: Also we have to consider consumer satisfaction. If we can make people happier by adding different colors or styles to a product, why shouldn't we?One specific down side of capitalism is that it encourages Materialism and Consumerism. These two things in my book are both social evils.
Adverts are materialistic propaganda designed to persuade people that by choosing one brandname over another, you can solve your social problems and reflect your inner personality. They use every low-down persuasive trick in the book to convince the gullable public into thinking that brand X spot cream will make you more attractive to the opposite sex, or that brand Y washing up liquid will make your hands softer and your family love you more. Yet the sad irony is that they put nearly the same gunk into every package, only the colour and the smell change.
You might think that I'm not giving the public (and that includes me) very much credit for intelligence, but the point is that adverts ARE aimed at stupid people, and they DO work or else the advertisers wouldn't put so much money into them. Adverts do not educate us as to the consumer choice we have, they are the polar opposite of education: propaganda, teaching us what to think, not how to think.
Many of the tricks that are used to persuade us are detrimental to society. They make frequent use of stereotypes because of the quick and immeadiate effect they have, e.g. person who buys clothes from a supermarket is seen as 'geek'/'nerd'/'dork' in contrast to the trendy kid who pays through the nose for brandnames.(I don't buy designer label clothing because I think they should pay me to use my body as an advert for their company, not the other way around.) By constantly putting people into catagories and demonising or worshipping characters, it presents a simplistic and innacurate view of human nature with the ultimate moral being "Buy,buy,buy."
Adverts don't satisfy needs, they create them. The solutions they offer to problems are shallow and short term, (e.g advising poor people to buy lottery tickets.) They dangle visions of perfect existence in front of us like carrots and we fall for it. This leads us to become dissatisfied with our mundane reality until we will do anything for a fix, and then they've got us. Once people become hooked on spending they will do anything for the buzz of the next five minute wonder.
I may not be incredibly knowledgable about all the various political systems but I do have a bee in my bonnet about adverts and materialism. A lot of what I've said may seem extreme but I hope some of the points I made got through. And I'm not attacking Capitalism directly, merely stating that into encourages certain negative things which should be stopped. If other political systems discourage consumerism then it's a big plus in their favour.
Does anyone agree?
Will other political systems really reduce consumerism, or is it too ingrained?
Any thoughts?
Stu
