polluting products, nor the culture of consumerism - which has to go if the earth is to survive.