I’m having one of those days where I feel immense guilt about my environmental impact on this Planet. I’ve been clearing out my closet of all the stuff that I have that I barely wore that I now need to find some home for, lest it end up in landfill. And this got me thinking about gift-giving as we approach the Holidays.
We give gifts with good intent – to show our love, to show we thought of someone, to show generosity, and sometimes in reciprocity. But giving gifts is like playing a casino game — the odds of getting it right are hopelessly slim.
Buying for yourself and guessing what you like can be hard enough
One of the hundreds of items I donated in my life to a charity shop was a sky-blue sequined dress that I’d worn once. Literally once, and that too at an unremarkable party in London (where the friend I’d gone with got doted on by a guy, whilst I stood by her like a sidekick for the whole night – truly unremarkable). As I donated it to Goodwill, I thought about all that went into it: the fabric, the sequins, the under-layer, all the materials, the dyes, the human effort, perhaps children were involved in carefully stitching the sequins on it, the fossil fuel emissions to transport it from Bangladesh to the UK, the oil spills at the sites that produced the oil to fuel the ship carrying it. All of their effort for me to wear something once and then discard it.
Donating to Goodwill is a far better route than throwing stuff away – but note about 5% of what you send to Goodwill will end up in landfill too, after they try to recycle anything that can’t be sold. This is not that small an amount going to landfill when you think of the full amount of stuff Goodwill receives. And for the stuff that isn’t going to landfill, there is a ton that isn’t finding a doting new owner, but is being converted into something like couch filling. What a shame for garments that have been designed, embroidered, printed, sequined with so much effort to be shredded to bits for couch filling!
I’m not alone in being so bad at predicting what I’d like to continuously wear. A study by sociologist Sophie Woodward from the University of Manchester found that on average 12% of clothes in women’s wardrobes could be considered “inactive”. Fast fashion has huge environmental costs, which I’ll save for another blog-post, but know that 10% of global greenhouse gas emissions and a whopping 20% of waste water production is related to the fashion industry !
I’ve improved over time in buying for myself. I now do a crazy amount of evaluation before putting something in the cart and then a notorious number of returns — if I find myself having any doubt about loving something, I return it. The tags aren’t coming off until I’m sure I love it and will get use out of it.
But the point is: if we continue to make errors like this blue sequined dress for ourselves, the person we know most intimately, the person whose head we literally live in, why do we think we could be good at picking items for someone else?!
Gift-giving misdemeanors and felonies
If I had to write the anecdotes of all the crappy gifts I’ve given people, I’d probably get a lot of head-nodding from the friends and family who received these gifts and had to pretend they liked them. Here are just a few examples:
- Gifting a very elaborate plant to a friend who was an urban socialite who was hardly ever in her apartment and was still discovering adulting –> I really wanted a plant at the time and suggested it for her birthday instead. Many of us make this gift-giving error of giving something we would like, not realizing the other person is different
- Giving British Christmas tea to all of my American team — no one liked it and the boxes were on their desks for months, unopened. I wished I could have collected it all back but then that would be too impolite, so it probably just all got thrown away
- One of the Father’s days and we couldn’t think of a thing that my dad actually needed and so we went to the card shop and bought a bunch of stuff like a mug that said “No.1 Dad” and a notepad and pen that said the same thing. We had no need for any more mugs in the house (we have a negative need for mugs in fact), and my dad never used the notepad or pen. It was just gimmicky crap and we fell for it because we felt we had to get him something
- One of my friends was visiting Boston for a weekend, and I’d regrettably missed his wedding. I bought him two crystal book-ends (because I like crystals, there had been no evidence that he or his wife did). Gifting these giant rocks to him at dinner, watching his reaction as he turned them around from all angles, and then watching him struggle to pack them into his carry-on, I realized what an idiot I’d been
- The times when I gave gifts I had received onwards – to equally burdened recipients – upholding a Ponzi scheme of shit that no one actually wanted or asked for. I hope they gifted it on too
The fact is most of us have very particular tastes, and knowing someone as a person doesn’t mean you’re good at predicting their particular tastes. I’ve had gifts from people I’ve known very well fall flat — like jewelry which was sadly quite expensive that I have never worn; clothing that I didn’t like even gifted from my mum once — so this is not about how well or not you know someone and you shouldn’t make it about that. Once one of my best friends picked a handbag for me from my then-favorite brand and somehow managed to pick one of the few from that brand that I didn’t like!
How do we do better?
We may be able to afford these errors because we are privileged, but the earth cannot. We must do better. We want to show generosity, kindness, love, affection and reciprocity. I am now moving to a different model of showing these sentiments:
- Ask people what they want or need: Before my partner’s birthday this year, I checked with him what he wanted and then got him to pick out the camping chair he wanted. Didn’t waste any wrapping paper on it and didn’t write a card because I said the message to him verbally. For some people who are practical, this approach works, but if you’re with someone who loves surprises, this won’t work and good luck to you 😛
- Gift money: most of us shy away from this because we are worried we will look cheap. But I think less money is actually more valuable than an expensive gift that no one is going to use! I got gifted a $85 bracelet once, and I’d rather have had $15 to spend on a burrito. Personally, I’ve decided that for weddings I will now venmo cash. I’m not going to try and guess what crockery floral pattern you want (unless you have a registry).
- Ask people if you can donate to a charity on their behalf instead: if you don’t want to give them money because you are worried the amount comes off as offensive or won’t move the needle on their life (it won’t), note that no amount to a charity is offensive (ok, may be less than $5 if you’re donating it in someone’s name as a gesture to them…but I’d appreciate any donations to my favorite charities any day) and this does move the needle on someone’s or some animal’s or some tree’s life who actually needs it
- Give a gift that is hand-made: One of my best friends made an amazing blueberry cheesecake for my birthday which will be memorable for years to come. It’s surprising sometimes that the warm memory of something hand-made and consumable outlives any non-consumable good
- Don’t be embarrassed to give something that isn’t physical/material: I wrote a poem for a friend’s birthday recently and that half an hour of thinking about her and crafting a poem and then penning it is my gift. Phone a friend, write something nice for them, tell them you care. Words are some of the greatest gifts we can offer
What are the best gifts you’ve gotten or given? What are the worst :P? And what ideas do you have for a better, more sustainable holiday season?
References
https://www.huffpost.com/entry/what-does-goodwill-do-with-your-clothes_n_57e06b96e4b0071a6e092352
https://www.bbc.com/future/article/20200710-why-clothes-are-so-hard-to-recycle
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