Allie Kushnir [@alliekushnir], artist + activist, is passionate about living a sustainable lifestyle. This conversation has tons of resources on living an eco-friendly life, like: swapping out almond milk out for oat milk, what you can + cannot recycle, compositing in an apartment, minimalism tips... + of course, all about animal agriculture ; ). We hope you guys are inspired after this episode to live more of a *green* life -- Happy Earth Day!
Notes:
-- alliekushnir.com
-- Allie's Resources
-- Allie's Documentary
-- https://storyofstuff.org/
-- https://www.zerowastechicago.org/
-- https://www.recyclebycity.com/chicago
-- Second Hand Stores: Poshmark, Buffalo Exchange, Crossroads Trading, Mercari
-- Book Recs: Eating Animals, Mad Cowboy: Plain Truth From The Cattle Rancher Who Won't Eat Meat, Give A Sh*t
-- Documentary Recs: Food Inc, Cowspiracy, Eating Animals, 73 Cows, Minimalism, The True Cost
-- Podcast Rec: Rich Roll
-- Insta Recs: @minimalistbaker, @erinireland, @easyanimalfree, @litterless, @zerowastehome
-- Sustainable Products: Yeti, JOCO, Plaine Products, David's Toothpaste, Lush, Credo Makeup, Kjaer Makeup, Meow Meow Tweet, Scratch Goods
Allie Kushnir [@alliekushnir], artist + activist, is passionate about living a sustainable lifestyle. This conversation has tons of resources on living an eco-friendly life, like: swapping out almond milk out for oat milk, what you can + cannot recycle, compositing in an apartment, minimalism tips... + of course, all about animal agriculture ; ). We hope you guys are inspired after this episode to live more of a *green* life -- Happy Earth Day!
Notes:
-- alliekushnir.com
-- Allie's Resources
-- Allie's Documentary
-- https://storyofstuff.org/
-- https://www.zerowastechicago.org/
-- https://www.recyclebycity.com/chicago
-- Second Hand Stores: Poshmark, Buffalo Exchange, Crossroads Trading, Mercari
-- Book Recs: Eating Animals, Mad Cowboy: Plain Truth From The Cattle Rancher Who Won't Eat Meat, Give A Sh*t
-- Documentary Recs: Food Inc, Cowspiracy, Eating Animals, 73 Cows, Minimalism, The True Cost
-- Podcast Rec: Rich Roll
-- Insta Recs: @minimalistbaker, @erinireland, @easyanimalfree, @litterless, @zerowastehome
-- Sustainable Products: Yeti, JOCO, Plaine Products, David's Toothpaste, Lush, Credo Makeup, Kjaer Makeup, Meow Meow Tweet, Scratch Goods
spk_0: 0:04
you guys will charge Mass today. I had Alan Kushner with me. She is an artist and activist who is really passionate about conscious consumption. I am so excited for this podcast because I've actually been wanting to interview someone about living an ICO friendly life cell for really, really long time and in honor of birthdays this a week. I can't think of anyone better to interview. Then you so welcome.
spk_1: 0:34
Thank you. Happy to be here.
spk_0: 0:36
Let's start off with introductions. I'd love for you to share where you went to school. What brought you to Chicago and what you do for a living?
spk_1: 0:44
I went to University of Iowa, actually studied psychology and finer and then promptly abandoned psychology. Probably. You know, even before graduating. Yeah, I just I was never really super sure. Not never. I was actually really sure that I wanted to psychology and then just I have so many interests. It was really hard toe to narrow down. And I knew that I wanted to do something a little more creative. So then, I mean, I grew up just north of Chicago, so I basically just came home. I studied graphic design and had, like 1000 internships. I'm an artist and designer Full time. I host various events and workshops to talk about conscious consumption that could be like a vegan tasting or clothing swap with speaker. Or we're actually about to be hosting one that is a watercolor workshop. But we're gonna make our own paints out of natural pigments to talk about the impacts of those things and make it kind of like Is your waist painting workshop So just stuff like that. And then I have, ah, small product line, and I am primarily a painter. And so that's a big part of what I do
spk_0: 1:57
so cool. I actually first heard of the term conscious consumption from you, and I was like, I love that so much. When did you become passionate about this work?
spk_1: 2:09
Well, it's kind of a weird question, because it's not a weirdo. Very normal question, but I it's a hard one to answer, because I it's been like this evolution as my knowledge has grown. My view of what it means to be a conscious consumer has evolved because it's like you don't know you don't know. And even as a kid, I mean, I've just always been a an over thinker and be sensitive. And so I've been worried about hurting people or things I was always annoyed with. My dad would pull out disposable plates at home just like being wasteful. You know, one thing that happened was when I was in college, we went to one of my classes. We visited a landfill. It was nothing environmental related, Really. It was for this kind of weird, like multimedia art class. And But while we're there like this, the scope of it, just like the weight of the amount of waste that we produce really sunk in in a different way where I started thinking, Oh, my God, every single thing I use produces waste in one way or another. And I'm just one of what, like, seven billion people or something at 7.5 1,000,000,000 people. Um And so just like that, that sunk in. But even still, it wasn't until, like, more recently, that I went from a little more focused about on social justice toe for sure more focused on environmental justice because I see how those things are linked and I see how there's like imminent danger and not taking our environment seriously. Yeah, so sorry. Longwinded answer. But as a designer, I always from the beginning, I wanted to be honest and do what I thought was making conscientious choices like a never outsourcing to places that I couldn't trace and not using animal products using recycled materials or pricing as fairly as possible so that my products were accessible. But I've since learned so much about the impact of everything. So now my focus is much less about selling the products and more about making a positive impact with the work. I do.
spk_0: 4:19
I really want to talk about that involvement. Would you say that when you visit the landfill? That was your first really big wake up call? I don't
spk_1: 4:28
know. I mean, it was it was definitely one. It definitely like sunk in. And I I really felt that. But it still has been I mean, that was 10 years ago, so scary. But it was like it was maybe even more than that. No, it's probably about 10 years ago or something like that, eight or 10 years ago. And it wasn't until the last few years that I've like really decided to, like, read the articles and the watch the documentaries and do the research that I have done toe really make changes. S so it's like, you know, you learn something and it hits you for a week and then kind of mine. And then you have to kind of like, refresh to remember, remind yourself that you care. So it's been a few of those before getting to where I am now.
spk_0: 5:15
Totally. Can you give us an example of what your lifestyle looked like back in the early days, when I was in college or right after college of things that you would do to live in Hico friendly lifestyle vs what that looks like? Now what? That research, the books that you documentary? Yeah, things like that.
spk_1: 5:35
Well, I think before in my mind it was like recycling is all you got to really worry about. I'm trying to think of like what else I would d'oh. I mean, I hated being wasteful. I hate if I was going to get rid of something. I wanted to give it to someone rather than throw it away or anything like that. Now I think much more deeply about it. Like I told I avoid packaged foods in general as much as I can, I buy a lot of stuff in bulk. Um, I am more aware of the different places that things need to be recycled. For example, plastic bags. You can't just throw in your recycling bin.
