Why You Feel Guilty About Problems You Didn’t Create

0:00 Why do caring people feel guilty every time they buy groceries, use plastics, or even open an app? Because somewhere along the way, the biggest environmental decisions got pushed onto you. This is the How to Protect the Ocean Podcast, your weekly ocean news update. And if you care about staying informed about the Ocean every weekday, hit that follow button right now so you don't miss tomorrow's episode. Today we're talking about the hidden system behind your choices, why consumer guilt is so common, and what real accountability actually looks like. This is based on a powerful conversation I have on Friday. I'm gonna be posting that conversation with Sarah Federman, a professor of Peace studies who examines how corporations shape justice, sustainability, and long-term impacts.

0:43 Now we've all felt it. You're standing in the store trying to choose between two products. One has more packaging, one costs more. One may be sourced ethically, one might not be. You need groceries, you're in a rush. You suddenly feel like saving the planet depends on what you put in your cart. And it's exhausting, to be honest. And according to Sarah, many of these ethical dilemmas were never supposed to land in your hands in the first place. She described how decisions about environmental harm often travel all the way down the supply chain until they reach the final person, the consumer, and then were left holding the guilt. I think it's really interesting, like when I'm in the grocery aisle and I'm trying to choose a product.

1:25 I'm always trying to choose like what's the best one. And I start looking at the products and something that always stood true to me and always stayed with me when I interviewed somebody who was involved in product management and involved in like, selling products online, especially from an environmental standpoint to be environmentally safe. And what he said to me really resonated with me. When you get stuff from him, this is the Grove Collaborative. It was the founder of the Globe Collaborative. You get it in these little bottles. It looks so small, but it's detergent say, but it's the same amount of detergent in there that actually, you can get from anything in the grocery store. And those big, big, like four liter containers. The reason why they're four liter and they're orange and they're yellow and they're bright colors are green, is they stand out more. They're bigger, they're more colorful, and that they're competing with other products, the same products on the grocery shelf.

2:12 So when you're standing on the grocery aisle, you're looking at a competition of these products. And a lot of times that competition to make them bigger, they have to dilute the actual soap. So when you use the soap, you're trying to use more. They want you to use more 'cause they want you to go back and buy more. But when you get it online from an environmental sustainably sourced company, they're just coming in these small bottles and you just put a little bit, a little tad and that's enough. And you start to look at that and you're like, is that enough soap? Like, is that gonna take off that stain or is that gonna make my entire load of laundry cleaner? Because when I use something else, it requires, I use more. Why am I using such a little amount? And that's where it comes from. Like you look at these groceries, you look at these islands and you're like, do they need to be that big?

2:53 Do they need to have all that water in it? Do they need to be certain type of plastic? It doesn't have to happen, but it's that competition that makes it big. And it doesn't mean that consumers, when you pick those products, because you can't see anything else, it doesn't mean those consumers have no responsibility. It means responsibility has been unevenly distributed. So like, let's be honest here. It's much easier for a corporation to say, Hey, shop better than redesigning their package. Think about that. It's much easier for industries to say, buy sustainably than to fix their sourcing transparency. It's much easier for governments to tell people to conserve resources than to regulate waste pollution and extraction at scale.

3:40 And when that happens, everyday people start blaming themselves for problems that they did not create. Think about the guilt that's put on us. Sarah gave a strong example with AI. People are now learning that data centers use massive amounts of water and energy. So what happens? Users begin asking, should I even use this tool? Am I causing harm by opening the app? That's a real emotional burden because everybody's using AI. But one person choosing not to use a chatbot is not the same as demanding better infrastructure, renewable power, water planning, and transparent reporting from the companies building those systems. And let's be honest, these data centers as I go in the conversation, you'll hear it on Friday with Sarah.

4:22 These data centers are often put in places where land is cheap. So it's usually often put in a place where it's not that expensive. Marginal communities live there. And they have to deal with these data centers. We don't know what the effects of having those data centers. They're also put in areas where there's already water problems because the land is cheap. Nobody wants to live there, and there's already water problems. So they're competing with drinking water for the people who do live there. So I think it's really difficult. You are looking at different levels of responsibility and we are stuck with the bill of guilt. We see this in seafood all the time. Consumers are told, buy sustainable seafood. Read labels. Know your species. Know the stock status. Know the fishing method. Know if labor practices are ethical and if it was local, know if it was imported and most people just want dinner.

