Consumed: How Markets Corrupt Children Infantilize Adults And Swallow Citi Paperback – Feb 26 2008

We, especially the peoples of Canada and the U.S.A., have become hopelessly addicted to shopping. It has become a serious psychological disorder for many individuals and it has ruined lives of many families. This wonderful book looks at this important phenomenon closely, analyzes the underlying causes of it, and tells us how it has become such a serious social problem. It is a very objective work; it is timely and highly relevant to many of us.

Don't miss it.

Barber argues that consumers have been duped into thinking that the freedom to choose is a rational extension of their capacity to develop an emotional attachment to a brand name. In numerous examples, Barber shows that manufacturers are selling an image or concept rather than a tangible product. Many lines of children and adult clothing are purchased strictly on how they might appeal to others than just the purchaser. While that attitude has been around for ages, manufacturers are now introducing the `lovemarks' feature into their brands by trying to make the purchase truly personal and intimate. That is why current advertisers for automobiles, perfume, soaps, clothing, music, aphrodisiacs, food, and books seem to be making more liberal use of the word `love' as a tactic for connecting with a potential customer's emotional side, because studies have shown that that is where they are most susceptible. As commercial competition for the hearts and minds of new generations of consumers, the propaganda and accompanying rhetoric deepens to the point of adopting both culture and counter-culture icons to get the message across. If Generation X or Y is sensed to be in a mood to reject their parents' cultural values, corporations might promote a product like Mao jackets to capitalize on that sense of rebellion. The use of iconic pictures of the Pope on dinnerware quickly become parodies in the next generation bathroom with accessories such as "Pope on a Rope", all in the name of doing business and making a buck. This widespread, feverish `hyperconsumerism' that dominates our thinking today will remain firmly entrenched in our psyche of `infantilism' until we collectively decide to return to purchasing products more out of need than want. One of the biggest victims is this consumer rush to the bottom to get all that we want at the cheapest price is democracy, which, unfortunately, while openly promoting the need for great citizenship in the marketplace, quietly abets the consumer in satisfying personal wants before addressing social needs. The result is a society gradually being consumed by its amassing of material wealth rather than a establishing of effective social values; it becomes a case of the rich getting richer, and the poor getting poorer. I would recommend this book as a reasonable and intelligent effort to get at the heart of what really ails society in the 21st century. Naomi Klein's earlier book,"No Logo", offers more indepth examples of where 'hyperconsumerism' is taking us.

I remain a fan of Barber's earlier work, Jihad vs. McWorld, almost solely because it was the first to intelligently cover the disintegration of traditional identifiers. He demonstrates that our affiliations are growing not along religion, nation, or color lines but increasingly by what and how we buy. As he writes, "consumer branding rather than race, religion, and other forms of ascriptive identify along with voluntary civic and political identity comes to define who we are."

It is the age-old argument of finding fulfillment not in what we need but in what we want. Hollow materialism is well documented in Consumed and so is the relationship between capitalism and democracy which is a debate of increasing relevance.

Where I disagree passionately is on the subject of "conscious corporate manipulation via advertising, marketing and branding." That is because the consumer still possesses the ultimate power in the form of choice. Influence is the core of communication but choice is the responsibility of each one of us. So instead of projecting blame on business communications it must be liberally assigned to society as a whole and the individuals who comprise it. More to point, we consumers are now a series of communities united around fleeting desires and outcomes rather than well articulated and consistent groups of people pursuing positive activities that benefit the whole.

I encourage you to read the book and debate it (would make a great non-fiction book club read) because this effort was written to deliberately provoke thought and conversation not to provide a how-to guide on how to fix ourselves and our world.