We are Wal-Mart

“Wal-Mart Endangers Vermont,” a recent headline of an Associated Press story by Jennifer C. Kerr read. “Entire state makes list of threatened places,” declared the subtitle.

“Because of plans for several new Wal-Mart Super-centers across the state, the National Trust for Historic Preservation has placed the entire state of Vermont on its 2004 list of the most endangered historic places in the United States,” according to the article.

Later, I happened upon additional noteworthy news. Forbes magazine revealed that there are now 587 billionaires, among them the heirs of Wal-Mart founder, Sam Walton. “Of the ten richest people on the planet, five are Waltons, each one sitting atop $20 billion in Wal-Mart booty,” reported the author of “Thieves in High Places,” Jim Hightower.

This muddies, even more, the murky depths of my morning coffee. I remember the despairing comments of a friend whose daily walks along a stretch of Route 6 in Greeley, Pennsylvania produce bags of refuse that she collects from alongside the road.

Her most frequent find? Cast-off plastic Wal-Mart bags.

We find this to be remarkable, considering that the nearest Wal-Mart stores are located roughly 20 miles away in either direction.

I am a confessed resenter of big box store invasions. I detest the way they spread like plagues, consuming natural resources as long licks of macadam level former stretches of natural landscapes. These commercial behemoths approach the scene with promises of good jobs and convenient low-cost shopping opportunities. As soon as the doors open, we show up with our paychecks, exchanging the hours of our lives for cheap goods, sometimes of questionable origin.

Traced to its root, that $3 shirt might have been stitched by a child laboring in a country we never even knew existed. Do we give thought to this as we clothe our own children in these garments? And if we are aware, do we care?

I’ve shopped at Wal-Mart twice, making purchases both times. Therein lies the crux of the matter. Therein lies the fuel that feeds the fire threatening to engulf Vermont. How and where we choose to spend our dollars determines which big box stores choose our communities. We’re wallowing in Wal-Marts because we choose to shop there.

My sister’s favorite strolling meadow disappeared under pavement in the proliferation of buildings and parking lots that typically occurs in clusters around big box stores. As I bemoan the loss of this golden grassy place that supplied something vital to her artist’s soul, another friend reminds me that what replaced it is precisely what most people want. She’s correct.

As some old sage said, “The proof is in the pudding.” We can proclaim our disdain at the dreary formulaic sameness of the big box blight and gnash our teeth at their tendencies to trammel local businesses and uglify landscapes, but let’s remember who really puts them there.

It isn’t easy to peer into the mirror and find that we fund the scourge of the superstore. In the pause that follows our awakening awareness, we might ask—what was life like before superstores? Is bigger always better? Do we really need another place to purchase cheap stuff, to eat predictable food from chain restaurant menus, to saturate our senses with advertisements and marketing strategies? Could the folks behind the cookie-cutter facades renovate existing structures instead of building new ones?

Is the Green Mountain State endangered? The unique character of Vermont is the result of its many quaint villages and towns, studded with delightfully diverse small businesses that will suffer substantially when superstores rise in their midst. Giant retailers attract similar competitors and would enable Vermont to become much like the rest of America. Such sameness seems to appeal to us.

We are what we do. We do what we want. We want our Wal-Marts. Right?