So I am a firm believer in the idea that artists and crafters (ze says as though there's a difference) should be paid for their work. Somebody wants to give something away for free or sell it for cost of materials, awesome, more power to 'em, but the default assumption should be that this project took someone's time and time is valuable.
Except I just got Betsy Greer's essay collection Craftivism, and one of the essays includes the line "However, marketing one's self and selling one's work as a name is still a capitalist tool that's hard to avoid."
Capitalism = colonialism = unsustainability. Or capitalism = colonialism + unsustainability, I'm not sure, but the three words are definitely inextricably linked. (Thank you, Ecofeminism class.) I'd much rather be a socialist. And not in the Fox News sense of the term, either, because Obama's a capitalist no matter how anyone but Fox cares to slice it. But I have to live in a capitalist society, and I still like the idea of making money off my word art and jewelry art and yarn art. But. Capitalism.
I need to go think about this.
