Consumer, Culture, Commodity and Mass Deception
“There are no citizens in the modern society. We all are consumers.” The Critique of Consumer Society
Consumer, Culture, Commodity and Mass Deception
Our minds give shape to our reality, as Buddha says, “The mind is everything, what we think we become.” Freud’s analysis of consciousness examines and defines the evolution of the human psyche the subconscious mind, breaking it down into subsections and defining our habitual nature as conscious beings. With those teachings, it is hard to ignore the reality of what truly controls human interaction and what one deems of value to their existence. It is known beyond all reasonable doubt, that our mind and our thoughts control our habits, our bodies and even our belief systems. Consistent interaction and repetition will yield most efficiently in any training of the brain. Whether that be a hobby, mindset or perception, using repeated habitual stimulation rewires the brain to hyper focus on that which is being presented.
Our obsession in the 21st century concerning commodity and consumption of material goods within our cultural environment has become more evident through our impulsive nature as beings that are taught to continuously fill “voids” with stimulates and the tangible. The undeniable push and pull of the capitalist regime developed into more than just consumerism, commodity fetish and the need for material goods, but built on an entire system of mass deception within the culture of mass production and the alienated worker. Echoing the writings of Marx, reflecting on Adorno and Horkheimer the philosophical questions have been raised and the exploration of consumer culture has been brought to our attention. It is said that, “There are no citizens in the modern society. We all are consumers.” The Critique of Consumer Society puts a spotlight on how entrenched these infrastructures blend within the means of mass society’s cultural capitalist hegemony.
The Enlightenment of the 18th century brought up societal grandiose beliefs systems that truly steamed off of monotony and inclusiveness for all. Introducing the notion of egalitarianism, a model built off of social equality, belief in uniting humanity - making all people a priority was one of them. Egalitarianism - the understanding that all humans are equal in fundamental worth, a political philosophy, mirrors that contradiction itself through the reality of classicism. Although this mindset comes from good faith, this itself is a deeply flawed premise as the progression of society and consumer culture has evolved and taken shape due to the rise of the Industrial Revolution. There is a firm set of standards and principles that brings the topic of classicism to the forefront, as we have all become puppets of the consumer culture and culture industry that oversees current trends. “The overproduction of signs and reproduction of images and simulations leads to a loss of stable meaning, and an aestheticisation of reality in which the masses become fascinated by the endless flow of bizarre juxtapositions which take the viewer beyond stable sense.” (Featherstone, 7) This is ever present, more so now with social media becoming a literal extension of the self.
The distinction of class has always been a conversation since the beginning of colonization. The command of capitalism has shaped the modern-day discourse on classicism through our consumption of material goods, fashioning trends and simulations projecting those trends through the extension of mass media. “At a certain stage of their development, the material forces of production in society come in conflict with the existing relations of production…” (Marx, pp. 634) The occupied “cog on the wheel” alienated worker must continuously adapt to the new modes of production based off of the what is in demand. Marx identifies the constant change that the economic society evolves at, raising the issue of dismissing anything that once was by implementing immediate change politically and economically, permeating human thought and modernizing machinery with the improved modes of the new. Becoming a product of the working class and commodity consumption, creates an inner conflict within lower class society of inequality. Those that cannot afford the best, simply live with the harsh reality and rejection believing that they are not worthy of top tier mass production and material goods. We are trained to go to school, get a job, and work until we die. Here egalitarianism fails modern society, as we have fed into the reality that constant consumption and “upgrades” in material goods at the sake of one’s own well-being is the means of the ends to living.
This sense of mass deception that seems to creep into the minds of those that have found a sense of “enlightenment” comes from being more self-aware and mindful of the patterns that our actions have on a global level. When you take a step back from society and look at it from the outside in, there is a dense realization that through culture industry, we are feed what we are designed to hear. The consumer begins to become the discourse within those industries in order to map out what the general population is drawn to in relation to how the schemes should be implicated.