spk_0: 6:10
Can we talk about that? Because that was actually a question that someone had is Don't ask me what can actually be your cycle,
spk_1: 6:18
So I mean, I feel like the easier thing is probably toe. Think of things that can't be recycled because it's like we all think plastic, paper, aluminum, glass, like even throw it all in. You can't throw in like household ceramics or broken glass, which is a hard one for me because for the longest time, it's like I for like, honestly, probably up until a few years ago would just put whatever in the recycling bin because I just felt so guilty throwing it out. I'd be like maybe someone will recycle this. Maybe it can be recycled. I'd rather be safe, but it's actually a bigger problem to do that, because these people at the like sorting facilities don't have the time to it means like a quick operation. So it'll just sometimes just all be thrown out if it's contaminated. So things like used like pizza boxes that have grease all over him. You can't recycle that Big One is like coffee cups, disposable coffee cups or ice cream cartons. Or like almond milk cartons. They all have our like lined with plastic. It's not very easy to separate that from the cardboard, so it's almost never recycled. And same thing goes for, like, chip bags. It's like an aluminum. I think it's lined with some kind of plastic. Same thing can be recycled
spk_0: 7:31
like a musical plastic. I was You could you know
spk_1: 7:33
you can. But I'm saying, like the this specific Well, certain types of plastic you can
spk_0: 7:39
so plastic bags you cannot plastic
spk_1: 7:41
bags. There are just separate places that those go. You can take him to places like target. They have, ah, just a bin where you can take all your plastic bags. So any time we have, like food, that does happen to be packaged in a plastic bag. Um, we put them in a separate place, and then every few months will take. We don't really accumulate that much. We'll take it toe, just Target and throw it in there. I don't know if that's helpful. So I mean, even like, like batteries and light bulbs. I think right. And it knows there's like various places Home Depot or Target being the two are the adversity Think of Oh, and then, like best Buy will recycle it Electronics. But it is hard. I mean, we had the microwave that broke and again like it kills me to just throw something that substantial just into the trash. So I did research and she found a place in Chicago. We could drop it off. My husband went there. I think there was no one there when he first went, and then he found another place and went there. It cost him, I think, like close to $20 to do it. But, like were people that are definitely going to do it, And other people are gonna be like, Screw this. I'm throwing it out There are and and then from there, I'm not entirely sure like how these things are recycled.
spk_0: 8:51
So what can go into the recycling? But
spk_1: 8:54
they're different numbers of plastic. I would just look up a list Aluminum cans, glass that's not broken. I would steer clear of buying any packaged plastic. In general, any anything's packaged in plastic in general because it is very iffy and plastic calling as a limited times a number of times it can be recycled. Where is glass can be recycled? A lot more. Do
spk_0: 9:17
you have any articles that you think we could link up in the show notes that would share this information That could be helpful?
spk_1: 9:23
Yeah, definitely. I'll send you some
spk_0: 9:25
Awesome What else? In terms of what you do now to live an environmentally conscious lifestyle.
spk_1: 9:32
Well, now I compost. I, um, like I said, I'd buy primarily from bullpen's. I have a A refrigerator that's always on the brink of being empty way. Just eat what's in there. When it's gone, we buy more. I almost never have food that goes to waste in terms of clothing. I shop very little, and if I do, I try to shop secondhand or do research about the businesses and make sure that they have, like a very substantial sustainability policy on their website. That seems reputable. Another one is that I Actually, I try not to wash my clothing more than I need to, because there are micro plastics and our clothing that get into the water that could be in endure soil and all. You know, it could be dangerous for the environment, so I just try not to. I still wash my clothing, but I asked Mellott first if it's necessary.
spk_0: 10:24
How often do you wash your clothes? Would you say just when they smell? Yeah. What do you mean? Yeah, I washed those. I run
spk_1: 10:33
every day. So, uh, but like polyester, things are hard because they're entirely synthetic and terrible for the environment. The story of stuff is like a really great resource.
spk_0: 10:43
Is that a book?
spk_1: 10:44
It's It's a no. It's like they say it's a company that they make various videos about environmental things. I think they're working on a documentary about plastic pollution. They did a video about micro plastics, which is really great, which I should give you the link for a swell. It kind of just walks through how the plastic that is used to make polyester clothing little tiny bits that we can't see get into the water than the fish eat that. Then people eat the fish and it's just this whole, like it's really bad for the environment. So there is something called Guppy Friend, which is just this bag that you can put polyester things in. And that way when you wash him at the end, there's kind of like lynch that's collected at the bottom, which are like the micro plastics, and you can dispose of
spk_0: 11:25
those. What do you believe? Our everyday actions that most people do that actually cause a ton of harm in the long run? Give us five samples.
spk_1: 11:34
Really obvious ones are disposable plastics. It
spk_0: 11:38
kills like Ziploc bags, things like like
spk_1: 11:41
like iced coffee, like as the weather is warming up, I'm like feeling the imminent pressure of seeing all the plastic cups with it's plastic straws everywhere. I cannot encourage people enough to bring their own cup to bring your own cup. And if you feel like you can't carry around for the day, then sit and have your coffee there. Some places will say I mean, one time I didn't bring my own cup because I was planning on staying there, and they said they had no cups for their which I was like
spk_0: 12:09
mine. Early. Devastating. Yeah, but I was just, like, really nothing. Like,
spk_1: 12:13
Can I drink out of the
spk_0: 12:14
creamer, right? Like, I don't
spk_1: 12:16
understand. But, I mean, I didn't I just said okay, but I mean, you know, your iced coffee will taste the same as in a glass as a dozen among So if you have to drink out of something like that, like who really cares? I mean, they're like, seven billion people. If that many people just got rid of one plastic cup a week, which we all know is not the like common practice. It's like five a week. What does that look like? It's horrifying. Maybe individual impact sometimes feel small, and we all sit around thinking like, Well, big policy changes need to happen. But there are a lot of things that can happen in an individual level on it. People commit to doing it, then. I mean, that's like, that's that's massive. That's a huge that makes a huge impact, not to mention the like. Brands are driven by their consumers, and they're constantly doing market research. So if they see that something is a priority, there's no chance that they're not going to make an effort to change, but their brands like Adidas, who I'm hesitant to trust. But But they are making at least a massive campaign out of using ocean plastics to make a whole line of shoes. So it's like even if it's just for the sake of the campaign, it's just showing what what's a priority to a lot of consumers now? So anyway, um, single use plastics. It's a huge one. In some ways, you could do that or bringing your own cup carrying your own travel utensils. I sell you travel utensil wraps. I mean especially like moms with little kids. They carry around so much shit all the time. There's no reason not to throw that in there, bring your own water bottle like a clean canteen, or swell their multiple different companies. Uh, what else? I mean, when you go on an airplane, hand them your water bottle instead of let me give you a plastic cup. Sometimes they give you a very weird look. Really? Yeah, I mean, so it's very surprising that, like I've had a couple of times where they look at me dumbfounded and I'm just like so I can set a boring is the airport there? But I just have to, like, stand your ground. I mean, not be rude, but just just be like this isn't awkward. This is an awkward This is because, like, I've brought my I bring my own cup. If I go get a smoothie somewhere because I don't want to use, they always put him in plastic. So I just had my cup. More often than not, it's totally fine. I've had, like, one guy look at me like, are you saying? But he did it Anyway.
spk_0: 14:38
You have a certain cop that used for smoothies. I
spk_1: 14:40
have a joke. Oh, cup And I have a yeti. Yeti, I would say would be the go to there. Have you ever used one?
spk_0: 14:47
Yes. They keep it so cold, which is so nice for so hot. Yeah, which almost to lie.
spk_1: 14:54
One time my husband left his ice coffee like you didn't finish it. And he left it out with ice in it. And the next morning they were still ice cubes in.
spk_0: 15:02
It really is not a sponsored ad, but it should be, but yeah,
spk_1: 15:09
but I use a joke. Oh, Cup. For which they're based out of us. Really? I think so. I don't really know a lot of people here that I think I saw them from someone I follow in Vancouver. And then, yeah, but all right. Almost never see them here. But they're glass, which I like because they don't absorb the smell of coffee, which I think
spk_0: 15:28
is a big thing. Cheaper ones. Yeah.
