Ethical consumers– Are you one?  

When using social media to shop or simply look at your newsfeed, being an ethical consumer should be one your main priorities. By choosing to be an ethical consumer not only are you helping smaller more ethically run businesses, but you are also shedding light on the misconduct that workers endure when working for some big tech companies. Although many people can’t completely disconnect from big networks like Facebook or Amazon, by simply reducing the time you spend on the website can help reduce activity on the websites encouraging the networks to improve their conditions.  

To help reduce the number of unethical consumers there are, you can simply use the internet less. Today, saying so sounds like a ludicrous idea but by using the internet less you would also be promoting unethical companies less as well.  

Since slowing down internet usage probably isn’t in most people’s agendas you can simply use your data and money to promote ethical vendors rather than waste time and money on unethical vendors. Even though you won’t be able to find exact replacements for such big tech companies, smaller companies could do the job just as well all while being more ethical.  

The most impactful way to let big tech companies know they are failing you is to boycott them. Whether it be for a few days or forever, boycotting very clearly gets your message across and allows the companies to have to decide- either fix the problem or lose business. Take for example Uber, once sexual misconduct reports started to come out many people enforced #deleteuber in order to get their point across until some sort of action was taken to try to fix the problem.  

Being an ethical consumer is important for all people who use social media or the internet. By being aware of companies that are unethical and avoiding them you are helping make the internet a better place to be on. By choosing to buy from ethical vendors you are taking away clientele from big companies such as Amazon. Companies like Amazon have had many claims filed against them regarding misconduct of workers and harsh working conditions. By avoiding these companies, you can be helping not only yourself but the people who suffer in these jobs as well.