The problem with the guide book led me into wondering about how day-to-day ethical questions arise. It seems to me that most of us don’t really engage with ‘ethics’, we just get on with life.
Wherever I can, I like to buy fairtrade products because it seems right to demonstrate a commitment to this way of doing business. But, in France, last week, I had the choice of buying regular coffee or fairtrade coffee. The difference in price was so extreme (the FT product was more than double the cost) that I’m afraid I decided to buy the cheaper one. I’m not going to rack myself with guilt – it seems to me that someone, somewhere, in that little food chain is exploiting the consumers as much as they used to exploit the producers!
So then I began to wonder what to do with this “Rough Guide to the Hotels of France” that I can no longer trust? (By the way, that might seem a bit extreme, but I only have ten or so days holiday a year and I don’t see why I should let someone else’s naff recommendation potentially ruin one day of them.)
Usually, if I have a book that I don’t particularly want to keep, then I’ll give it to a charity shop. But ethically, as I know there’s at least one bad description in it, should I inflict that on someone else? Of course, I could just throw it away… Or perhaps I should annotate the page and THEN give it to the charity shop?
So many decisions! Time for another coffee!
All the best,