spk_1: 15:32
Yeah. So I gave you one tip.
spk_0: 15:34
Yes, I'm ready for the next. I love it. I love all of the examples.
spk_1: 15:39
Okay, Another one is sort of a tough one, but like almond milk is kind of a rough thing. I still do drink it sometimes, but not a lot. I don't have a lot of need for it anyway. Almonds using a huge amount of water. And they're largely grown in California. Where there's water, there's a drought. So, uh, and not only that, but like the amount of pesticides, then, um, kid harm the water that's left. So it's like using much water than contaminating waters
spk_0: 16:12
is just Allman specifically are all nuts.
spk_1: 16:16
It's It's specific. This is specific to almonds. I don't know about other nuts, but this is something I've specifically read about almonds. So, like they're different, you can look up like range of the different dairy free milks. And like their environmental impact, I think, Oh, milk and milk are supposed to be like the best. The reason I liked almond milk is because I could make my own and then have zero waste, right? But I don't really use it at home like almost ever. So If I'm out and I have an option to add something to my coffee, I'll try not to use Almond. Another one would be buy second hand because the fashion industry is really devastatingly polluting for a lot of reasons, one being that they intentionally mass produced things that they can't. They can't sell everything when they know they can't sell everything. And so certain companies will just knowingly overproduce and then send it right to landfill from the store. When it doesn't sell. I mean their companies like H and M, that do that exact thing and then try to make up for it by saying that they'll take Do you know how they accept old textiles and then they recycle them? Well, I just have a hard time, really, like a trusting that that's what happens and be giving them a pass for that because I feel like they're the ones creating this massive problem. And there were new seasons that were created for the fashion industry to try and push us to buy more. And it's just become so ingrained in our instincts to be sick of things so quickly, do not value what we own To the extent that I think we we should and can. We can get a lot of personal satisfaction out of just value what we already own. So I would say that you need something new by second hand.
spk_0: 18:03
Where do you shop?
spk_1: 18:04
Posh Mark is a really good one. Online Buffalo exchange crossroads. There's another website like Posh Mark Feel like it's called Mark Ari, but I will send you to be Oh, I also on my website. I have a tab called Resource Is and I have in a few different sections by eat, listen and watch and the by section is the most updated. So it's like a bunch different brands that I would support the other one's Aaron less update it, but they will be. Yeah. Um I mean, I don't know if this is obvious to butt in animal products. I mean one. Okay, a good one is probably eggs because I think people think of that is like the most innocuous animal product you can consume because chickens lay eggs and we take him like, what does it matter? But that's just not really the process. And the industrial scale that they're produced at is harmful, really harmful to them and really harmful to our environment. There are two different types of chickens. They're broiler chickens and their later chickens layer chickens. If they have a male chick, they're of no use to the industry. So it's very common practice. The the male chicks will just be tossed alive into the high speed mass aerator and just cut up alive. So if animal rights isn't really like a concern, there are still other reasons. I mean, these chickens are packed d beaked packed even when their cage cage free or free range just means access to the outdoors. Access to the outdoors could be a tiny two foot door or smaller that is rarely opened, but when it is, it's still like a small dirt patch. Chickens are like 50,000 in a shed D beaked genetically engineered to have their muscles and bones grown at different rates so they can't stand. They get sick really easily. That's why they're fed antibiotics. And this is all just for X. And they also have to be given certain hormones and manipulated, um, by light, in a certain way so that they do produce a lot of eggs a lot more than they naturally would. But they are like spent really young. So then they're they're just killed a couple years into it, sometimes less. That's a big one.
spk_0: 20:25
What about the different types of eggs, like cage free, free range, organic?
spk_1: 20:31
Well, organic? I would trust more, just in the sense that they can't be fed and antibiotics they can't. So theoretically, that means they can't live in an environment that would kill them without antibiotics. They can't be fed any GM owes either or any non organic feed, and there is some animal welfare stuff that goes into that as well. But cage free and free range is, in my opinion, meaningless like, as Jonathan Safran Foer would say, he's the writer of eating animals, which is, like, the best resource ever. Uh, you could have a flock of chickens under your sink and column free range. Um, he may have been being sarcastic, but Yeah,
spk_0: 21:17
what about it? You really know the farmer, and you know that there. Yeah. Great job. Would you feel more comfortable? I
spk_1: 21:25
can understand it. I think the issue with that is Well, there are a few things I can understand that I have a friend who has their own chickens. I have a few friends about their own chickens. I have one who's then slaughtered her own chicken, and she was like, It's sucked. But she feels better doing that than, um, buying something from a store. The thing with that is that you're still I mean, if we're talking about an animal, well, for her still treating an animal like a commodity, and that's one thing, but also just the amount that we all consume of meat and the number of people around the plant there are on the planet. There just isn't enough space to do it all sustainably, so that could be great for one family, and they can not rely on those animals for their main source of food, but when? But they're being much less wasteful because they're consuming the animal when the animal dies or whatever. I mean, that all makes sense to me. But on a large scale, it could never work just because there's too many people, Um, and there isn't enough land we already use about 1/3 of inhabitable land on the planet, 1/3 for animal agriculture for livestock or their feed. Imagine if those animals had space to live, what that would grow
spk_0: 22:42
into. If you had to have a conversation with a farmer from the farmer's market, Would you still have these feelings, or would you kind of understand what I do? I
spk_1: 22:53
do understand. And I and I would even say that industrial farmers are. I feel like I have to go on the record saying they're not bad people. Yeah, because there are people in my family. They're industrial farmers. I, uh, well and my husband's family and I would never want to imply that they're bad people there. They're people that are like razor on a very different perspective and surrounded by people with very different perspective. and they're intelligent and insanely hard working, and their goals are in no way malicious. Having said that, there are some people that knowingly put practices in place for push policies that don't protect us and know that that's what they're doing as faras like ethical farming on a smaller scale, there's a ranch that was really well known, called the Diamond Ranch, for being like one of the last pork producers that lets their pigs like, literally free range, like all around and there they live a happy life. And there they put an emphasis on humane slaughter, which is really hazy, to be honest, because there are things you can do, and I think it's very comforting to be mistakes and then the the animals are alive while their throats being slit or something they recently sold to Purdue, which is a really sad thing. They say that it's not going to impact the way that they run their farm, but I just feel like it's just a matter of time. I think that what they were doing was in some ways honorable because it's impossible to think that by them, not existing, the world will get better and have a better perspective on the way we consume animals. To think that they would go away because they're like, Screw this. I'm not gonna I don't know. I'm not gonna be around this industry. Then the only industry that exists is industrial farming. Um, it's the same thing. I wasn't an interview with the CEO of Whole Foods who I know people have, like, different thoughts on. But I thought he made a good point in saying that I believe he's vegan, but he wasn't going to only sell begin products because then people are just not gonna come to the store until learn about those products. This way, they're there to get the other products. They're getting them supposedly a more humane or sustainable way. And then they come across newer products and are open to a different perspective in that way. So, yeah, I wouldn't demonize those farmers. I just Personally, I I can't imagine feeling good about hurting an animal. And even as a child, I mean, I haven't been begin for that long. It's only been a few years. I've been vegetarian for longer as a child. It made me uncomfortable, but my like family would make fun of me or something. So I just be like, whatever. And then I watched one documentary like Right after college knows like
spk_0: 25:40
Which one was Fuding? Oh, yeah, And there was
spk_1: 25:44
just one image. It was like the one the most ridiculous thing my husband and I well, boyfriend. Then I went to go visit him because he's a year younger than me. So he was still in Iowa, went to go visit him, and we decided to watch this documentary and make chicken over, like, sitting there making chicken. And I was like, Oh, my God, what are we
spk_0: 26:03
doing? Wow, so stupid
spk_1: 26:08
and mean, But yeah, it's just it's just it's just so It exemplifies the hypocrisy, the incredible hypocrisy and in every society, of teaching our young Children to love animals, teaching them like writing story books about cute little animals and then slaughtering one and cutting it up, putting on your plane being like, Well, that one's food. That's what we love or even like bringing out the tiny piglets from the farm. It's like you're killing. You're gonna kill them. So what do you want? The child to fall in love with, Um, I mean, it's just it's very confusing. Or like this animal is edible. This one is not. There's no riel reason that a pig and a dog should be any different in terms of intelligence in terms of like mental capacity in terms of capacity for pain. Yeah, there's an argument for eating dogs, but I know your listeners will probably really enjoy, but but But it's it's more just making the point that, like they're all these stray dogs out there that are being humanely euthanized with a painless death and then discarded, there were these other animals that are suffering for a lifetime that are created to suffer for a lifetime and then killed in a really painful way. But they're really no different from each other's. Yeah,
spk_0: 27:26
well, certain cultures eat dog, right?
