Amazon's New 'Sneaky' Re-gifting Scheme: Is it ethical?

It seems that re-gifting might soon become even more common. Some have questioned the ethics of this practice in the past, but there will be stronger reasons to question it if a new approach by Amazon is implemented.

US Technology journalist Marshall Kirkpatrick has exposed a 'sneaky' new way to re-gift in an interview with the Sydney Morning Herald.

'First Amazon gave us the one-click-to-buy system. Now they're giving us the one-click-to-lie system....[With Amazon's newly patented system] we register our disinterest ahead and so what we have is Christmas helping us celebrate our limitations. It robs people of having the chance to have their horizons expanded and being surprised. It's social engineering of the worst type.'

Here's how it would work. Someone chooses a gift for you via Amazon and then Amazon sends the recipient a notification of the gift. The recipient then has a choice to accept the gift or convert it into an Amazon gift voucher, which they can then use to purchase something else. Some might not be worried so far, but there's more. The recipient then has the option to have Amazon send a thank you note to the giver for the ORIGINAL gift even if they've converted it. That's right, convert the gift that someone has (hopefully) thoughtfully chosen for you, and then lie by thanking them for the original gift.

While it's easy to see why this would be a convenient way to exchange a gift that you already had (that 2nd or 3rd wedding toaster!), or perhaps something that wasn't to your taste, the deception involved in thanking the giver for something that you didn't keep, would hopefully be seen by most people as unethical.

Kirkpatrick's outrage at this new way to shop and give (which presumably is soon to be released) is grounded not just in the deception, but the fact that the essence of gift giving is undermined. As he sees it, the approach would "....rob people of the chance to have their horizons expanded and being surprised. It's social engineering of the worst type."

While his comment about social engineering is a bit over the top, surely he's right in saying that there is something fundamentally wrong with this new practice.  You might question the practice on moral grounds because it involves deception and a lie, but it also does undermine the essence of gift giving. In this age often described as the 'me generation', it would feed the tendency to think only of what I want and miss the point of the original gift. A gift should be something that is given as an act of love or a desire to offer someone something that the giver thinks they need.  It should also be something given without expecting return. This new practice is an almost inevitable outcome in an age where we've lost sight of the essence of gift giving.

We've just celebrated Christmas and many gifts have been 'exchanged'. But exchange isn't something that is fundamentally part of giving. Amazon has probably hit on a winner; crafted to match the self-centredness of humanity that fails to grasp what gift giving is all about,

Other links

The Sydney Morning Herald article (HERE)

Previous posts on the ethics of shopping (HERE & HERE)

The Ethics of Shopping

This post is a repeat of one posted on the 22nd December 2008

Carmen and I spent some time in Singapore, Kuala Lumpur and Hong Kong about a year ago. On the Saturday before we left Hong Kong for home we did what many people do when they travel to Asian cities, we went shopping for a bargain in one of the well-known markets. We were mainly looking for Christmas presents for our grandchildren, but as we wandered up and down the rows of merchants there was one very consistent cry:

"Copy watch, you want copy watch sir?"

Typically this was a question asked of me and it occurred at just about every second stand. It was sometimes followed with statements like "We've got Rolex, copy Rolex out the back, you want one, very cheap".

I had no trouble resisting the pleas of the many sales people. For a start, I wouldn't want my friends and the residents of New College to see me wearing a watch that looked like it was worth $5,000 (even though it was only worth $20); I'm not one for bling! But I'm also strongly against people ripping off the trademarks and intellectual property of other individuals and companies. I'd thought this through as a Christian long before I started receiving 6-10 SPAM emails daily offering me similarly wonderful 'replica watches' as the spammers call them. This decision seems like an easy ethical dilemma to resolve. But this made me think, what other ethical shopping dilemmas will I face this Christmas season. And which ones am I not even aware that I'm facing? What does it mean to shop ethically? What guidance does the Bible give us?

The problem of selectivity

Part of the problem with thinking ethically about shopping is that we tend to focus on one area of concern. For example, I know people who act (quite rightly) as campaigners for Fair Trade. Their concern is driven primarily by their desire to see justice for workers and suppliers (fair pay for products as well as the labour that produced them). Others campaign to ensure that we don't encourage the sale of wooden products that destroy the environment. It's easy to pick some issues that you can quickly make an ethical decision about while missing other areas of perhaps equal ethical concern. I suspect that we face ethical decisions as shoppers every day. Here are a few examples:

