Cultural Obsolesence

"When people are persuaded, advertised, propagandized, and victimized into throwing away their cars every 3 years, their clothes twice yearly, their high fidelity sets every few years, their houses every five years, then we may consider most other things fully obsolete, Throwing away... may soon lead us to feel marriages (and other personal relationships) are throw-away items as well and... on a global scale countries, and indeed subcontinents are disposable like a kleenex."----Victor J. Papanek, Design for the Real World, 1970

This man saw this in 1970, indeed these things have come to fruition, people lease cars for a time and get rid of them and get another, more and more marriages end in divorce, people throw away friends like its yesterdays news. Africa and other third world countries are forgotten. What was the "thing" to do five years ago in flipping houses for money is now the banks natural past time.  It seems cultural obsolescence has invaded our principles as well. In Giles Slade's book, Made to Break, he uses quotes from many people to awaken us into realizing that we have let the objects we buy and dispose of change the way we perceive the world. Slade states, "Obsolescence began to take on increasingly abstract meaning. Whereas in earlier decades the term applied strictly to physical objects, in the 1960's it became possible to describe peoples knowledge, training, and skill sets as victims of obsolescence." It seems to have gone even further then that. As technological obsolescence had grown exponentially after microchips and computers were invented, it seems culturally, obsolescence has increased and gathered momentum in the same manner. With the rise of E-waste throughout the world an especially in America, we are products not of our natural environment but products of our technological environment. Unfortunately, PBT's (Permanent Biological Toxins) are on the rise and we can not get rid of them. We as a nation, built on our capitalistic tendencies are victims of our own success, our cultural obsolescence has given rise to people who will throw away companions in their private lives and professional lives to succeed, get ahead, or be part of the next big thing. We have let big business with all their "death-dating" of the objects they make, destroy our environment. We have landfills with toxic waste that cannot be destroyed. Imagine that? We have waste that cannot be destroyed. So what to do? Well Slade proposes that inevitably America will have to become "greener" because the waste we generate will be too much for us too handle. Countries will refuse to accept our waste, our bribes, and our proposals of "cheap" material that can be harvested through recycling. Finally the corporate companies of America will have pressure put on them by our Government to make objects that can be recycled and are humane to the environment, to make products that can be last rather then making the "death-date" a part of the design. Hopefully this happens before its too late.