spk_1: 27:29
I know, and it's really sad and scary, but it's also just because we're not comfortable, are used to it, right? I mean, that's the thing with a lot of things, like, people are like tofu cheese, and I'm like I get it Sounds gross, but like, if this was the cheese you thought was cheese as a child, do you think the other one was gross. So it's really just But, yeah, there are cats, too. I think
spk_0: 27:51
I know, but yeah, it is interesting to think you made a really good point about Yeah, there's so many stray dogs out there and we just kill them like, don't even think about it.
spk_1: 28:02
Yeah, or, I mean, people will go to jail for harming a dog the way they are big. Oh, yeah, so But, I mean, it's it's really tragic. It's really, really sad. And I think it's It's beyond what we could cover in this. It's not like there's some people that are such advocates for, like mass animal or industrial agriculture, animal agriculture, Um, that they're like, Well, those those insider videos or those undercover videos that you see of people harming animals like that's like the one that happened to be doing that that they covered. It's just it's just not true. And there are so many accounts in so many different books and articles of people who are on the kill floor, which is what it's called, saying they're their own accounts, about how it's changed them and how they view people even because they just had their whole job is to kill. I had one thing about this guy being like I know this sounds really horrible but there have been times where the pig is squealing and high on this. He just cut off. It's know as it's alive and took salt brine and put it in its nose just to just to give it pain. And he's the one admitting this and writing it in the article or in the book.
spk_0: 29:15
Oh my God, yes,
spk_1: 29:17
And he's just like, I'm not the only one who does stuff like that.
spk_0: 29:20
So he must goes in saying I am in this work.
spk_1: 29:24
Yeah, I mean, I no pun intended the chicken or the egg, I guess. But But no, I think that being that I mean there are other people have said that their job is to, like have, ah, assembly line of chickens and slit their roads on dhe it How just I mean, just imagine the smell of the blood and the way that you stopped to think you stopped thinking of living beings as living beings and that can cross over into humans eventually, not for everyone, but it makes sense to me?
spk_0: 29:54
Yeah. My gosh. I want to get to your point. But I wanted a little bit deeper than that. Becoming a vegetarian. And now begin. I'd love to hear what that process looked like.
spk_1: 30:10
Oh, well, I mean, I watched Food, Inc. I thought I want to try being a vegetarian. I wasn't, actually. Don't even say a vegetarian is I wasn't ready to, like, draw a hard line. I just thought I'd try not eating much meat. And then I did. And the longer I went without it, the more turned off I was by. The more I started to watch, other documentaries could just interests me. And then, just like 3.5 years ago or something, because I just find all these thes documentary so interesting, like, really just it interests me to learn about health and wellness and impact and all that, um, we watched cow spirit see which I wish wasn't named conspiracy. Because it's such a silly name. Like, if you don't want to learn, you're not gonna watch that right. But that one talked about the environmental impact and my husband I went to bed that night. Like
spk_0: 31:02
did he become a vegetarian the same time as you know, he was.
spk_1: 31:05
He wasn't for a long time. For the 1st 5 years, we were together or something, and I don't really care. Eventually, when I started to learn, like more about the pork industry and stuff, then I was like, this is actually just straight up wrong. And I equated it to picking up a child to take them to school. And I knew every time I drop them off, they had the shit kicked out of him and how I couldn't just drop them off and think like, Okay, not my issue. I'm just the person with the ride. And so the idea of looking at food that way was just, I mean, almost cowardly. I mean, I don't want to put everybody on blast, but I or, like, make everyone feel like a pariah by me saying that. But I just really feel like it's it's not right toe. Learn something, anything is wrong. And just ignore it. Now. You obviously have to go on with your life, and you can't just solve all the world's problems. But there are things you could D'oh! So yeah, we watched conspiracy and, um, that it was a slow of lotion. From then we were like, All right, well, I'm not gonna, like, buy this stuff now. And I for sure I don't think I bought animal products after that, but it would more be like if we're eating out. It was like more of a gray area, like we traveled to Thailand and like, very soon after watching a documentary, and it was more of a gray area then. But it wasn't long after that that we just stopped altogether, and it was really like for him. He said that it was seeing the amount of water and food that is give is given into is put into producing this amount of meat and could be given to the 10% of the world that's starving. And I wish I could remember the exact number, but, um, I already said the 30% thing for animal agriculture, but a large part of it is just their feed, and that is given to these animals, and from that a small amount of food is created. So instead of using so much water and so much land to give to these animals, we could be giving it to people. So, yeah, that was where the animals go, though. Well, at this point, we just would eat a mall on. Then we would stop creating more. I don't see that happening, but I don't know what's gonna happen. Yeah, I mean, yeah, I don't know. It's a It's an incredibly powerful industry, like it's not even very easy to get now it's much easier to get this information. But every time a documentary has produced, they're really putting themselves at risk. They're stories about like a woman in Brazil, because I think there's like a big cattle industry out of Brazil. And this woman, I think she was a nun, tryingto expose some I don't know, some part of the industry, and she was, like, kidnapped and killed. I know, and that's just I'm not saying that that would happen anywhere in the U. S. But it's It's just it just sort of shows like just how powerful these industries are and the information we're getting in the studies that are being funded by them. Did you know this this conversation was gonna go entirely towards
spk_0: 34:04
capable? Oh, no. I have so many more questions on. So I'm so excited. I guess something that I always wonder about is honey, Why, yes. Don't eat honey with syriza vine. Yeah, I am kind of
spk_1: 34:18
a hard time with that one, too. But my understanding is that honey's air really imperative for pollination of so much of the food. We I mean, honestly, a lot of pesticides kill thes bees. And if those bees were killed than there are a lot of foods that we won't have, So that's the main thing is like not wanting Thio harm bees because they're necessary part of our ecosystem We featured. I didn't mention before that we have our video Siri's that features various businesses that are focused, unconscious consumption. One of the people we featured in our last season was Jenna Kinsman. She is a beekeeper here in Chicago. The way that she produces honey is such a small scale, and um is at such a small scale, and I think it's beneficial to the farms and the communities that she puts her highs so personally, I don't really have an issue with it. I would be interested to hear someone else's perspective, though, because there's a chance of missing something.
spk_0: 35:18
So you still eat, honey,
spk_1: 35:20
I am not against it. But I'm not like a big honey person. Like I don't have any honey in my home at any time. But that's not That's just cause I don't care about honey.
