The Dangers of Consumerism

1676 Words4 Pages

In an article presented by Sud Jhally, “Advertising at the Edge of the Apocalypse,” he mentions that consumerism is dominating our culture and also the hazardous acts of it (2000). To analyze these dangers in our culture, I have presented an evaluation that illustrates my consumption behaviour in regards to fashion. Through this interpretation, it is hypothesized that the consumption of fashion is highly dangerous. This is seen through the influence it has on emotions, class, alienation and the difficulty in attaining an identity. This is significant because in a capitalist society, consumption is a part of people's daily lives; being that so, it is important to be aware of the implications that it has. Since 1899 and to this day, it has been known that individuals no longer buy products out of need; instead, they purchase items like expensive clothing to improve their social status (Naiman, 2012). By 1998 consumer capitalism had grown massively. America and Canada accounted for thirty one percent of four Trillian dollars that was spent globally by private and public companies even though they only made up five percent of the population (Naiman, 2012). This portrays that needs are not the only thing that individuals consume for. Today, corporations, advertisement and the media are encouraging individuals to purchase fashion products with money they do not have. This provokes them to borrow money for consumption leading individuals to be in debt rather than accumulating wealth (Naiman, 2012). Correspondently, this has a major impact on the health of an individual. It could cause them plenty of stress because of the loss of money and still having the need so consume. Fang Ma et al. had theories involving the psychological motiv... ... middle of paper ... ...erre Bourdieu theory portrayed that the commodity of fashion provides a large separation between the wealthy and the poor and splits even young adolescents into groups. Although companies maintain an unethical workplace, consumers continue to still purchase their fashion products because of the way the company depicts itself. Locans theory supports this idea because he believes that capitalists succeed since they induce beliefs. Lastly, suggestions by Juliet Schor provide a bit of assistance to reduce these dangers. Living in a capitalist society today, these dangers could help individuals realize the implications of consuming fashion and as well as ways to prevent it. Some limitations to this research were that there were not as many scholarly articles as hoped. For further research, there should be more articles analyzed for more reliability and validity.

Open Document