“How much is enough?”
Sandra Bullock once asked Jeff Bridges in one academy award function, and everyone burst into laughter.
She was merely trying to lighten up the ceremony with a comical remark regarding the fact that ‘The Dude’ had already won the Oscars and perhaps it was time to let others put their hand on the coveted gold-plated statuette.
Well, her witty remark might have been enough to make people smirk, but what she said jokingly has longer significance to the world we are living in today, or speaking- specifically the world consumed by consumerism; the core ideology of the capitalism.
I do not want to start the theoretical debate regarding the Capitalism, Socialism or Marxism and on what way one prevails over other. I might not be the right person to do so. I am merely referring to the behavior of human beings that has intensified lately, hoarding a lot of stuffs, many of which we do not even need and can easily survive without. One major reason that has fueled this is the growing number of Middle classes in the world and their increased ability to spend.
Now this escalated consumption behavior comes with its cost. At the individual level, it has made us people more greedy, reckless and unnecessarily sad and depressed. At the broader and more global level, the more we consume the more we pollute, just look at the massive level of plastic wastes ending in the Oceans.
For a moment, imagine ourselves walking the aisles of supermarket. For every one thing that we need to satisfy the purpose, we have hundreds of options. Be it soap or shampoo; biscuits or chocolates; sanitary pad or condom; pasta or the toilet paper; they all come in different packets and colors. Man, I get so confused I just pick one, the one that falls within my budget, mostly the cheapest.
And then there comes clothes, shoes, kitchen wares, electronic appliances, beverages and alcoholic drinks, furniture, and the list goes on. God, I did not know that ladies’ handbags were so much in shapes and variety that they had names.
I looked around my bedroom. My wife, she has more than a dozen and I have three; one backpack, one office laptop bag and one 50-liter trekking bag which I have used only twice, as I barely go into the hills.
What exactly is this Consumerism?
Theoretically speaking, it is the idea that states people are well off if they consume goods and services in large quantities.
Adam Hayes of Investopedia gives the most pertinent definition of consumerism in current times as “the behavior of people to engage in a lifestyle of excessive materialism that revolves around self-centered, frivolous, or conspicuous over consumption.”
Thorstein Veblen, in his book The Theory of the Leisure Class (1899) terms conspicuous consumption as “a means to show one’s higher social status, especially through publicly displayed goods and services that might be too expensive for others.”
This might also include the use of garments and beauty products coming as a result of child slavery. For example, mica industries in India and garment industries in Bangladesh employing kids as young as 11.
Similarly, Peter Stearns in his 2006 book defines Consumerism as a “social and economic order in which the goals of many individuals include the acquisition of goods and services beyond those that are truly necessary for survival or for traditional displays of status.”
From the Economic perspective
Keynesian macroeconomists take consumption as the most effective tool to boost the economic growth in short term. This require the policymakers to plan the monetary and fiscal policy in such a way that consumer spending is elevated. As consumer spending is the key contributor in nation’s aggregate demand and GDP, increasing citizens’ purchasing ability is highlighted as the key government move for economic gains.
Additionally, consumerism also allows for the better quality of goods and services elongating such business houses’ lives and providing best values to the buyer’s money. Nevertheless, excessive marketing and predatory advertising, in their goal of creating demands, might still fool the general public and steer disbelief.If you are looking for bracelet. There’s something to suit every look, from body-hugging to structured, from cuffs to chain chain bracelet and cuffs.
On the darker side, this fuels the insatiable demand of people of hoarding things resulting in reckless debts and unwise spending habits.
From the Sociologists perspective
Sociologists have more negative view of consumerism as symbolic consumption. This practice with the sole aim of elevating one’s fake social esteem can bring more detriments than deriving the true utility of the goods and services. In the long run, they deteriorate the social values and traditions.
For instance, look at the lavish weddings. The families look too influenced by the expensive celebrity marriage ceremonies. There’s this narrative that the celebrities spending so much is not expenditure but the investment opportunity. (In some cases, the media channels pay the couples to televise the whole ceremony). But, for the normal citizens all that pomp and show would not be that necessary. Same goes for the Nepalese women who in the name of celebrating Teej focus too much on the jewelries and the sarees they flaunt.
Peer pressure to own smart phones, handbags, shoes, motorbikes and luxury cars and eating at fancy diners. The age of Facebook and Instagram when the person inside his tiny corner compares his lifestyle and belongings with some person or celebrity in another corner of world who he barely knows and will never meet in his/her lifetime.
This only makes a person more greedy, avaricious and egocentric. It pressurizes a person into earning more than another, which in turn can easily lead to his/ her moral downfall.
Psychological Perspective
Researches have come up with the results that people who are constantly bothered by hoarding stuffs show poor mental status, frequent mood swings, superficial friendship and failed marriages and other psychological problems. The experiments have also evidenced that that people inclined more towards rapid acquisition of wealth, status, and material possessions tend to suffer from anxiety and depression in higher degree.
Now, what is the relevance of stockpiling the stuffs deemed to make one happy if the same things drive you miserable?
Confused by all of these, I stood up from my chair and told my wife I was going to take a cold shower. Now my wife who is fond of collecting so much chemicals that she calls beauty products, or whatever, she told me that she had just brought this shampoo which once used would make my hair feel unreal.
To me, honestly, it did not feel any different than Sun Silk I have been using hitherto. Once I came out of shower, my wife immediately asked me with her curious bright eyes soaked in self-assurance,
“So, what do you think? Doesn’t your own hair feel different to yourself?”
I replied nonchalantly, “Well, actually it does feel like MY OWN HAIR. ‘Just confused which one it is, from my head or down there.”
She has not spoken to me for three days.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IeR-h9C2fgc&t=216s