spk_0: 35:29
Yeah, for sure. When did your husband convert to becoming a vegan vegetarian? What's that conversation look like? I
spk_1: 35:37
was a vegetarian. He basically eight. No need. He would just because he didn't care. But it was definitely, like I don't want to call myself a vegetarian because I don't wanna be limited. And I was like, All right, whatever. But then when we go out to eat, sometimes he'd order me sometimes not. Then we started watching, listening to podcasts and more documentaries, and he was, like, maybe a pesky Terry in. And, um, I was like, what? You know, whatever. I was happy, but I I never really been there, Really, like to conversations where I was towards when he was starting to think more about it, where I was like, Okay, actually feel like this is wrong.
spk_0: 36:10
I really didn't
spk_1: 36:11
ever try to convince him of anything. And it wasn't even on my mind for the most part. But when we wash conspiracy, that's when he was like, I really got to try not to do this because it just it just felt so guilty about the environmental impact and that was just that was a few years ago. But it's like so not a problem. That's the That's the big thing is like he didn't necessarily grow up in a home with, like, a hugely varied train. Say yes. I mean, he talks about how he lost a bunch away as a 15 year old by switching of fat free hot dogs. So yeah, so he didn't know like he didn't know that. And I didn't either. I mean, I grew up with like my mom loved cooking and lost different types of food, but I didn't know that being vegetarian or vegan was such a piece of cake. Especially now it wasn't. Maybe then, but it's we love to cook. We love to try lots of different kinds of food, and there's a lot that you can eat as a vegan. Maybe you just don't know until you start exploring it.
spk_0: 37:13
How often you Tetovo.
spk_1: 37:15
So I used to never really eat it. And then I learned how to make tofu cheese, and I make it a lot. And we've actually recently have been like, I actually gotta stop making this because every time I told foods in a plastic carton and it kills me. But that's the main thing. Otherwise, it's not a big part of my day, not even like as a rule. But we kind of don't need a lot of process stuff in general just because we cook and just buy everything and make it into a meal rather than buying a premade thing. Do
spk_0: 37:45
you get your work done? I do.
spk_1: 37:48
But that's because, um, I've had other health problems on Let me in. What I've had like this is not interesting to the podcast, but I had Lyme disease and, um so I've had, like, a 1,000,000 different tests done, are you? You're wondering if their deficiencies in anything,
spk_0: 38:06
Yeah,
spk_1: 38:07
it's different for me. I definitely was very low magnesium, and sometimes that's I think maybe the thing that people have from being vegetarian, but I also know people they're like will be low and iron.
spk_0: 38:20
I know that's what I was kind of
spk_1: 38:22
Yeah, There are so many foods that you can get that from. And like I know, molasses is really hired iron, which isn't like an easy thing to just add
spk_0: 38:31
your How do you add in the last year I mean, I don't know, literally bought molasses. Oh, you can make cookies. Yeah. Yeah. I mean, that's great once in a while, but that's
spk_1: 38:45
really funny. I don't I don't know. How can you put it in a smoothie?
spk_0: 38:48
I think you can put it in tea. Sweet. Yeah, yeah. I don't know that I'm like the sugar content is obviously Yeah,
spk_1: 38:56
exactly. So I mean, I think spinach is really high in iron differently booms, but I don't know. They're just so I mean, everybody's body is different, So I don't want to act like I'm a physician. And I can say, like, you need this and you don't need this. Like some people are like super happy, healthy, very active vegans. Other people need to take supplements, can take supplements. Ideo. Yeah, I take vitamin D, take flax oil. Um, algae oil and magnesium.
spk_0: 39:25
What does Algie dough? I don't know. My doctor told me it's like, you know, I
spk_1: 39:30
do. It's like omega threes. The it's yeah, fatty acids. I use a spray and it tastes disgusting. It's incredibly hard for me to do it. I don't as often now. I used to take a tablet, but that company, I couldn't. I couldn't find it anywhere. So someone recommended this spring, and it's been been choking it down.
spk_0: 39:53
What about wool and things like that? Products from the animals? Yo, buy that at all. What are your thoughts on that
spk_1: 40:00
I don't feel good about? Well, I'm not as educated on it, but I know that it's a pretty aggressive process to take their share a sheep, and they get injured. And I feel like the thing that I just fall back on is my instinct is when an animal is true as a commodity, there's no way for them to grow for that business, to grow in a way that won't eventually harm the animals because their priority is is income. And when there's a lot of one thing I mean one animal, they have to get through it quickly. I mean, we're just talking about well, they have to get through it quickly, and e I don't know. Things happen, and they entered really badly.
spk_0: 40:42
What are five Resource is for becoming more educated on the importance of animal agriculture.
spk_1: 40:49
The ritual podcast is a good one,
spk_0: 40:51
the ritual packing rich roll ritual. Yeah,
spk_1: 40:54
he's like an ultra athlete, these vegan and interviews a lot of different people in health and wellness. His plaque guests are a little rambling. There are two hours long, but you could skip the first, like 15 minutes. I'm talking end and and then, you know, break it up if you have to. But there are a couple that are super interesting. There's one with Neal Barnard, who's a really great doctor, very knowledgeable on has done a lot of research. And then this guy, Bruce Friedrich, who's done a lot of studies about lab, raised me, which again is like, makes a lot of people get to think about. But it's a super clean, interesting thing that could feed people into the future. Then I would say, Well, uh, actually, Piper, do you know her? She's here in Chicago. She was amazing. She wrote a book called Give a Shit. Um, and it's all about like sustainability and fashion and food and your home. She's a great resource. Recipes might go to his minimalist baker. I think she just recently announced something about not only doing plant based meals.
spk_0: 42:01
I'm not hiding right. Actually, I don't right.
spk_1: 42:04
I don't know what that was about. I just saw something eluding toe. Did you see that on Instagram?
spk_0: 42:08
No, but I actually just interviewed Monique from Ambitious Kitchen. This podcast will go a little bit later, but she mentioned that she doesn't think Minimus Baker is only Plant based Now.
spk_1: 42:19
She's always called herself like everything eater, but it was very clear. It was all plant based. It was all vegan, and now I think something is different about that. But there are. It's just her recipes, air so easy and all really good. So it's always my go to Okay, My favorite person, probably to follow, were up. There's air in Ireland. She's based in Vancouver. She has like a small bakery. She is really active, and she's very passionate about being begin. So she talks about. She shares articles she constantly is showing what she's cooking. She's now pregnant, so she's always talking about like being pregnant vegan to show people that is healthy and she feels great. And she talks about what she eats. And there's another woman, easy animal free and also in Vancouver. Her name is Anna Pipes, but her account is easy, animal free, and she's all about showing what it's like to be a mom with two young kids that are all vegan. And I feel like I mean, I'm not a parent, but I think that that's something that, um, parents need is like a resource for howto make it easy with kids in Eating Animals, The book and the documentary There's a Buck and a documentary. They're both connected, and it's like the number one resource of all time okay and conspiracy. I had one in there, but I already mentioned it, but it's also really good documentary.
spk_0: 43:48
I can't wait to watch eating animals. Never heard of that.
spk_1: 43:51
You think animals talks a lot like it's less about, like don't ever eat meat and more about, like, bad and good animal. I talks about like like shit lagoons. Do you know about this room like so there's there so many animals packed into small spaces. There's nowhere to put their excrement and so I mean, just to make this a short story, a lot of it is pumped into these massive lagoons, massive and because their excrement isn't treated as waste the way that human waste is, where it's like it's treated, there are live pathogens. There's lots of there's, like ammonia, lots of chemicals. It's really like toxic stuff that's going into the environment and harming neighboring communities. But also these Libyans are not aligned with anything, so it could get into the soil and into the water as well. So they talk about that meaning animals. It's it's something that no one knows about. And the industry, Like I said, it has so much power. There have been times in North Carolina. There was a hurricane and these lagoons overflowed and they contaminated.