• You are given too much change by the shop assistant - should you give it back?
• You wear a piece of clothing but decide you don't like it - you are tempted to take it back for exchange after wearing it (just once), but should you?
• You have to answer questions about your driving record when seeking a new insurance policy which will affect the premium you're charged - do you tell them the full story?
• You see products that have most likely been manufactured by workers who have not been treated justly, (often clothing, but also household items in wood or cane). The workers might have been poorly paid, child family members could have been forced to work long hours and may have been denied education (especially girls), slave labourers may have been used, staff within family sweat shops may have produced the clothing and so on. How do you assess this and should you buy the products?
• You have the chance to buy something that will tempt you or the recipient of the gift to break the law or act unethically themselves - e.g. police scanners that allow people to listen in on the police broadcasts, machines for multi-copying of DVDs and CDs, devices for detecting speed cameras so that you can speed in 'safety'. Should you buy such a device?
• You see a book, CD, video or clothing item that is obviously a copy of a well-known brand (like my 'copy watch'). Do you purchase it?
• You know that the seller is desperate for a sale (often this can occur in Asian countries) and you think you can drive the price even lower to the point that it is costing you almost nothing. Should you? I can well remember bargaining for a painting in a village in Indonesia about 5 years before I became a Christian and getting it for a ridiculous price. I recall later realising that it cost me 14 cents and feeling very guilty, as it was hardly a fair price.

This might all seem a bit much, you might think I'm going over the top! But am I? If you're a Christian reading this blog then like me you need to consider what the Bible has to say about ethical shopping. Even if you aren't a Christian it is important to think ethically about issues like honest shopping.

What the Bible has to say that can help us?

The easy part is that if your action or choice is going to lead you or others to break the law then you shouldn't do it. While we are to be obedient to Christ first, we are to be obedient to the laws of the land that are set by authorities appointed ultimately by God. So, a 'copy watch' is out, as is an illegal video, copied music etc. Romans 13:1-7, Titus 3:1 and 1 Peter 2:13 are helpful here, especially Rom 13: 1,2 & 7:

Let every person be subject to the governing authorities. For there is no authority except from God, and those that exist have been instituted by God. Therefore whoever resists the authorities resists what God has appointed, and those who resist will incur judgment....Pay to all what is owed to them: taxes to whom taxes are owed, revenue to whom revenue is owed, respect to whom respect is owed, honor to whom honour is owed.

But the Bible teaches more than simply obedience to the laws of the land; we are called to pay attention even to the 'spirit of the law' not just the 'letter of the law'. Jesus teaches about this in his Sermon on the Mount (Matthew 5:17-20) when he says:

Do not think that I have come to abolish the Law or the Prophets; I have not come to abolish them but to fulfil them. For truly, I say to you, until heaven and earth pass away, not an iota, not a dot, will pass from the Law until all is accomplished. Therefore whoever relaxes one of the least of these commandments and teaches others to do the same will be called least in the kingdom of heaven, but whoever does them and teaches them will be called great in the kingdom of heaven. For I tell you, unless your righteousness exceeds that of the scribes and Pharisees, you will never enter the kingdom of heaven.

Jesus is suggesting to the Scribes and Pharisees that the righteousness that he expects is nothing less than complete conformity to God’s law. Jesus is teaching that it is the heart not just the outward deed is that is ultimately most important. This is God-given righteousness; hearts transformed by the saving grace of Christ, not a righteousness of outward compliance. Jesus demands more than just an outward pretence of honesty while all the time acting unethically and unjustly by seeking some level of right action, to keep up appearances, but quietly pushing the boundaries of what is right in one area while trying in another.

I’m challenged by Jesus’ words for I know that in my heart I’m tempted constantly to ‘cut corners’ so to speak, hiding behind a façade of ethical action a heart that while viewed as free of guilt because of the righteousness of Christ, is still engaged in a daily war against the flesh. Jesus teaching is hard teaching here. What is expected of us? Mere token observance of the laws of the land? No much more than this. As Christians we must not relax “one of the least of these commandments” and what’s more I must flee the false righteousness of the Scribes and Pharisees that fails to satisfy the heart and the mind, that seeks to glorify self in our actions, that is self made, not reflective of a repentant and obedient heart.

Shopping till we drop - the planet!

Facts on US shopping

In a recent article, Stan Cox outlined America's insatiable desire to buy clothes. US census data suggest that the No. 1 gift in the USA this Christmas will be clothing. Some key points from his article were:

* US spending on new clothes annually is $282 billion, up from $162 billion in 1992.
* Clothing prices in the USA have dropped by about 25 percent between 1992 and 2002, but purchases went up by 75%.
* The USA population increased only 13% in that decade, so the average annual shopping haul has risen from approximately 50 new articles of clothing per person per year in 1992 to 75 or more items per person by 2002. These trends have no doubt continued since 2002.
* In a response to a comment on his Blog he added the following useful breakdown - Women's clothes account for 56% of sales, men 27%, children the rest. Women's sales increased 73% from 1992 to 2002; men's increased 60%; children's 114%.
* The average American discards 31kg of clothing and other textiles each year, according to the US Environmental Protection Agency.

