SimpleWeblog

Voting with dollars

Sorry for the rant:

Star Wars Episode 2: Attack of the Clones opened today, and most of my friends went to go see it. I decided not to. No big important reasons, but I really didn't want to lend my support to the movie.

I have been trying to evaluate my spending a little differently lately. Nothing too original, but I have tried to shift the focus from "is this worth the money to me?" to "do I want to support this with my money?"

Sometimes it is an easy call. I don't want McDonald's to get my money, but the little tacqueria (even if it may smell funny) is a worthwhile cause. Sometimes there isn't much choice - are airlines really that different to justify an extra hundred and a less convenient airport? But I am trying to do better, to make as much of my spending money go towards businesses and restaurants and artists that I enjoy and want to see around for a while. I am lucky to have the money to do this, since the cheapest choice is usually not the one that I want to support.

So what about this movie thing? Do I really want my money going to support films that I know won't be that good? No. I don't really want to see more dumb action movies, so I try not to get dragged into seeing them. I don't want Star Wars movies that are shoddily made because they know people will see them regardless - which is what I felt about the first one. Unfortunately, my money for that one went into the opening day totals anyways, since I couldn't know ahead of time what I was getting into. I want to think of my not going to see this one during the opening week (we'll see if I go at all, I guess) as some small bit of protest.

In the scheme of things, does it matter? No, Mr. Lucas won't really notice the lack of my $9. But that's my part in this, so I will do what I can. Wendy's probably doesn't notice I stopped going there, either, but my not going has also reduced the number of times the lunch group at work goes there. Do they notice that? Probably not. But these things need to start somewhere, right?

[I guess this isn't much of a rant since it turned into some lame talk about individual responsibility. Oh well. You'll notice I'm not asking for anyone's money here. Someday I'll try to focus on improving my writing skills. For now, the focus is surviving the impending nihongo final.]