spk_0: 44:53
Oh my God, and it was
spk_1: 44:56
something like a $20 million fine for doing that, but they make that amount of money in like a week, so I mean, I don't know exactly how quickly, but it's something like that, and they so to pay off that fine is much easier for them than to change their entire practice. So nothing stops them, and they just keep on doing that. I mean that That's very common.
spk_0: 45:17
That's in C. Disgusting. Are there any other books that you'd recommend on this topic? I think one other good
spk_1: 45:24
one was written by Think it's called The Mad The Mad Cowboy. I'll look it up. It was written by this guy that was a rancher for a long time, and he had to completely change. I mean, a really long time. Um, like, I think, even as a child, this is what he grew up on. And then he started to learn about the impact of what he was doing, and he got us a lot of trouble with the industry for writing this book and going on Oprah. This was a long time ago. So he wrote a whole book about it, though, which is interesting. Yeah, there's also this video called, I Think It's 73 Cows. It's a short documentary, Um, like maybe like 12 minutes or something. It's so wonderful. And it's about a farmer who just the weight of hurting these animals, like started to really consume him, um, and shifting his practices. It's it's really beautiful, so I've got lots of links to Sunday.
spk_0: 46:19
Yeah. Please. You mentioned buying a lot of things in bulk. Yeah. Where do you grocery shop and what's the best way to buy things in bulk?
spk_1: 46:29
Yeah. Okay. You can buy in bulk at whole foods, fresh thyme, dill pickle, thes air, all Chicago places and let me know all but the sugar beet call up, which I think is an oak park. I've been I just read about it at fresh Thyme. That's kind of my go to partly because it's really near me, But you can bring any container, any bag. You bring it to the front, the way it and then you go to their Balkans. They have bulk olive oil, bulk apple cider vinegar, honey, coconut sugar, cocoa powder. So many things. So, like none of those things I ever have to buy in a package, which is really cool. I have just the's like organic cotton little pouches that I put like nuts or rice or something in when I get things like that. But I just saved an olive oil, a big olive oil bottle that I had from while ago, and I just fell out, weigh it and fill it up um I bring a few jars for their olive bar, and so I don't have to buy another jar, but yeah, that's definitely my go to. You could do the same thing at Whole Foods, but they have. They're not as easy going about it. You can bring your own bags, for sure, but if you have anything like powdery, you don't really want to put it in a bag. It's a huge mess to get out, and I've brought containers there, but sometimes they are not super great about it.
spk_0: 47:52
Yeah, I can see that.
spk_1: 47:53
But dill pickle you can. They're just kind of more expensive sometimes. Do
spk_0: 47:57
you prefer shopping at those places, or do you like shopping at the farmer's market? Um, I didn't
spk_1: 48:03
both. Farmers market is always better. It's just, you know, sometimes, like the one time you're free to grocery shop isn't like from 10 to 1. I, um I tried. I mean, they're some of these grocery stores have sections of local and organic food, so at least you have that. There's also, um, do you know about like in perfect produce or ugly?
spk_0: 48:24
Yeah, yeah,
spk_1: 48:25
those air cool. But I I did it for a little while. I stopped because I was accumulating all these boxes in the plastic bags, and they sometimes wrapped the things. And so I love the concept, though. Yeah, the idea of not tossing out in perfect produce, which is for surplus.
spk_0: 48:43
What about composting? If you live in an apartment? Yeah,
spk_1: 48:47
so we just put ours in. I mean, we're lucky in Chicago, there are lots of compose companies you can either. OK, so we put ours in a freezer. And when we have enough, we take it to the farmer's Market because healthy, so composed to we also featured in our documentary series has a drop off point. So you just bring a bucket full and pay $5 for us, it's like $5 every few weeks, so it's maybe every two weeks. It's not a lot, and it's just so important. I don't know if people really know why you should care about composting.
spk_0: 49:21
Let's talk about that
spk_1: 49:23
so well. And then also. The other thing is that these businesses are there's urban canopy and healthy soil. That I know of that have pickup service is so you can pay a monthly fee and keep a bucket outside. I'll come get it and empty it for you. Um, for us, it's just too expensive. So we do the other option. But it is an option.
spk_0: 49:41
Is that at Logan? Or
spk_1: 49:42
it is. But they also are Green City Market.
spk_0: 49:44
Okay, Cool.
spk_1: 49:45
Yeah. Um Oh, no. Sorry. Wicker Park and Green City got and okay, why? To compost. So basically, when um, foodways is trapped in an anaerobic environment, so without oxygen it produces, it releases gases like methane and, um, other things that could really harm the environment, as opposed to being organically composted and being able to be reused. So, I mean, that's like the really short version of it. But what what healthy soil does is they take the food ways to a worm farm and the worm farms eat the eat the rotting food, And then basically, what they put out is what our dirt on land and soil is made out of. So it's like, really clean. And this composted, this compost that's left over we can use to, I don't know, grow our own home gardens or whatever. So I don't know if that's a great answer. Does
spk_0: 50:42
hosting too. Is it just fruits and vegetables or what? Can you camp?
spk_1: 50:46
Yeah. So you can't put in an animal products. No meat, no dairy. You can't put in like your pets poop or cat litter. Some places say no compostable plastics. But I've been told that you still can't from Jonathan. A healthy soil. I'd be curious to ask him. Now, something has changed. But you see a lot of those, like packages that say that they're like, Have you seen those? There's, like, sometimes food bags that say that they're made from, like, a corn on their compostable. Okay. But they just decompose at a different rate. So sometimes I think causes issues and no, like sick plants, But you can put like, All right, So any food scraps are absorbed. Fruit scraps, coffee grounds, vegetable scraps, teabags. If there's no like nylon or and, you know the like, not stapled to the string. So no staples, obviously. Green leaves, grass trimmings.
spk_0: 51:48
Yeah. So old likes egg shells. Would not be able to go in the compost.
spk_1: 51:54
No, actually. Sorry. You can put eggshells.
spk_0: 51:57
Okay, but not eggs. Got sorry. Yeah. Yeah. Cool. Okay, Minister. Doing that Yeah. I didn't even think about the freezer. Such a good idea. Yeah, there's no smell. Freezer is so tiny. Ours
spk_1: 52:09
is too. But we don't have that much stuff in it.
spk_0: 52:11
But you walk it, though. No, I
spk_1: 52:14
put Oh, yeah. I should mention you could get these compostable bags. They're like these green blood bags. You can find the whole foods. We put that in a big Tupperware, just tow line, and then that way because it fills up, we just take it out and tie it and put it next to it and then fill up more. I mean, because we are vegetarian and vegan. We eat so many vegetables so that we do have, like, avocado pits and no orange Ryan's pills and stuff like that. So it does. It does build up more than I had expected, but I do try to get some responsible. You can also save certain vegetables and make broth. I don't know if you've heard people say
spk_0: 52:52
yeah, and I actually have a juicer, and I'm like, I need to do something with all of this. I was thinking a vegetable broth.
spk_1: 53:00
Yeah, I I think they did it once but I can't remember if you could make crackers out of the pulp too. Just like of interest. Yeah, just Google. Like juice. Pulp?
