It’s back to school shopping days and I just saw a TV commercial where the mother was buying two of everything for her forgetful son.
This is one example of how we live in such a wasteful society. I, for one, do not care to see commercials where a mother is encouraged to throw an extra backpack in her shopping cart knowing that her son is likely to lose one.
What are the repercussions of this? Children are growing up with a sense of entitlement. There will always be new things for them whenever they want it. They don’t have to work for it. The discarded backpack will just end up in a landfill.
What about the poor child labourer who stitched up the backpack for minimal wages so that the average Canadian mother can chuck an extra one in her shopping cart?
Does this teach the child how to care and have empathy for the vast number of children around the world and even locally who don’t even have basic school supplies and can’t afford a simple pencil?
Perhaps the mother, rather than buying a second backpack for her son, might encourage him to spend the same money on a donation for school supplies for some needy child.
Simon BurnQualicum Beach