Small buisinesses as plastic garbage factories

In mainstream american culture, the act of supporting small, local buisinesses is seen as a noble thing to do. People might be spending a little bit more, but that money is staying within their community on a supposedly higher quality item.
there are many different kinds of small buisinesses. Everything from the local grocery store (break the chain!) to a lemonade stand run by young children. the issues with small buisinesses such as labor violations, landlord behavior, and wealth hoarding have been explored many times in leftist circles as a bourgois vs proletariat dynamic, which makes sense when it's multiple people, behaving like a small corpration. But what if it isn't?
The internet has made it very easy for artisans to sell their work. these works can vary in form; original artwork, of course, or prints, pins, apparel, etc, or digital commissions. and more. In real life, artists at flea markets and conventions and so on can also sell their work as well. But i have noticed a bit of an epidemic, one possibly born of widespread artistic stagnation, or more likely one of non-artistically inclined people attmepting to cash in on pre existing infrastructure initially established for artists. This is not nescisarily an insidious practice either: people want to make some extra cash to survive. thats great. but, it is done at the cost of authenticity.

3d printed things

take, for instance, a form of this reappropraition of art that i am well aquainted with. My uncle runs a pretty succesful 3d printing buisiness, selling at local events and such, as well as online. obviously, there are a few forms of capital at play: the ownership of a couple of 3d printers, which are actually not that prohibitivley expensive anymore, the colorful plastic filament as well, and most importantly the 3d models themselves, of which there is a thriving market for. Some of the creators of these models have become very wealthy from the lucrative 3d printing buisiness. by harnessing these 3 things, a regualar everyday person can create quantities of plastic garbage practically unheard of before.
and it is everywhere. my proximity to 3d printed items aside, these pieces of, and i mean some offense, junk, are unavoidable! at the antique store, at the rennaisance faire, at the mall. little articulated dragons, which cost a few cents to produce, being sold for $10. and to whom? (we'll get back to this...) It's an artform that fundamentally requires little imagination. just pick a model from thingverse and 2 colors.
The sheer volume of these objects is obviously not comporable to that of traditional companies. those companies are the ones filling the pacific garbage patch. no competition. but, i don't know if the people creating this "indie" plastic garbage realize how little value their work is worth, to the greater body of humanity's art. let me tell you, unsanded plastic corgis carry very little cultural value. And I guarantee like 90% of it is destined for the trash.

Resin Things

Its not just 3d printing, of course. perhaps at the mention of small buisiness "art", something else came to your mind. Resin Things is an emerging genre of plastic garbage, with an even lower barrier of entry. the ability to enclose Things in resin is just exciting! I've done it (i hated it) but it was cool to witness these smelly liquids turn into a real solid piece of plastic garbage. people make ashtrays, paperweights, and of course, dice out of resin. nevermind that it is a toxic substance that breaks down and turns yellow over time.

people that print things on cups or t-shirts

This is an interenting one given how absolutely banal the output is. Some of it is clip art, some of it is ai generated. almost all of it is dropshipped. Particuar strains may include AMERICA and/or GOD BLESS PRESIDENT TRUMP, as well as fandom schlock and other phrases. Out of these examples, this is probably the one with the most 3rd party involvement, whether you are screenprinting your own fruit of the loom tshirts or having people in the global south do it. Being the most resource intensive form of small buisiness plastic garbage, it seems to be also less common. I think a lot of them are the equivalent of cia assets, at their mall stands. it's a waste.

who is it all for

The answer: I dont know! none of these objects have any appeal to me but it seems people haven't grown bored enough of them to see the light. People with bad taste.
Discalimer Also I'm not saying that none of these things require skill. In fact they all require an amount of technical knowledge that the layperson does not possess. from computer software, to chemistry, to stitches, to the general "entreprenurial spirit". And some people are ctual masters of these crafts. there are amazing artists who work in these mediums. Its just, the way these things usually go, its so very divorced from the organic creative process. which brings me to the next question

Are regualar artists bastards too

I've recently come upon a sort of sect of radical leftism which is markedly anti-artist, and their worms are crawling into my brain. those who believe that posessing even the materials to create art are of the capitalist class as their materials and expersise constitute capital. This is silly, objectively. Or is it? if you consider where your materials come from, there is almost certainly going to be some form of exploitation, as well as environmental damage involved. the unfortunate thing is that everything is like this, it's why we're all going to hell.
Real artists/and sell their wares for currency. Sometimes these wares are a piece of digital art printed on stuff, a more original version of the thing above. is this a bad practice? the people that cannot afford an original piece of art but want to support, and the artist who gets it printed and shipped en masse. symbiotic. Is this wrong? the people actually working the machines are certainly not being paid a fair share of the profit from each print sale? but maybe this is ok. I would be remiss to listen to online leftists for genuine criticism of systems at play. Are artists, as a class, priveleged? Will there be a place for art in the ever-immenent revolution? Who cares.
your plastic keychains of anime characters are really giving us "an ick"

conclusion

i have none. gootbye