spk_0: 53:10
Yeah. Recipes. Yeah. Okay, I'm excited. Let's dive back into the beginning of the video. I want to know your last tip on something that we can d'oh toe live more eco friendly life
spk_1: 53:27
by organic. I mean, that's an interesting one, because I think people think about buy organic is being a like a personal health decision, which it is. But it also can be talking about organic cotton or well, yeah, like, organic in terms of what you be and what you wear both of these things. These products require a lot of pesticides. Cotton specifically uses a lot of pesticides and a lot of water, and the people that produce them are harming themselves. It's very common for farmers use lots best sides to have, like certain types of cancers. It's also really bad for the environment that really bad for the water really bad for the soil. And so I tried to buy organic when I can. I know that there are things like, um, oranges and I think cabbage and things not. The cabbage is one of the things that have. We got a thick peel that can protect themselves from pesticides, but and it's more expensive. But if you can, I would lean towards buying organic for environmental reasons just as much. That's a
spk_0: 54:38
really good point. Yeah, it's easy to forget about organic being anything other than food.
spk_1: 54:44
Yeah, and I think something that's interesting is that from a farmer's perspective, using these pesticides saves them a lot of money in the grand scheme of things. When, uh, these pollutants flow down to the Gulf of Mexico, which is what happens and pollutes the water in, like Louisiana or something, people back up here are paying for to clean their water. In the grand scheme of things, it ends up costing a lot of you factor in everything like like that, like the river guys I'm not doing, I don't know, eating organic.
spk_0: 55:18
I was also thinking about all the online shopping that people do know what that's on, that,
spk_1: 55:25
um, if I can find something in the story, tryto find something in the store, there's so much packaging, it kills me. I
spk_0: 55:32
am a son, isn't saying it's
spk_1: 55:34
terrible. I don't I really don't like it. And I if I can't find something in a store that I will look on Amazon. But I definitely try ahead of time to not deal with all that packaging. I mean, that is a hard thing about, Like, I was saying to try to buy a second hand and you can shop online for that stuff. It is hard because I also the same time I'm saying, Don't buy online because it just accumulate so much waste but save your packaging, reuse it and consume lous e mean, that's the big thing. And for me, it's not been such a hard thing to consume less because I just It's become unappealing to me. I know that that's not the norm for everybody.
spk_0: 56:16
When did that become appealing? D'oh!
spk_1: 56:19
Well, they're so another documentary is minimalism.
spk_0: 56:22
Do you know I watched it?
spk_1: 56:24
Yeah. So I watched that a while ago, and I was kind of like, Yeah, that that totally feels right to me because, I mean, just from, like, a space perspective, like I don't like feeling cluttered. I don't like we live in a small home. I don't like having piles and not be able to close the drawers. And it just feels so relieving to me to not have that my parents moved from a house that I grew up in for, at least from 12 starting at the age of 12. But it's a big house with a lot of stuff, and when they moved, I had to clean out everything in my bedroom and found all these things I kept just for sentimental reasons that didn't really need to be sentimental. It's just like they were there for so long that they were sentimental, like, I mean, I went on a trip to Australia with my family and I kept the gum wrappers. Oh, because it was like, Well, this is Australian gum e novelty. But from doing that, that I mean, that was such a wake up call for me, and my husband calls his mother moved as well. In the end, it clean out all stuff. We're both like we don't want to accumulate things like if I die tomorrow, I want to be really easy for people to get rid of my
spk_0: 57:36
things. But on top of that, I
spk_1: 57:39
mean it's just back to the 7.5 1,000,000,000 people. It's just like every time I'm I wear through a pair of shoes, it's it doesn't disappear when you're done with it like you may feel freed of it because it went in the trash and that went off somewhere that you don't know. But it's not disappearing, and that is an honestly enough for me to not really like desire anything new. I like to think of ways to, like fix up my clothes or breathing life into things. And if I can't I mean, I'm kind of like a little bit mournful that I that I'm adding one more thing to landfill. Um, so yeah, it's I think it's just the knowledge of what happens on the other side and again, just wanting space
spk_0: 58:25
totally. Would you say that a lot of your friends are like minded? Or do you have a lot of friends who love to shop?
spk_1: 58:32
Oh, yeah, like no one's like mine.
spk_0: 58:34
How do you like work with that? Or do you just let them be?
spk_1: 58:39
Well, here's the thing. Like I feel like one of the most powerful things. It's just been like living what feels right to me by example, and I have seen people in my life absorb some of that. People could be really sensitive and really defensive and feel like they're being attacked just by bringing something up. Food is really personal. What you wear is really personal, and you can feel like you're losing a part of yourself if you're making some shifts in those things. I don't know what the right answer is because everyone's different. I would say that just like living by example has been impactful in some ways. I mean, I'm constantly hosting events and constantly talking about how these things are a problem, so I make it clear what my values are when they're over. I'm not barking down their throat about it, but, um, I'm also only serving the vegan food, and it just has gotten family and friends at least more curious about it. I have friends that will ask about it, and I'm about to eat. It'll still order pork, but at least they like asked and talked about it and are aware. At least they know now. I don't Yeah, I don't know. It's it's definitely hard to tow. It can be hard to talk about, but because if this is the direction chosen, for better or worse, I mean, I can't I cannot get my head out of it like I can't stop thinking about this stuff. So it's hard for me toe unwanted. Like I said, you have to go on with life you can't solve. I cannot solve all the world's problems air like really any of them. But But, I mean, I also can't act like they're not there. And so, yeah, just by talking about it
spk_0: 1:0:17
besides the documentary Minimalism, do you Have any other resource is that can help us live a more minimalist lifestyle,
spk_1: 1:0:26
so literalists she's from here or No should. Not anymore. Now she's in Wisconsin, but that's an account to follow. Zero Waste Home is a great account to follow. She wrote a book as well. Um, and she did a talk at The Shed Aquarium last year, which was really great. Um, zero Waste. Chicago is an organization here, obviously, and they host events. If your listeners were all in Chicago, I don't know, but, um, visit the plant. The plant on this outside is an amazing place, and you could do a tour of the building and learn about their whole goal of being a circular economy within that building. It's really cool. Ashley Piper again, Double shadow. Um, she's she's amazing. She I mean her book. This is an amazing resource because it's not written like a textbook. It's written with a sense of humor and companions. They
spk_0: 1:1:17
give a shit. Yeah, yeah,
spk_1: 1:1:19
yeah, it's really good.
spk_0: 1:1:21
I love that title of that book, too, because a question that I had waas how can we get more people passionate about this? Because I think a lot of people know, But they no, I don't know if it's just lack of not really carry on or they have other priorities.
spk_1: 1:1:37
You know what I think it is is like not really being able to fully wrap their head around this girl with the impact. Like what? I've I feel like a broken record saying this, but it's so easy for people to wrap their heads around social impact or human suffering because it's something we all gonna experience. We have experienced in one way or another. So, like you can kind of, I think, like what it feels like for this person, but thinking about like the degradation of our environment. In the grand scheme of things, it's not slow, but in our lifetimes it feels slow and you don't see it right in front of yourself all the time. And when you get rid of your trash is out of your sight. So it is hard. I think, that there is a personal level of there's something within it that could be personal to everyone, whether it's their own personal health, their future of their Children, the impact on like the rainforest to harvest palm oil. Or, you know, things like that or the fact that maybe like again, they want their kids to see Theo Ocean without plastic in it. So I mean, I think it's kind of like finding what that what that personal aspect is and kind of touching on that and just being like, ever present, just always talking about it or living it and like when you go somewhere and they offer you a drink and all, they have plastic cups just saying No thanks. And then someone's like, Oh, I didn't even think about that and which is is wasn't is me still in different aspects. Like every every so often. There's a new thing where I'm like my God and even think about how that was, like, another thing. So, yeah, I mean, at my old job years ago, I would bring my A couple of years ago, I would bring my own cup because we'd walk to get coffee every day and after a while, my co workers, we're bringing their cups. So it's not like I was like, you assholes get Yeah, they just were like, Oh, hello, you
spk_0: 1:3:31
know, And that's such an easy change. Yeah,
spk_1: 1:3:33
it is such an easy change, So yeah, I don't know.
