Using Charity shops is one of the most obvious and easy ways of living out all those standard eco living hashtags #secondhandfirst #chooseused #upcycling #reduce #reuse #recycle #zerowaste. It therefore never ceases to amaze me what is the actual demographic using charity shops – and the absence of those I would expect to be MOST keen on them.
I do not see any evidence of widespread use of charity shops from looking at the pics of all the young women who go on the school climate strikes; and make up a significant proportion of the crowds on Extinction Rebellion demos.
My own female students – all keen to take a day off school for a climate strike – are also very keen on fashion. The Recreational Marxist who loves her urban guerrilla chic and frequently wears her £140 Doc Martens shows no indication of going anywhere near a charity shop for her clothes. One young women when directly challenged responded with: ‘They never have anything I like.’
And here is the problem. Their starting point is that the clothes they are going to wear must be dished up to them in exactly the form they like; and conforming to the image they have been informed they are supposed to like. To get them into charity shops this must be shifted the other way round. They go into charity shops to find clothes they need; and then develop an eye for how to turn what is available in the shop into something which they can wear with style. This however would require them to develop some strength of character – very difficult for millennials immersed in Instagram culture; more effort than they are willing to expend; and probably a requirement for sewing skills that were lost to women the generation before their own mothers.
The impact on the environment of the fashion industry shouts out to me that teaching these women some dress making skills and how to use charity shops should be low hanging fruit for anyone with a concern for green living.