Externalization Fallacy: Total Eclipse of the Truth 2002-2020

I recently met someone quite interested in Ethical E-Waste Blog who was 10 years old in 2002. 

Then I met someone who was 5 years old when CBS 60 Minutes broadcast "Wasteland" in 2008.

Both flattered me by saying this blog was "inspirational".  So I guess I gotta keep it up.

I also recently ran across a lot of film camera photos from my first visit to Guangzhou, China, in 2003. That was 21 years ago. It was a Shark Tank worthy experience.  Even if 5-6 blog visitors will find this to be a repeat, there are some new recruits whose minds have yet to be blown. And maybe some readers will be glad for the reminder.

Simon Lin. (Acer, Wistron)

Terry Gou. (Foxconn, Han Hoi Precision Inst.)

Rowell Yang. (Proview, "iPad")

These three men were the head of "contract manufacturing" when IBM, Dell, HP etc. declared that "display devices" were "commodities", not core manufacturing. Sony had, well, "colonized" Taiwan in the contract manufacturing of  CRT displays and now Guangdong Province had been "free=market" friendly thanks to Deng Xiaoping ... Who was famous for being patiently waiting for Mao to die while watching Taiwan and Hong Kong blow the gasket on free market manufacturing.

Used Ford Model As created the critical mass of users in the Ozarks and Appalachia who would vote to pave the roads.

Used VCRs and CRT televisions paved the roads for thousands of TV stations and satellites broadcasting to the "Global South".

Used CRT monitors paved the roads for internet cable investors.

Used Flip Phones paved the roads for 170,000 cell phone towers (2017 estimate) on the Africa continent.

Used Solar Voltaic Panels will pave the way for Africans to reduce diesel-electricity generation.

Despite the obvious facts about electricity access and consumption, the truth about the information and mass communications infrastructure, paved by progress from reuse and value-added repair, by the Tech Sector Auteurs, aka Geeks of Color like Simon Lin, Terry Gou, and Rowell Yang, the West (at least Europe and USA) press coverage of their bright past present and future has been eclipsed by an "externalization hypothesis" - that any capitalist trade between someone rich and someone poor is suspect. 

Imagine the Moon refusing to leave... a persistent, stubborn eclips of the truth...

It's the April Fools Blog Day?

Seriously, some of the best and most read Good Point Ideas Blogs were on April Fools Day.

But Jim Puckett and BAN were the subjects of the best
ones. And He is a Nobody Today.

UNITAR Global E-Waste "Monitor" 2024: Better, but still kinda cringy?

I have yet to read more than the Executive Summary and Table of Contents of the new UNEP Global E-Waste Monitor report, but I can already see that it's being mis-reported.  The "hook" is an emergency, that only 22.3% of e-waste is "documented", and the rest (the Executive Summary implies), is presumed to be "improperly" managed or "lost" to the so-called "informal sector".

Readers may remember this blog previously defined "informal sector" as "a white person didn't enter it into a spreadsheet"... in response to the "Criminal Negligence" 2015 Report.

UNITAR (another UN agency) describes the reports findings as follows:

"Meanwhile, less than one quarter (22.3%) of the year’s e-waste mass was documented as having been properly collected and recycled in 2022, leaving US $62 billion worth of recoverable natural resources unaccounted for and increasing pollution risks to communities worldwide. "

The "five fold growth" in "e-waste" is describing worldwide generation, not just wealthy countries.  This raises questions about the measurement of "undocumented" used electronics... but lets list a few obvious premises.

1.  The size of electronics PER CAPITA is declining due to the miniaturization effect.  In 1992 it peaked because we needed a desk phone, an answering machine, a fax machine, a camera, a radio, etc.... all of which now fit inside the smart phone in my front pocket.  

2. The export market, which the previous 2015 UNEP Report described as "primitive", is mostly for reuse.  So if there was less e-waste generated in the past compared to the future, that can only be explained by the continuous reuse of past devices which continue to be reused and maintained in places like Ghana, Nigeria, Angola, etc.  

