December 19th, 2007
But if there is a non-toxic byproduct of toxic toys, Mother Nature might be among the beneficiaries. Because buying local and buying hand-made, buying artisan and non-plastic shrinks the corporate global marketplace in some small way and trade simplifies. It becomes more local and the monitoring of environmental hazards simplifies.
And inside individual households, these things trickle down: Life simplifies.
“It’s actually better to live without a bunch of stuff around,” says Christy Morrison of Austin, Tex., who has sons – Tom, 2 1/2 years old , and Nic, 14 months. She and her husband, Brian, decided to go through their house and toss out every toy they owned that was from
While the couple are aware that not all Chinese-manufactured toys are evil, as a young mom who attends school and works, Morrison says that neither she nor her husband has time to call the manufacturer for each toy.
“It’s frustrating that in addition to the normal things about parenting – watching what they’re eating, worrying about the air quality, worrying about what they’re going to see on the Internet, where they’re going, all of those other big things – now it’s toys. So it’s better to just live without a lot of it, kind of simplify. This whole thing has made us think about what we really need around. Our quality of life is just fine with out them.”
On the positive side, Morrison says, she feels good about supporting a more grass-roots economy – a kinder, gentler type of trade, as it were.
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