Environmental consequences

But while on the surface we might be surprised by the apparent volume of sales and the waste, the picture becomes even more worrying when the environmental consequences are considered. Cox points out that:

“Although 10 million tons of unwanted duds per year puts a lot of pressure on U.S. landfills, it's in the origin of the clothes -- fiber production, manufacturing and dyeing -- that the most harm is done. Production of synthetic fibers like nylon and polyester consumes nonrenewable resources -- primarily petroleum -- while emitting greenhouse gases like nitrous oxide and releasing toxic wastewater containing organic solvents, heavy metals, dyes, and fiber treatments. Nylon is also very difficult to recycle. Producing fiber from recycled polyester is easier and produces only 15 percent as much air pollution as using raw materials, but the product is of lower quality than virgin polyester. Fibers made from renewable raw materials are typically no more earth-friendly than polyester. For instance, rayon is made from wood pulp coming from mature forests through a process that pumps out large quantities of air and water pollutants.”

Cotton is an interesting fibre. While it is grown on less that 2% of all US farmland, it accounts for 25% of pesticides and this may be as high as 50% in parts of the world.


This topic is easy to sensationalize, but it is complex. Economists would give some good reasons why consumption is good for economies, with obvious benefits such as employment and reduced prices. This is true, both in the case of developing countries that produce most of the clothes, and also the developed countries where it fuels the retail cities we call shopping centres (or Malls if you’re from the US). But then again, the economic benefits of consumption need to be weighed up against the social costs in developing countries (e.g. some exploited workers in developing countries that produce much of the clothing) and environmental costs in all countries. Then there are the spiritual costs.

A biblical case for living more simply

How do Christians respond to a topic like this? Some self-assessment is a helpful start. It is easy to throw one’s arms up and say, what difference does a bit of over consumption make. But collectively, it makes a big difference, and individually it can be devastating. It would seem that there is a strong biblical case for more modest consumption, less waste and a serious re-consideration of the environmental and social costs.

The biblical pattern in relation to possessions is one of simplicity, of having our needs met, and of generosity with what we have. There seem to be environmental imperatives to change our ways and to limit our wasteful consumption - to be good stewards of what God has given us (Gen 2:15) - and there are also good spiritual reasons. An unhealthy and wasteful preoccupation with things is - well - unhealthy!

The biblical pattern of seeking to satisfy our needs, not our cravings and wants, was clear even in the way God provided for the Israelites in the wilderness as they fled Egypt. God provided enough food for their needs. The Israelites were to collect as much Manna and quail as they needed each day and no more (Exodus 16:15-17). Later Moses taught that God's law required them to be generous with what they had. He urged them always to give generously to the poor. “Therefore I command you to be openhanded toward your brothers and toward the poor and needy in your land” (Deuteronomy 15:11)

This pattern is given plenty of attention in the new Testament. Paul urged the church in Rome to live lives worthy of God “….as living sacrifices, holy and pleasing to God—this is your spiritual[a] act of worship.” They were not to be conformed any longer to the pattern of this world, “…but (to) be transformed by the renewing of (their) mind.” (Rom 12:1-2). Paul then went on to list generosity as one of the gifts that God gives. If your gift “...is contributing to the needs of others, let him give generously” (Rom 12:8). So some people are gifted givers, but all are called to be generous.

But there's more! Paul goes even further and makes a connection between being generous and our relationship to God; connecting godliness with contentment: "But godliness with contentment is great gain. For we brought nothing into the world, and we can take nothing out of it" (1 Timothy 6:6,7). Paul stresses to the young Timothy that he is to put his hope in God, and that to be "rich towards God" is to "to do good, to be rich in good deeds, and to be generous and willing to share" (1 Timothy 6:17-18).

Paul suggests that contentment is the key. He had learned what it meant to be content with what he had, rather than hankering after more. As he sat in prison and gave thanks to the Philippian church because of its generosity to him he wrote: “I know what it is to be in need, and I know what it is to have plenty. I have learned the secret of being content in any and every situation, whether well fed or hungry, whether living in plenty or want. I can do everything through him who gives me strength” (Phil 4:12-13).

It seems to me that the US statistics on shopping are reflective of one of the key characteristics of our age - over consumption and waste. This is an age in which we always seem to want more. An age in which for a woman to have 100 pairs of shoes and a man to have 50 ties is not unusual (of course in my case, some of them are 30 years old!). Where new houses invariably cover the block and technology purchases and gadgets can be a preoccupation for all of us. And when a rich man like Renee Rivkin, might just have 37 watches worth up to $500,000. There are consequences for the planet, for our contentment and more importantly for our souls. The article by Sam Cox is a challenge to me and I hope it will be a challenge to others.