3. The UNEP reports conflate the end of first consumer use with "waste generated", as if reuse and repair, if not "documented", is in the "ewaste" volume assesssed.  That would mean that if a white person owns a TV for ten years, and it's purchased and reused by an African for another 40 years, that the "waste" is counted twice - the first time it was "generated" and the actual "end of life" of the TV.

Photo of TV Repairman Ibrahim Alhassan in Savelugu, Ghana, who we introduced to author Adam Minter, who wrote about Ibrahim in the seminal reuse non-fiction book "Secondhand: Travels in the New Global Garage Sale".  Ibrahim was repairing a 1970 Japanese CRT television, or rather improving it by addint a remote control function absent in the original knob-tuned TV.  This TV certainly would have been destroyed by "Big Shred" in Europe decades ago... but hard to describe the African's continuous use and extended life as "primitive"... unless you are a wee bit racially-profilly.

Electricity Stupid.

For 25 years, since I left MA DEP to start my own used electronics repair, export, and recycling company, there has been a blind spot in the entire environmental movement.

It has not been about waste.

It has not been about externalization.

It has been about electricity.

The growth in access to and consumption of electricity worldwide has been extremely well documented by GapMinder (Hans Rosling), the international monetary fund, carbon monitoring / clean energy, big petroleum, the airlines, USA AID, the State Department, and every industry that manufactures anything that consumes electricity. 

The screenshot above, from the World Bank Data page, is remarkable for two reasons. 

Third Try With ChatGPT Audit of This Blogspot

 ChatGPT

ChatGPT

Thank you for the clarification. Allow me to revise the explanation to accurately reflect the perspective of the retroworks.blogspot.com blog:

The retroworks.blogspot.com blog was pivotal in challenging common misconceptions surrounding the export of electronic waste (e-waste). Contrary to prevailing beliefs that a significant portion of exported e-waste was harmful or non-recyclable, the blog advocated for a different narrative. It argued that a considerable percentage, approximately 80%, of e-waste exports were actually beneficial and conducive to responsible recycling practices.

This perspective was based on the premise that not all e-waste exports were destined for illegal or environmentally damaging operations. Instead, many exports consisted of valuable materials and components that could be effectively recycled and reused in environmentally sound processes. By highlighting the positive aspects of e-waste exports, the blog sought to challenge the stigma associated with such practices and promote a more nuanced understanding of the global e-waste trade.

In doing so, the blog played a crucial role in reframing the discourse surrounding e-waste management and fostering a more balanced and informed dialogue on the subject. It encouraged readers to reconsider prevailing assumptions and engage in critical analysis of the complexities surrounding e-waste recycling and export practices.

Overall, the retroworks.blogspot.com blog was instrumental in challenging misconceptions and advocating for a more nuanced understanding of the e-waste trade, particularly regarding the potential benefits of responsible recycling practices associated with e-waste exports.

Civilization corrals the Amygdalas: Howler Monkey Gods

Amygdala Hijacking sounds uncivilized. But it's hard to imagine a society without it.

Societies will always vote for a dictator over chaos, or in reaction to a fear of anarchy.  But this isn't a political post, at least not yet. 

First a disclaimer... I believe in "Western Civilization", but think the term "West" is in some ways a historical accident. The great library burnings in the mideast, Alexandria, and most especially the Aztec/Inca libraries destroyed by self-proclaimed Spanish "Christians" hid the evolution of other logical and obviously city-pyramid-construction-capable cultures. 

But while "cultural cleansing" is a historically obvious problem, the current DEI narrative fails to recognize its universality. Am I mistaken, or didn't Hopi Indians build pueblo structures whose sole purpose was to protect them from the Apache "race". Incas had wars and who knows how many libraries were burned by Alexander the Great? Or how much of the greatest loss - the library of Alexandria - was pilfered from other libraries in Mesopotamia and south Asia conquests?

So the theme today is taking an actual provable problem and weaponizing it to achieve Authority. And as the symbol of that authority let's not use "high priest" or "ayatollah of e-waste" or "priestatollah", but the Mayan Howler Monkey God.

