"Can sustainability be fun?" – that's just one of the questions we ask in the new edition of The SPIN OFF...
In the current debates about sustainability and climate protection–topics that also move us in The SPIN OFF–one thing strikes me again and again: if you're not clearly and consistently in favor of it, you must be against it. It quickly becomes morally sour and a bit hostile to life, if consumption is not completely demonized.
Admittedly, it can't hurt to question the lifestyle that all of the world's major industrialized nations cultivate from time to time. Hopefully, it is clear to everyone that we live on an extremely large scale by comparison, and that it is not a human right to jet halfway around the world on vacation a few times a year. And let’s not even want to start with the crazy global transport routes that our consumer goods take.
Sometimes, however, it seems to me that the proposals for improving the world miss the mark and open up new gaps: Who are we high-income earners to deny people with lower incomes the pleasure of shopping at H&M or the long-saved week's vacation in Mallorca?
On a larger scale: because we have just discovered climate protection for ourselves, the sourcing countries should now please convert their production to green–but please do so in such a way that our profit margins are maintained. The costs for a better world are borne by those at the beginning of the supply chain.
The point: the matter is complex, much more complex than we want to admit. And this is by far not only due to small-scale and unmanageable production mechanisms. It's because of our species. Humans are irrational, unreasonable, thoughtless. This is detrimental to the common good. But it is also exactly what makes life fun.
To make the connection to the new edition of The SPIN OFF, I want to mention a phrase that particularly caught my eye while proofreading the issue: “Hedonistic Sustainability.”
My colleague Maria Cristina Pavarini uses it in her feature on Biophilic Architecture in connection with the transformation of conventional inner-city buildings into multifunctional entertainment complexes with eco-infrastructure. It's a matter of combining the best of both worlds: responsibility for the common good and space for individual development. Then sustainable living can also be fun.
Sabine Kühnl
Executive Editor, The SPIN OFF
P.S. Make sure to get your hands on our new magazine – for example next week in Munich at Munich Fabric Start/Bluezone!
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