Hypercommercialism And Consumptive Consumer Behavior

Hypercommercialism in society is based on short-term pleasure and a pending future cultural crisis. It warps society’s values while at the same time degrades the environment. However, its “lures” are tough to resist.

Marketers stay in business as long as they can keep the consumption ethic, they espouse, alive in consumers, to keep consumers from focusing on leading simpler lives based on family, community and personal growth. As long as consumers are confused or unfocused, marketers will tend to be happy at the result….confused buying habits.

Consumers are virtually in it alone and must decide on their own what is necessary in their life of consumption as well as what is superficial, what is useful or wasteful, beautiful or pretentiously vulgar. Never succumb to marketing strategies, sales pitches or peer pressure to unnecessarily consume, consume, consume. Remember, “Always wanting more, more, more” is an impulse of human nature, regardless of what we “already have”. For too many of us, “having enough” is when our money runs out.

Americans are addicted to consuming more than what they actually need to be content and make life comfortable. Shopping is no longer a means to an end, but an end in itself meaning too many of us like to buy things we simply do not really need. TV and print ads help keep consumers focused on constantly consuming more and more with TV being the most powerful sales tool and potential creator of values. Even the American banking system encourages consumption instead of saving by offering us hideously low interest rates on passbook savings accounts, while sending us pre-approved credit cards, as well as constantly hawking loans for new homes and cars.

Marketers have conditioned consumers to think of frugal as “cheap” when it really means “balance and efficiency” or the “golden mean”. Environmentally, Americans, by far, live the most wasteful lifestyles in the world due to marketers’ planned obsolescence of products. Manufacturers, through their marketing advertising agencies, instill in consumers the notion to always buy new not used goods.

The counter intuitive trick however, much to the chagrin of marketers, is to live so you do not always need more, more, more to be happy and comfortable and avoid getting sucked into the “suburban consumer grind” of letting “things” control you instead of you controlling “things”. Lfie is NOT about having more or less. It is about contentment and, if necessary, working less so you can enjoy more, instead of falling prey to the materialistic, manipulative, hedonistic trap of consumption or consumerism.

Marketers and advertisers help shape how we eat, think and behave. Could they be linked to the ripping apart of our social fabric? Reformers of this process face great political and financial opposition. Therefore, it is up to YOU, the consumer, to improve how you think, eat and behave.. This is NOT a prescription for denying oneself goods and services but it is one for seeking greater personal satisfaction through a simpler lifestyle, as well as prolonging the environment worldwide.

The less than desirable alternative is to continue down the road of hypercommercialism’s wasteful consumption. By inviting us to live a suicidal lifestyle, advertisers foster consumer behavior that contribute to poor health and well-being. Advertising creates fantasies, attitudes, insecurity, inadequacy as well as virtually unattainable ideals. Today, materialistic young people commit crimes just to get highly promoted, so-called “cool” clothing, shoes, corporate logos and other perceived-to-be status symbols. Distorted logic has become the currency promoting selfishness and discontent while aiding and abetting the destruction of cooperation.

SUPPLEMENTAL SOURCE: the book: MARKETING MADNESS BY JACOBSON AND MAZUR