“The consumer has become a god like figure, before whom markets and politicians alike bow. Everywhere it seems, the consumer is triumphant. Consumers are said to dictate production; to fuel innovation; to be creating new services in advanced economies; to be driving modern politics; to have it in their power to save the environment and protect the future of the planet. Consumers embody a simple modern logic, the right to choose. Choice, the consumer’s friend, the inefficient producer’s foe, can be applied to things as diverse as soap powder, holidays, healthcare or politicians. And yet the consumer is also seen as a weak and malleable create, easily manipulated, dependent, passive and foolish. Immersed in illusions, addicted to joyless pursuits of ever-increasing living standards, the consumer, far from being a god, is a pawn, in games played in invisible boardrooms.” (Gabriel, Yiannis and Tim Lang. p. 9)
The consumer controls the conversation. The social network streams that are controlled by very select higher individuals that seem to shape the discourse on humanity have interwoven themselves deeply into the habits of the everyday human, controlling the thoughts we think, planting new seeds and shaping the dialogue of our subconscious thoughts. Through television, radio, print and now social outlets the availability to brainwash or train the brain is easier than ever. The world is a complex place, since the Enlightenment of the 17th and 18th century. The planet and its citizens have ebbed and flowed in many unthinkable directions. Open literacy, the working man, human rights, modern society has created this dynamic perception of what it means to be alive and why we are here on earth to live. The freedom to be and become all that there is, but told that there are ways to get there and rules to follow. Capitalism and commodity consumer culture seems to top all.
The rise of commodity fetish and the political dissertation on exchange value is brought up to highlight the romanticized truth behind what is now considered the culture industry. Shaping and molding the minds of the old and young to believe anything they promote through mass media, “Baudrillard’s semiological development of commodity logic, entails for some an idealistic deflection of Marx’s theory and movement from a materialist emphasis to a cultural emphasis. This becomes more noticeable in Baudrillard’s later writings where the emphasis shifts from production to reproduction, to the endless reduplication of signs, images and simulation through the media which effaces the distinction between the image and reality.” (Featherstone, 7) The media enhances the amplification of the need to fall into this unnecessary comparison of who we believe we should be, what we should look like, how one is supposed to behave, what one is supposed to be wearing, or reading. Removing all authentic instinctual, creative and spiritual aspects of our soul being. “Horkheimer and Adorno, for example, argue that the same commodity logic and instrumental rationality manifest in the sphere of production is noticeable in the sphere of consumption. Leisure time pursuits, the arts and culture in general become filtered through the culture industry; reception become dictated by exchange value as the higher purposes and values of culture succumb to the logic of the production process and the market.” (Featherstone, 6) We neglect the natural intuitive aspects of the self, the aspects that enhance our personal individualistic creative being, coming second to the instilled culture industries need to control and maximize profit off of trend and ideas of enhancement.
Liberalism, another Enlightenment 18th century mindset that followed egalitarianism echoed the freedom of the individual, encouraging people of society to live to their own idealistic individualistic ways of being. This was translated, as the development of mass literacy made knowledge accessible to anyone who could grasp the concepts that were being presented to them, leading to the enthusiasm that if one could learn to read and write, that they were assured happiness. “Enlightenment, understood in the widest sense as the advance of thought, has always aimed at liberating human beings from fear and installing them as masters.” (Adorno/Horkheimer, 1) The idea of education for all not just privileged is a key important legacy of the enlightenment. The rights of independent literacy aided and were sustained by the development of print, and mass media and social media giving the people of society the belief that their ideas, and thoughts and knowledge mattered. Liberal mindsets are still present in today’s society, but at what cost does one have to sacrifice to believe that a political party could assure one’s human right to individualistic freedom? The enlightenment brought forth the conceptual understanding of individual freedom and helped differentiated and define the individual from the state through one’s personal conscious thoughts. Instilling the influence to master our own minds separate from what society through lengthy generational trauma has instilled in us.
