Scarlet Statistics

A week has passed and by some miracle I managed to wear my tag a majority of the week, and the reactions to its presence were interesting.

First, a person either very quickly inquired about the tag on my chest or tried to slyly see what it said without broaching the topic. Next, I would tell them that I was wearing this for my class and that we inventoried our clothing for their implicit impacts that we usually don't think about. Then the response was usually some variation of "Ok." I wore my tag to classes, to meetings, to practices and to a big dinner at Hillel. I eventually forgot that it was on until someone brought up the idea. Most people seemed uninterested or maybe even gave an eye roll to what may have appeared like eco-crusading. A number of people responded by inquiring if I was connected to the Trayless Campaign, and one girl commented on how great it was that although the task of constantly describing it to people was difficult, that it was really useful for spreading a message.

Overall description of my experience? Well, it was sort of embarrassing...1.5% from second-hand stores is not such a good showing on my part. I would keep telling myself that I had other stuff, I just didn't include it in the inventory or that it wasn't my fault, because free t-shirts are thrown at us left and right. No level or rationalizing, though, could really remedy the dissonance. Interestingly, this endeavor highlighted how different people put different emphasis on different behaviors, especially in the environmental world. I take a lot of time and care when evaluating what foods I want to eat and what production modes I want to support, other people haven't bought a newly made pair of pants in years or are authoritarian about keeping heating bills down. There is a lot that can and needs to be done, and it can be overwhelming at times, but I think this goes to show that it is good to reevaluate from time to time what you are not putting as much effort into, because it may unearth some skeletons that you'd forgotten about.