Homogeneity in Advertising
Not to be outdone by "Have it your way" and "I'm lovin' it", the marketing agencies in Dubai dreamed up "Celebrate you!" as the next slogan offered to cheering masses with open wallets.The target audience for this ad, plastered all over the Dubai airport, may be the local Emiratis or the waves of foreigners living in and visiting Dubai (or both), but the message is disturbingly consistent with messages sold to billions and billions around the world. It's all about You!
Forget your culture. Ignore your history. The only thing that matters is You!
Conspicuous consumption, undoubtedly, will be the means by which these modern and ambitious young professionals celebrate themselves into cultural and spiritual bankruptcy.
posted by Intellectual Insurgent @ 7:59 AM
7 Comments
7 Comments:
The term conspicuous consumption was coined by Thorstein Veblen in his book published in 1898 called the Theory of the Leisure Class. That brilliant man along with some others went on to form the Technical Alliance, which turned into the Technocracy Movement in 1934.
-Agreed that our 'everything for me and nothing for you society', will end badly for all concerned.
A place like Dubai, will have it particularly bad, as it is almost a total artificial construct, of imported resources.
I agree with you 100%. It's going to end badly for everyone but places in Dubai are going to suffer even more because there is nothing indigenous to which they will be able to turn when the construct collapses.
I'd rather place emphasis on the individual (not on individual consumption
), than on some type of spiritual or cultural conformity...
That path is scarier than the one you decry:nationalism, group spiritualism -- they're all paths to disaster.
Yeah, but what's in it for me? :)
Ask not what your country can do for you, ask what you can do for your country. Hmmmm. Sounds kind of catchy.
I love your photos.
Somewhere in the last century, when America became the world's role model for economic growth and democracy, the concept of the "pursuit of happiness" got perverted into a the self-centered worship of me... Happiness has become defined as having financial independence without having to work, while gratifying one's desire for pleasure.
All of the comments agree with you that the future looks bleak for a society of self indulgent do-nothings, but my question is how do we awaken the masses to this knowledge? How do we stop the "cultural gentrification", and re-educate the global village on what the pursuit of happiness is suppose to mean? How do you convince the masses that worship of self is the first step to social collapse and therefore self-destruction?
chad
"He that loveth pleasure shall be a poor man" Proverbs 21:17
Chad,
All good questions and, so far, the only answer I have is to challenge the prevailing wisdom at every chance. Be a role model for alternatives to consumption so that others see it really isn't that difficult.
Nice to have you back BTW. :-)
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