5:06 Like my kids, I have two kids. They're older now, but things are busy when you have kids. And I'm not saying anybody who doesn't have kids aren't busy. We are busy. Everybody's busy. When I have kids, you know, we come home from school, they come home, you get them ready, give them a snack, hopefully it's sustainable and all this kind of stuff. And then you go out grocery shopping because both my wife and I work. We go grocery shopping in the evening where it's busy when there's a lot of other people and you're going out and you're buying all this stuff. You're trying to make all these right decisions, but you're in a hurry. You gotta go back. Our lives here in Canada are not slowed down. We move 'cause we have to get them to hockey or we have to get them to ballet or we have to get 'em to dance class. We have to get 'em to all these places. And if you have boys, it's different, right? Like different sports, different activities, everything's different.

5:47 If any child, you try and put 'em in activities like crafts and everything like that, arts and sciences and music and all these different things. And then you have to make dinner. You have to buy all these products and they need this and they need that and you have to make a decision. And we just don't have the information. Yeah, we talk about seafood. Just going back to seafood, like how are you supposed to know all that? Stock status, fishing method, labor practices were ethical. Is it local? Was it imported? All these different types of things. I just want dinner. I just need to fix dinner. And that makes it a really difficult thing. But then all of a sudden you feel guilty. That's why better systems actually matter. Traceability systems, clear labeling, strong fisheries management, fair labor enforcement, honest certifications, retailers that do their homework for their consumers.

6:32 Whatever happened to that? The actual choices matter, but consumers cannot carry the entire oceans on our backs. It's not fair to ask. So what does real accountability look like? It means pushing change upstream. That means asking a lot of questions. Who designed the system? Who profits from this system? Who has the power to improve the system? And who should be transparent and who should be regulated? You'll hear it on Friday. Sarah also talked about something important. Public pressure actually matters. Writing companies. Supporting better business matters, showing up at local meetings matter. Speaking up matters.

7:12 Collective action matters. Making that TikTok videos speaking your opinion matters because once that movement starts, once you see someone talking about it, you feel like talking about it as well. One person changing brands might feel small, but thousands of people demanding better standards is different. It's a movement. And just like yesterday, when we move as a collective, it works really well. When we move as a coalition, it works very well. It gets attention and that matters. That matters more than you think. If you care deeply about the ocean, climate or future, guilt can feel constant, but guilt is not a strategy. It's the clarity. The clarity is a strategy. You don't need to be a perfect consumer.

7:53 You need to be an aware citizen. You need to make better choices when you can. That's no doubt for sure, but you have to also give yourself grace when you can't make those decisions, when you don't have the information. And wherever possible, help move responsibility back to where it belongs with the systems powerful enough to create real change. Imagine grocery stores having to be transparent and where these products come from. That means the products themselves have to be transparent. Who can regulate that? Government can regulate that. Products, like even their own products, like their own companies or private companies can put that on there. And then you'd be like, you know what, I'm gonna buy from you 'cause you are awesome. It's helps when you start to push back.

8:33 It helps when you are not the one that has to make all the decisions. A lot of the times, we just give that to ourselves. It's all these hidden systems that are put on the burden on us. Why should we have to put the burden on where the fisheries come make those decisions? It should just be given to us. We shouldn't be given the option of buying fish that's over fished or we don't know where it goes in the supply chain. That should be a huge thing. Whether it's fisheries, whether it's beef, whether it's chicken, whether it's vegetables or fruit. We should know how things are done. Just like we know when Clementines come from Mexico. We should know when it's local and we should know when it's organic. Is it truly organic? What makes this thing organic?

9:15 It shouldn't just be a hidden marketing scheme. The hidden system behind your choices was built by people, and that means it can be rebuilt by people too. That's the final message I want to give you because that is something that is extremely important. This week in podcast I told you is gonna be inspiring because it's Earth Week. It is Earth Day soon, and I want you to be prepared to be like, Hey, you know what? I wanna protect the planet. But not just by myself. I want to be in a community. I want to be in a collective or a coalition or start my own or join one, but I also don't want to feel guilty all the time and have the burden put on me. Like have the burden put on you because you're using a phone that's made of plastic.

9:56 Well, that's not your fault. But how about we push back on the systems and the people who made that and say, why are we using plastic? Isn't there something alternative that we can use or the way the plastic is made is not by fossil fuels. That's what we're gonna learn all this week. We're gonna talk about Sarah by the end of this week. On Friday, you're gonna hear the full interview. But until then, if you want to hear that you don't wanna miss it, follow How to Protect the Ocean Podcast for more weekday ocean stories, science, and actions that actually matter. I wanna thank you so much for joining me on today's episode of the How to Protect the Ocean Podcast. I'm your host, Andrew Lewin, building the community of people who care about the ocean. I wanna thank you so much for joining me. Have a great day. We'll talk to you next time, and happy conservation.