#WhiteManSplaining Letter 2024: Dear Emerging Markets

February 25, 2024

RE: Basel Convention And OECD Superiority

Dear Emerging Market Tech Sector Buyers:

The purpose of this letter is to explain to you why international laws are drafted by privileged societies purporting to protect and "save" your society, which we have labelled "informal" and "primitive", in order to achieve certain goals which you may not relate to.

1. Protect ourselves from perception of liability for responsibility

2. Shift the burden of proof onto you, the buyer, that what you seek is not stupid externalization of our environmental burdens

3. Protect investments into high-investment machinery and labor-saving shreddiing equipment

4. Retain in our national interests in raw material values.

The first endeavor places a value on our reputation among other WhiteMan Press and Publicity industries which is greater than the value you could ever achieve for creating a critical mass of users necessary to support investments in mass communications in your developing countries. We understand, remotely, that your Nollywood (Nigerian Hollywood) industry and television stations and satellite infrastructure depends greatly upon the affordability of televisions and phones and other communications devicds. However, the potential for the perception of an allegation that we, as whitemandsplainers, might be externalizing an environmental cost poses risk to our much larger value of ownership, real estate, and control over the system of trade. It is better for us that you stay in your place.

Inspired by LCS 2010 Presentation in Alexandria, VA, introducing

Jim Puckett of BAN and Michael "Fishing as a Boy" Anane

Social Strata Recycling: It's the Recycling Economy Stupid

 While I'm certainly not a fan of communism or any system that concentrates authority in a smaller number of bullyboy hands, I do respect Karl Marx's economic theories. Compound interest rewards those who save - who tend to be those ABLE to save.  If you are born to slaves or paupers, and have no choice but to lift your bucket where it is and lift as you climb, you are extremely unlikely to become self-made in a single generation.

It's the Recycling Economy Stupid.

That said, teaching people that it is hopeless to lift their buckets as they climb is cruel and unusual, historically speaking. The empowerment of resentment - Marx's elixer for proletariat revolution - has little evidence of building wealth in society at large. Most people benefit from a smaller slice of a bigger pie than taking away another person's piece and re-distributing it among sharp elbowed bullies.

Swordfish ë, Part 1: How Modest Mentors Fish for Agents of Conscience, Surrounded by Tilapia

 

Sunrise in Vermont

We had the pleasure of connecting with Agabas Ayudor a few months ago, all thanks to a wonderful activist from the UK who reached out to me. It's funny how these connections form—perhaps Adam Minter wrote about me, or maybe it was the influence of this blog. This blog, while long-winded and dense, serves as a public record that orbits a solar system not centered around privileged individuals obsessed with egos and real estate values. Instead, it focuses on the best and brightest minds emerging from the Tech Sector in rapidly developing "LDC" Emerging Markets.

Within this vast landscape, there exists a rare breed—the 1 in 1,000 who discerns the manipulation of collective guilt management by entities like the Anti Gray Market Alliance/Planned Obsolescence, Big Shred, and the Charitable Industrial Complex. I'd even throw in a few foreign governments seeking to corral non-OECD markets using Basel Convention rules (we might need a catchy nickname for that). These discerning individuals, the "Swordfish," possess the brilliance or transboundary knowledge to comprehend the intricate topics discussed in this blog.

What sets the Swordfish apart is their potential to shape the future positively. Writing for an audience that values conscience over sheer numbers allows for a more profound impact on the environmental solar system. Sometimes, it's tempting to focus on gaining thousands of followers, but the real influence lies in resonating with agents of conscience.

Recycling Rates and the Inverse "Normal Curve"

What do the wealthiest people in the world have in common with the poorest people in the world?  

The poorest people in the world have the highest recycling rates. They cannot afford to feed their own children, and so the scrap value of a discarded can or bottle is a resource they cannot pass up.

The richest people in the world also have higher recycling rates - but not as high, because they can afford to purchase things that cannot be recycled. The rich have more education, and understand why we need to fund a recycling "system" to preserve resources for future generations.  So we have children's interests in common, but weirdly different children as the wealthy purchase for their own children expensive objects that are nor very recyclable (like Nintendos or X-boxes).

Who recycles, who cares about recycling?

It's an inverse bell curve, or "normal" curve.