The Breakroom
The holidays, overconsumption, and brain rot
Welcome to the Water Cooler
Oh hi.
Speaking of overconsumption, I (Maggie), your faithful newsletter collector, had what I can only describe as a fainting goat morning yesterday. They say art imitates life and some combination of too much holidays and brain rot happened to me1
BUT, in a moment of “this wasn’t the plan, but it worked out,” it turns out that waiting to hear what you had to say about our Friday episode means that I have more delightful things to share with you today.
Pantsuit Politics Bulletin Board
Holiday Schedule:
We will have new episodes of all of our shows next week.
Sarah and Beth will take the week of Christmas and New Year off to spend time with their family and recharge, but we will still have episodes of Pantsuit Politics in your podcast feed and a few treats for the Spice Cabinet.
We’ve been testing a new routine around the Good Morning News Brief, More to Say, and our regular episodes to look for how to balance our team resources with (what we expect to be) a chaotic news environment in the coming year. That means our Tuesday episodes are coming out in the afternoon/evening.
WITH TOTAL ACKNOWLEDGEMENT OF THE IRONY, we are expanding our Spice Cabinet Merch options in the Pantsuit Politics Store. One thing we like about our store is that it is a “print to order” store, so they only make the things you order, meaning they cost a little more than something mass-produced, but it is hopefully a small step in a more sustainable direction. By popular request, watch for hoodies, long sleeve shirts, and stickers coming next week!
What We Made for You This Week
This week, Sarah and Beth discussed the “too muchness” of everything through the lens of social media and overconsumption.
Earth Overshoot Day is the day each year when we have consumed all of the ecological resources that the Earth will produce in a given year. In 2024, that day was August 1.
On a psychological and practical level, we, as a species, need to figure out how to use about 35% less stuff. The great news is that you have great ideas about this. For every episode of Pantsuit Politics, we post a discussion post here on substack, where members of the Spice Cabinet (our premium community) share their thoughts on the episode. For Friday’s episode, you’ve shared great ideas about how you’re thinking about using less (and what Beth can do with her old towels):
Animal Shelters are almost always looking for towels and gently used stuffed animals for their dogs and cats
If you cancel Amazon Prime, you can still get free shipping, you just need to wait til you have $35 of things you want to order and wait a little longer for delivery
“No Spend” Days are a way to get started on this (also, I heard on about this idea of Frugal February where you don’t spend money outside of your food/utility/housing expenses - please let me know if you’ve done this)
Are Social Media Platforms the Next Dying Malls?
Also, Nicole shared this TikTok with us that shows you how to check and see if something you’re shopping for online is available at a resell site! JoinBeni.com
Jessica shared this quote that I know I’ll be thinking about for a long time:
“I used to think the top global environmental problems were biodiversity loss, ecosystem collapse, and climate change. I thought that with 30 years of good science, we could address these problems.
But I was wrong.
The top environmental problems are selfishness, greed, and apathy, and to deal with these, we need a spiritual and cultural transformation, and we scientists don't know how to do that.”
Gus Speth
From the Spice Cabinet
The other topic that has captured the zeitgeist and our audience this week is the fallout from the assassination of United Healthcare CEO Brian Thompson.
If you missed our spicy More to Say, our longtime listener Lou said,
“This is the first conversation I've heard that contained an appropriate level of criticism and caution for the elite class whose greed, vanity and contempt brought us to this moment, while staying well on the correct side of the line of not endorsing vigilante violence.”
So, if you’d like to listen:
Spicy MTS: French Revolution Vibes
Sarah and Beth were together in a studio in Louisville yesterday, so this week’s Spicy More to Say is audio only.
Beyond the great thoughts in our comment threads:
Heather thought this was a good read that brings together many threads of the post-election energy and anger we have in America:
The Real Roots of American Rage (Charles Duhigg, The Atlantic) gift link
Morgan works in the healthcare industry and shared this piece:
A Letter to my kids about last week (Christina Farr, Second Opinion)
If you, like me, are trying to have the coziest weekend available, maybe I recommend the sounds of Christmas Carols and crackling fire2.
Until next Tuesday, keep it nuanced, y’all!
Copyright (C) 2024 Pantsuit Politics. All rights reserved.
Everything is fine. In a real-life illustration of our theme of overconsumption, I tried to put too many things in the week this week.
If you have other recommendations for excessively long tracks like this, please share them in the comments
Serendipitously my audiobook hold The Serviceberry by Robin Kimmerer of Braiding Sweetgrass became available yesterday. It is an interesting look at the gift economy of abundance vs the market economy of scarcity. It is only 2 hours on audio and an interesting companion to yesterday’s podcast.
That article comparing malls to social media was fascinating!