Don't Trust the Minimalists/The Minimalists
413.27 ppm
C. van Gog, 14 January 2020
According to two people who call themselves "The Minimalists" we should buy the "Pakt Coffee Kit" (see here for a picture). Let's wind back a bit. What do they mean with minimalism? From their website:
Minimalism is a tool that can assist you in finding freedom. . . . Freedom from the trappings of the consumer culture we’ve built our lives around. Real freedom.
How wonderful! So you are telling me—an innocent deer ensnared in the trappings of consumer culture—that there is a way out? And this way out starts with paying $15 for your book on minimalism and $150 for an "on-the-go" coffee machine? I should mention that the Pakt Coffee Kit team includes a marketer, the job which perpetuates consumer culture. If that's not enough, the YouTube videos of the Minimalists include plenty of affiliate links (unlike luminouscuboids, see cuboids.page.link/cuboids).
A bit further on, they write:
What is minimalism? If we had to sum it up in a single sentence, we would say, Minimalism is a tool to rid yourself of life’s excess in favor of focusing on what’s important—so you can find happiness, fulfillment, and freedom.
That sounds great! Well, let me think. What's more meaningful, drinking a cup of coffee all alone, in unhappy, unfulfilled isolation, or drinking with someone else, maybe a colleague or friend, or even a total stranger? I can see much more fulfillment in making new connections! How weird that the Pakt Coffee Kit can only make one cup of coffee at a time! I'm supposed to only care about myself? Is that what minimalism is about?
Even if there is no one to share coffee with, and even if I'm in the awkward position of having access to electricity and drinking water, but not to coffee, I'd rather resort to another, let's say, more minimalist coffee-making method. Rather than giving an explanation, I have put the "Pakt Coffee Kit" and my solution side by side here: viewsync.net/watch?v=SMpmz4YL1Hw&t=0&v=D1PWXjTDKGE&t=0&mode=solo (play until right-hand video is finished). It saves me time, 150 dollars, and, as a bonus, I barely have to do dishes afterwards.
Despite the strong wording of this post, I do not have anything against the Minimalists or against minimalists in general. In a world in which the ultra-rich buy private submarines and whatnot, a portable coffee machine is relatively innocent. Rather, my point is that if we wish to relate critically to "consumer capitalism", it will not necessarily suffice to become "minimalists": minimalism, like most movements, is still subject to the same capitalist structures and forces it opposes. In my opininion, on a personal level the first step should be to clarify the line between needs and wants. Whole industries are built around needs; instead of soberly satisfying a need, they amplify it and make its satisfaction as hedonically appealing as the consumer can afford. The antidote is an emancipated contentment with a simple fulfillment of one's needs. It is in the Buddha's teachings that I have found inspiration for such contentment.