Consumerism, evangelism, scepticism

[Russell Turpin]

Jeff Bone writes:
>So here're the follow-on questions, then: since consumerism is by your 
>above definition an act of willing suspension of disbelief on the part of 
>an *individual* is it more like
>spirituality or religion?  Is there some accepted dogma associated with 
>consumerism, some catechism shared by all?

Hmmm.

All religions make some parts explicit, and hide other parts
behind the curtain. Most of the things we label religion --
Christianity, Judaism, Islam, Hinduism, Shinto -- are built
around some very explicit doctrines and stories, but their
power and compulsion burn off like a morning fog if too much
is made explicit. (Buddhism, too, but it labels that success
rather than failure, which makes it an oddity as a religion.
"Teacher, I've grown out of Buddhism." "Grasshopper, you are
just starting down the road.")

Consumerism works best when it is entirely tacit, when it
goes completely unstated though fully acknowledged. "Oh,
Honey, I went ahead and bought another Bammo Blurple
while I was at the mall." "OK. Christmas is just around
the corner." Without an explicit creed, it's not a religion
in the classical sense. Perhaps it is more like pre-religion,
when people danced under the full moon, before they had a
name for some god to direct the dance. Except that
consumerism is not fully spontaneous; it has a priesthood
that stays behind the curtain. (They doesn't remember the
137 Bammo Blurple commercials she saw on TV, but they worked
their magic nonetheless.)

>Are there martyrs to consumerism?

Absolutely. They just don't know it.

>As for the ad agencies and corporations: is their exploitation of the 
>gullibility of the consumer, their manipulation, is that more like 
>organized religion or is it simply capitalism at work? ..

Yes.

Capitalism will exploit whatever opportunities and
resources are available to turning a profit. And when it
fails to do so, wearing my hat as shareholder, I want to
know why, dammit. And if some exploitation requires hiring
some priests, or maybe an Evangelist and marketing guru,
then the company had damn well better do so.

>I'm clearly no fan of organized religion, but the equation seems to rest on 
>a particularly cynical view of
>organized religion. ..

I'm fully capable of particularly cynical views of organized
religion.

Russell


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