It’s hard to get mad at someone whose heart is in the right place.
“Seeding Change: The Power of Conscious Commerce” is a lean little 50-minute infomercial hiding under the guise of a documentary.
The movie features a handful of companies whose entire business model is based on the claim that in addition to being interested in profits, they are also dedicated to practices that protect the environment and empower workers along the supply chain.
This movie was also produced by one of these companies, so implicit bias is already at play here.
The positive takeaway here is that businesses even pretending to care about the environment and the plight of indigenous people typically exploited by corporations is a huge step in the right direction.
But then a movie that is made to encourage the viewer to “vote with their dollar” and support these businesses for all of the “good work” they are doing in the world with their venture capitalism strikes me as a bit cynical.
There’s also a veneer of arrogance as Americans with MBAs claim to know what’s best for the Amazon and the poor migrant workers and indigenous farmers that live there.
“Seeding Change” is also packed with so many corporate buzzwords that it starts to feel like a business college drinking game (“Take a shot every time someone says ‘sustainability!’”).
This movie brings up another good rule of thumb for living: if you ever find yourself in a conversation with someone wearing no shoes with the title of “Thought Leader,” it is probably best to run screaming in the opposite direction.
I so wanted to like “Seeding Change” and I deeply believe that even the tiniest modicum of positive change these companies can bring into the world is a good thing.
But in the end it all still felt like I was being encouraged to root for the lesser of two evils.
“Seeding Change: The Power of Conscious Commerce” is not rated.
