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Do you progressives avoid doing business with corporations with poor environmental or workplace safety records? Do you take public transportation even when a car is available, to minimize your carbon footprint? Do you make sure to only buy products made with union labor, from retail outlets that pay their employees a living wage? When you hear about billionaires or corporations donating to anti-gay causes, do you go out of your way to avoid doing business with their brands, or even find out what those brands are?

I know the answer -- the sales figures speak for themselves. Statistically, our buying habits have nothing to do with the philosophical and ethical positions we say define us. Some of you will insist otherwise in the comments, and that's fine -- the numbers speak louder. The situation we're in only exists because we don't vote with our dollar. The vast majority of us buy the stuff we want and can afford, with no other considerations. We'll spend two hours reading customer reviews for a product but won't spend five minutes finding out who we're making rich in the process of buying it.

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Blatant homophobia is easy to forgive when packaged at two for a dollar.

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"I only shop at Walmart because I can't afford to shop anywhere else! No one can beat their prices!" Yes, what brave revolutionaries we are. "But what hope do us common folk have against huge corporations?" You know Blockbuster Video used to be a huge corporation, right? Then the common folk starved them out almost overnight? But of course we didn't do that to stand up for a cause -- we did it purely because we found an alternative we liked better. That's how we roll.