US frontier origins and throwaway mentality.

[xsmilemilex]

Is convenience more important than sustainabilty? Explore the influence of the US frontier origins of on the throwaway mentality.

[WaldoMcFroog]

And when is your assignment due in?

[Bazile]

How many sides of A4 do you want ?

[heathfield]

I seem to remember having a book about this, but I'm sure I threw it away.

[xsmilemilex]

this is a single question i have been stuck on, and i just have NO idea what it means: if anything, what is throwaway mentality? and what does it have to do with US frontier origins?

-thank you :)

[WaldoMcFroog]

The throwaway mentality refers to the consumerist notion that replaced the 'make do and mend' mentality prior to the 1950s. Increased production of consumer goods and consumer culture lead to the instilling of the notion that one must always replace goods when they fail or go out of fashion, hence people moving into new houses and ripping out perfectly good kitchens and bathrooms because they're not the right colour.

[jake-the-peg]

Of course this question has an particularly interesting assumption embedded in it.

Clearly many other countries, such as the UK and much of the western world have a bit of a throw-away mentality too but do not have a "US frontier" heritage.

If the assumption in the question is correct it would imply that the rest of western culture caught this particular disease from the US.

Personally I'd suggest that there are other more dominant origins.

Primarily the realisation by marketing types that in order to sell more products you can appeal to novelty.

You have to buy the latest model, this years car, the latest fashions etc. etc. and to support this you churn out updated models every year, every quarter or even quicker.

Support this with advertising suggesting that you're somehow not as good as the man/woman next door if you don't have the latest model and you quickly end up with a society where second hand is second class.

And what happens to last years model? it's thrown away and that costs manufacturers nothing - or it used to.

The main drivers of disposable goods are not American culture but rather capitalistic drive for greater product turnover.

If this sounds like an environmental disaster - well it doesn't have to be. A recent government study in the UK comparing the environmental benefits of disposal veruses cloth nappies/diapers surprising concluded there was little between them. The environmental costs of washing, disinfecting and delivering the traditional ones soon mount up.

The problem comes when people are convinced that they need a new whatever each year when really they don't.

Oh BTW you get better responses on here if you say "I've got this question I'm having trouble with" rather than just typing in the question- it kind of looks a bit lazy if you know what I mean

[jno]

I'd be surprised if early pioneers on the US frontiers had a throwaway mentality. If they threw away a plough they'd have to get a new one, and how would they do that? And how long would it take before the next plough salesman from St Louis dropped by with the new 1823 model? You'd probably have to make it yourself at home. Mending an old one is simpler and cheaper.

The notion of the USA as a land of plenty initially related to natural resources rather than consumer goods. The arable land stretched out forever, there were any number of rivers providing beaver pelts for the top hat industry, and people could live in self-sufficiency. That still didn't mean they threw stuff away. This had to wait until mass production of cheap goods for an expanding market - most of which would have been in cities, and rather later than the era of 'frontier mentality'. So I'm unconvinced there's any link.

Given the way the question is framed - seemingly saying there is an influence - this is probably the wrong answer. But it's the one I'd argue.

[xsmilemilex]

that is exactly what i was thinking, i didn't see the link between the two. i had somewhat of an understanding of the both, but i didn't understand the connection between the two.