Re: Dumbing down, American-style

You are pointing at the cultural foundations of a global political
project.

It is the promise of happiness and fulfilment, a self-construction based
on branded goods. It creates junkies for identity-producing "spend
fixes". Here, the drug barons and pushers are the marketing and
advertising professions. Once hooked, each person becomes his own jailer
and slave-driver. A higher spend produces more debt and the need to work
more for it. Even so, this emotional control fails to deliver on its
ultimate promise to the individual. Political scientist Robert Putnam
(e.g. 'Bowling Alone') explains how socially disconnected individuals
are unhappy, unhealthy and prone to deviance. But it delivers to "the
economy" a docile workforce and to the hegemons of politics a
conditioned citizenry.

Look at the strong feedback loops which hold the system together and
allow it to self-repair. Someone put it as "prisoners hugging their
chains". The bondage is such, that it is easier for individuals to break
out through self-destructiveness, than through opposition to the system.
What is sad, is that millions of people "outside" it are queuing to join
this system, since the so-called "Left" is functionally mute towards
them.

Therefore any realistic counter-project would need to address the
foundations of this bondage: how to base self-definition on bonds and
commitments with other people, rather than on buying things. How to
break the feedback loops is, in my opinion, the key area where serious
conceptual work is needed, based on observation of what is actually
happening in the world. The "deliverables" would have to be another
system with its own feedback loops, and practical roadmaps for getting
there.

Petros Haritatos, Athens

-----Original Message-----
From: Mark Weigand <mweigand@usa.net>
To: BHATIKAR SANJAY RAJAN <Sanjay.Bhatikar@Colorado.EDU>; Vera M. Britto
<fiatlux@umich.edu>
Cc: Petros Haritatos <haritatos@athenian.net>; Anthony d'Auria
<apd@andrew.cmu.edu>; PROGRESSIVE SOCIOLOGISTS NETWORK
<psn@csf.colorado.edu>
Date: Τρίτη, 13 Μαρτίου 2001 4:59 πμ
Subject: Re: Dumbing down, American-style


>This is a very straightforward and accurate observation. It is easy to
>define oneself through the consumption of products and the
appropriation of
>popular images and thought-fashions. You identify an important cultural
>contradiction in U.S. society. On the one hand we have the older "work
>ethic", still alive in some sectors of the population. It promotes
>"achievement motivation" in individuals who strive to attain a
>profession or lifelong career in fields that demand years of education
and
>require high skill levels. On the other hand we have the
>consumer-entertainment ethic which emphasizes infinite indulgence in a
world
>of infinite supply, mindless leisure pursuits, affluence without social
>responsibility, instant gratification,  status-seeking and conspicuous
>consumption, style over substance, expedience over effort, opinion over
>knowledge, etc.
>
>Schools teach the virtues of the former, while the mass
media--especially
>through advertising--teaches the latter. In the contest to influence
the
>young, schools have largely lost the battle while corporate America has
>expanded its control. It is easy to be lazy-minded and shallow (and
proud of
>it! ) when this ideology is promoted by the powerful corporate
producers of
>popular culture.
>
>Best wishes,
>-=MW=-
>