spk_0: 1:3:37
You know, that really does. For some reason, toothpaste came into my mind. Yeah. What do you do for toothpaste?
spk_1: 1:3:43
Right now? I'm using Davis. I want to say just aside, No, a really, really cool way to find or not. I mean, cool in my definition of cool to find good businesses is looking up the Big Corp directory. Do you know about the corporations?
spk_0: 1:3:57
Kind. So
spk_1: 1:3:58
it's basically just like this really intentional, really rigorous set of standards that some businesses choose to me, that basically essentially just proves that their priorities are in social and environmental impact, and there's a balance between their profit and their purpose. So it's like if they are certified B Corp. You could just basically be like I trust you. David is cool because they're in a metal container that come with this key that you could twist that you don't waste anything
spk_0: 1:4:29
like, I know that they were
spk_1: 1:4:31
like toothpaste tablets now, but I I don't know. But like in terms of other things like that, like I use a shampoo bar playing products I got as a Christmas gift because they're actually really expensive. But do you know about playing products? They're metal bought bottles of shampoo, conditioner and lotion, and probably body washed, too. You get the metal bottles when they're empty. You keep the, um, whatever it's called the pushing thing. Yeah, on send the bottles back, they clean them and send you a new full on.
spk_0: 1:5:08
Cool. So you're
spk_1: 1:5:09
not ever wasting the packaging? The thing is, they're like $30 bottle for shows a lot, but I got the conditioner. That's what I've been using for a while because it takes a long time to get through conditioner Um and then we use lush shampoo and body wash bars. You didn't ask about all that.
spk_0: 1:5:27
I know that. That's definitely a question that I wanted to hear is what are some sustainable skincare BMB any of those sorts brands that you love? And I know that you have on your site, which I'll definitely like any that we should definitely shout out right now, even make up, too.
spk_1: 1:5:46
Yeah, so Okay, I don't wear a ton of makeup, so I'm not, like, amazingly knowledgeable about it. But I know a few really good resource is one is credo because they have brick and mortars that you could go to talk to someone there. Everything there is free of a huge number of chemicals that are actually legal in cosmetics, but they've decided or not acceptable and all. Everything is cruelty free so you can talk to them about their products. It's really helpful, for someone like me doesn't know anything about makeup. There's also this brand that I don't really know how to pronounce. It's like Keilar wise. It's okay. It's K J E r Care. Wow. Well, anyway, what's cool is they have, like, blush compacts that come in a metal container and when they're empty, they just said you were the replacement to put back in that container on bits in, like recycle paper shipping or whatever packaging. So you're never wasting the actual compact, which is really cool. I take my makeup off with coconut oil. He takes such a tiny amount, and it's really easy. You can use those cotton rounds. You know what I'm talking about? Yes, So you don't waste paper or actually cotton swabs or something, and you could hand wash him or throw him in the washing machine? What else? Now may I tweet? Tweet is a brand that is hard to say, but, um, I use their face wife bars and yeah, I mean, they're not. That comes in a box. I have tried not by like things that come in packaging, especially that's the beauty of buying bars. But there's dozen. Their stuff is really amazing, and their whole their whole mission is, is great. So, yeah, that's a few.
spk_0: 1:7:35
Yeah, no, absolutely.
spk_1: 1:7:37
There's also scratched goods, which is local, and we feature them in our in the ones that will also our video. Siri's.
spk_0: 1:7:44
I always look past that you go inside their stories so cute.
spk_1: 1:7:48
That's really pretty adorable. Least the the mask bars, air fun. Their stuff is all in plastic.
spk_0: 1:7:58
Ah, couple more questions. I want to know what has been the greatest lesson that you learned when it comes to state sustainability.
spk_1: 1:8:08
I mean everything about animal agriculture. Really, I'm I feel so strongly about it, and it's hard to feel so strongly about food because, like I said, people take it really personally. But I don't think it should be personal, because when we learn about any other injustice, we just spring into action at the time. But when it comes to food, it's like, Don't judge would tell my plate. I think that knowing where food comes from, but I feel the same way about fashion as well is, is just It's so important. I don't know that that's like a lesson, but there's like, maybe it is
spk_0: 1:8:41
you think about okay, actually, here's the lesson that
spk_1: 1:8:45
just everything that we see everything around us has there is a process behind it, and there's a process after it, and to just when you're contemplating introducing anything into your life to really just for a moment, think about what that looked like. Sometimes it's like, What can you do? You need to, like, get new pipes for your drain or whatever, or for your home, whatever but it. Sometimes it's like a shirt at forever 21 or address it for over 20 1 of it cost $10. That $10 covered the labor, the shipping, the materials in the profit for the company. It's not easy to do that in that number of dollars, so something has been left out. I think that just that mentality should just sort of guide our decisions. In general, That's been like, really definitely a big lesson for me is that there is. There are hands behind everything. There's a process. Find everything that I consume, and I have to think about what's gonna happen to it when I'm finished
spk_0: 1:9:46
with. How do you continue to say, educated on this work? I
spk_1: 1:9:52
mean, social media is huge. It just constantly introduces me to new brands. And then I look farther into those brands and farther into the research they have done, I mean, yeah, just I'm not gonna say social media is like where you should get your
spk_0: 1:10:03
education, but you're right on all of those accounts that you just said. I mean, they're the ones who continue to do even more research. Yeah, exactly. Excellent way.
spk_1: 1:10:14
And I mean, that's just like the starting point, which then leads me to other articles I want to read right leads me to new businesses that are doing new amazing things. That is what inspired us to do. Our video. Siri's is to just be like, Look at these businesses are trying to help you. It doesn't have to be feeling it falls on your shoulders and then watching, like every documentary that comes out Yeah, from, uh, the true cost is another amazing one about fashion industry to again. You know, the other ones I mentioned?
spk_0: 1:10:44
Last question. What advice would you get your 20 year old self about living and environmentally conscious lifestyle?
spk_1: 1:10:52
Consider where your waist is going. That would be really like the big thing. But just the same thing is like the big lesson that I mentioned just where your products come from and where they go when you're done with them, Just do your research.
spk_0: 1:11:07
Thank you so much. Where could we learn more about you?
spk_1: 1:11:12
Social media on Instagram and Allie Kushner with an I are Everyone thinks it's a year and then said a l i e k u s age and I are And then also my website, obviously which is just my name dot com on the 18th we're gonna be teaching people about the impacts of, like, the different chemicals and pains. We're gonna make our own from natural pigments and run through a painting exercise.
spk_0: 1:11:37
Amazing. Well, we will definitely sure that both the charge community wanted out. Go. Yeah, Thank you guys. So much for listening. I hope that you are as inspired as I am to start composting and just live a more eco friendly green life. See you guys next week. Bye, Charged girls. Good morning. Yes, I'm talking to you. Was time to get charged up Because these days you knew this guy says hi Hands blew it And blue with the sun shining and all the birds chirping to two day is the best day to be alive. The miracles appear once you open up your eyes Surprise time to keep living the dream So get up Enjoy the rest of your charge. Tain, huh?