“Affluenza” and Consumerism
Reuters has an article about “Affluenza“; how rampant consumerism appears to be increasing the incidence of depression and mental illness all over the globe… Does consumerism cause “depression, anxiety, addictions and personality disorders”? Controversial British psychologist Oliver James thinks so. The article describes how James toured several countries in the world and interviewed a number of relatively affluent people about their lives.
From the article:
An epidemic of mindless consumerism is sweeping the world with the compulsive pursuit of money and possessions making people richer but sadder… We have become addicted to having rather than being and confusing our needs with our wants.
Several questions came to mind as I read this article. How do we separate “legitimate” consumerism from “mindless” consumerism? We all need to purchase things to satisfy our needs for food, transportation, shelter and clothing. I don’t dispute mindless consumerism exists. But where do we draw the line between the two without infringing on individual rights? And who is qualified to draw it?
If we think of human social structure as following a pack mentality like that of other mammals, it’s easy to see that people are always aware of how their status compares with others in their peer group. It’s unconscious, human nature to want to “keep up with the Joneses”. The rise of global communication and media means that everyone’s peer group is a lot larger than ever before.
People’s rates of satisfaction relate directly to the comparisons they draw against their peers. In other words, if you see that everyone on your block, or in your group of friends, or with the same job as you, is driving a Lexus, then the Chevrolet that you were perfectly happy with last week may no longer be satisfactory.
Do you have any thoughts about the questions raised here? Let us know!
For more on satisfaction see:
Expectations Determine Happiness and
Emotional Burnout and the New Ergonomics
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The fast-paced, consumerist lifestyle of Industrial Society is causing exponential rise in psychological problems besides destroying the environment. All issues are interlinked. Our Minds cannot be peaceful when attention-spans are down to nanoseconds, microseconds and milliseconds. Our Minds cannot be peaceful if we destroy Nature.
In a fast society slow emotions become extinct. A thinking mind cannot feel. Scientific/industrial/financial thinking destroys the planet. Emotion is what we experience during gaps in our thinking. If there are no gaps there is no emotion. Today people are thinking all the time and are mistaking thought (words/language) for emotion.
When society switches-over from physical work (agriculture) to mental work (scientific/industrial/financial/fast visuals/ fast words) the speed of thinking keeps on accelerating and the gaps between thinking go on decreasing.
There comes a time when there are almost no gaps. People become incapable of experiencing tolerating gaps.
Emotion ends. Man becomes machine. A society that speeds up mentally experiences every mental slowing-down as Depression/Anxiety. A (travelling) society that speeds up physically experiences every physical slowing-down as Depression/Anxiety. A society that entertains itself daily experiences every non-entertaining moment as Depression /Anxiety. Fast visuals/words make slow emotions extinct. Scientific /industrial/finanical thinking destroys emotional circuits…
I have to say that I agree with a lot of your points. All issues are indeed interlinked to one degree or another. And it’s true that attention spans seem to be shortening more and more. However, I would attribute this to the ever-increasing amount of information that is available for us to process.
I’m not sure what you mean when you say that “slow emotions become extinct” and “a thinking mind cannot feel”. One of the things I’ve talked about in previous posts is that what we commonly call “logic” or “rationality” is really an emotional process. In other words, emotions provide the feedback on which we base our so-called “rational” decisions.
You seem to be advocating a return to a largely agricultural style of living, while completing discounting the advances in life quality that have been made possible by science.
I agree that industrialization has had many negative environmental consequences. However, I feel that I’m lucky to live in a country where we take certain benefits of industrialization (like sanitation, vaccination and clean water) for granted. I wouldn’t be eager to live in a country where thousands of people routinely die because they lack these things. Industrialization has both positive and negative effects.