It seems though, the more we know – the harsher the reality. These enlightenment philosophies really gave hope, but stood no chance against the force of what Karl Marx saw as the problem of machine aesthetic, and how it was going to dehumanizes everyone, for the sake of “social regression in material progress.” For philosophical thinkers like Marx, the world of materialism and the working man through his personal observation reflected our subconscious drive to fulfill the capitalist infrastructure and superstructure. “The sum total of these relations of production constitutes the economic structure of society – the real foundation, on which rises a legal and political superstructure and to which correspond definite forms of social consciousness. The mode of production in material life determines the social, political, and intellectual life processes in general. It is not the consciousness of men that determine their being, but, on the contrary, their social being determines their consciousness.” (Marx, 634) Social consciousness is formed through capitalisms mode of production. The evaluation of you as a social being translates in your level of involvement within the system, playing your part in the levels of production and manufacturing of an entire organism of societal framework.
Through the division of labor and classicism Marx highlighted reification and human alienation of those that are used as chess pieces in the capitalist society. “The mode of production is which the product takes the form of a commodity, or is produced directly for exchange, is the most general and most embryonic form of bourgeois production.” (Marx p. 224) Bourgeois ideologies introduce the concept of classicism, a need to “upgrade” not only machine but consciousness as a whole in relation to the societal structure that is being transformed from what was to what will be. This is where the conversation of exchange value in the consumer culture becomes any intensified discourse. “Culture is recognized as an important variable influencing consumer ethical decision-making and behavior. Culture affects the marketing mix (product development, promotion, distribution and pricing) because it determines what consumer wear and eat and where they reside and travel.” (Swaidan, 1) The citizens of modern society are no longer encouraged to think for themselves, yet are convinced that consumerism tops being a citizen with free thought. “Marx’s technical analysis of the production and circulation of value shows that an ostensibly equitable set of arrangements – ‘a fair day’s wage for a fair day’s work’ – conceals a systematically unequal relation between capital and labour.” (Featherstone, 1) Without the rise of capitalism, we would not have the infrastructure on a global level that we are privileged to in the 21st century. Although we have come to understand that our mindless evolution has really created a psyche separation between human and worker, man and machine.
Humanity, has turned into a consumer culture – shaping our wants and needs to fit the mold of what we are fed to be truth. The political discourse on exchange value and the romanticized truth behind this is that we have lost value in ourselves as living breathing beings, and started to idolize commodity goods in definition of our own worth. The problem in the consumer culture and the elimination of the idea of a citizen is that we have removed our own instinctual nature in replacement for the commodified means of being a part of a culture practices of consuming all together.
Marx, Karl. 1970. A Contribution to the Critique of Political Economy. Moscow: Progress Publishers. Pp. 633-634
Marx, Karl. "The Fetishism of Commodities and the Secret Thereof from Capital vol. 1." Marx-Engels Reader, Edited by Robert C. Tucker, W.W. Norton, 1972, pp. 215-225.
Theodor Adorno and Max Horkheimer, “The Culture Industry: Enlightenment as Mass Deception”, Dialectic of Enlightenment, 1944
Featherstone, Mike. “PERSPECTIVES ON CONSUMER CULTURE.” Sociology, vol. 24, no. 1, 1990, pp. 5–22. JSTOR, www.jstor.org/stable/42854622. Accessed 29 Mar. 2021.
Swaidan, Ziad. “Culture and Consumer Ethics.” Journal of Business Ethics, vol. 108, no. 2, 2012, pp. 201–213. JSTOR, www.jstor.org/stable/41476287. Accessed 29 Mar. 2021.
MacInnis, Deborah J., et al. “The Disciplinary Status of Consumer Behavior: A Sociology of Science Perspective on Key Controversies.” Journal of Consumer Research, vol. 36, no. 6, 2010, pp. 899–914. JSTOR, www.jstor.org/stable/10.1086/644610. Accessed 29 Mar. 2021.
Gabriel, Yiannis and Tim Lang. The Unmanageable Consumer. 2nd ed. London: SAGE Publications Ltd, 2006. SAGE Knowledge, 29 Mar 2021, doi: http://www.doi.org/10.4135/9781446213049.
McGuigan, Jim. Cool Capitalism, Pluto Press, 2009. ProQuest Ebook Central, https://ebookcentral.proquest.com/lib/oculocad-ebooks/detail.action?docID=3386181.
