We are constantly striving for a higher standard of living. New modes of production emerging from the mass media are causing an unprecedented, insatiable desire for more. The media constructs and presents the public with images of lavish, unrealistic lifestyles, which we have somehow come to believe are within our attainable reach. We are offered glamorous glimpses into the high lives of the rich and the famous, and with an increasingly accessible media landscape, the more we are convinced we can reach this level of consumption. The pervasive mass media offer only one side of the picture, the glamorous consumerism, materialism, and derived satisfaction. Meanwhile, the negative realities concerning production, debt, exploitation, manipulation, and environmental depletion are ignored in an eager attempt and effective ploy to keep us spending. The fashion industry, television programs, advertising, and fascination with celebrities together perpetuate the consumption momentum, constantly raising the desired standard of living.
Karl Marx, writing in 1867, examines the deconstruction of the commodity, and the separation of production and consumption. This division is explored further in Angela McRobbie’s essay regarding the fashion industry. Marx argues that the social relations and “labor-time” during production are more significant than the use-value when characterizing or defining the commodity (331-332), which can be related to McRobbie’s analysis of fashion.
Angela McRobbie examines the fashion industry and the divide between production and consumption in her essay, “A New Kind of Rag Trade”. The poor conditions of production must be concealed in order to maintain the glamour and romance associated with fashion. In reality, the industry consists of a series of processes, which mutually depend on each other. Fashion, like most other industries, relies on each level of production and consumption in order to maintain the necessary perpetuation to survive.
Juliet Schor asks why Americans have not yet articulated a critique of consumerism that will bring about a change in the current detrimental, onward momentum of consumption. She examines the ever-escalating desired standard of living and the notion of the “adequate” income which is an “elusive goal”, since this adequacy is relative to the incomes of others. She goes on to explain “the new consumerism” which refers to the climbing lifestyle norms, the pervasiveness of conspicuous consumption, and the “growing disconnect between consumer desires and incomes” (448).
Veblen’s notion of “conspicuous consumption” examines the consumer’s desire to purchase consumer goods that will communicate the consumer’s wealth and status, but more importantly their knowledge of cultural taste and social relevance (Veblen 188).
John Kenneth Galbraith’s essay “The Dependence Effect” was written in 1958 but is incredibly relevant to current consumer culture as it explains a concept concerning the relationship between the consumer, their wants, and production. He calls this concept “The Dependence Effect”, and it delineates that the consumer wants depend on production, while the production then satisfies the need it has itself created (24). This perpetuating cycle results in unlimited and insatiable consumer needs. According to Galbraith, some needs are genuine, but most often social meaning and the dependence effect are in motion.
Stuart Ewen, writing in 1988, discusses style and the ways different media present fashion ideals to the public, such as television programs and accompanying advertisements. He examines the idea that television presents a seamless, “uninterrupted message” that style “makes up a way of life, a utopian way of life marked by boundless wealth” (47). This idea can be related to other media as well, including the magazine, advertising, radio, and film. Style is something consumers are expected to keep up with in order to be accepted as a contributing and relevant member of society, while this uninterrupted message simultaneously communicates to consumers what they should be consuming as well as communicating the notion of limitless and boundless consumption consumers are expected to desire.
Magazines are produced in order to be consumed, in order to tell consumers what else they should consume. The magazine is a product that creates needs and wants for further consumption. The entire magazine industry is situated in the midst of production and consumption. The magazine industry is also of course, a huge arena for advertising.
Perhaps a less obvious element of the magazine’s ability to perpetuate consumption is the presentation of celebrity lifestyle, which is unattainable for most readers. The pervasive, ever-escalating strive for more spending, getting, consuming, can be attributed to the upper class’ high level of consumption, which is then plastered across magazine pages. Celebrity endorsements aside, the magazine industry has created a successful way to indirectly encourage further consumption and simultaneously entertain readers. Gossip/celebrity/tabloid magazines such as Star, UsWeekly, InTouch, OK!, Life&Style, and People, feature candid photographs of celebrities showcasing the clothing they wear, places they go, what they do, what they eat, where they live, what products they use, and where they shop. Seeing day-to-day routines of the rich and the famous makes them seem less distant from us, and makes these lifestyles seem desirable, normal, realistic, and achievable for middle class readers.
Gossip magazines have always been filled with scandalous stories and rumours about the hottest celebrities. We read them for entertainment, but walk away somehow idolizing these people, aspiring to reach their level of success and riches, so we too can experience these apparently glamourous and supposedly fulfilling lives.
In terms of Baudrillard’s concept of needs, the magazine does not satisfy basic human needs or “primary needs” (71), such as eating, drinking, sleeping, and so forth. To consume a magazine is not rational or objectively grounded. It functions as a means to entertain, which is a “secondary need”. The consumption of a magazine is a complicated scenario as it does not only serve to entertain, but it also intends to advertise to readers, to inform readers, and to create new needs and desires for readers. A secondary need is social and/or cultural and it is subjectively variable. It is an irrational need. While seeking to satisfy secondary needs, the individual becomes vulnerable to alienation, manipulation, and mystification. Secondary needs are obscured socially (Baudrillard 71-72). Magazines have the ability to alienate, manipulate, and mystify readers.
Pierre Bourdieu explores the notions of cultural capital and social capital in his essay pertaining to matters of taste (205). The magazine offers consumers an array of available options to consume which are currently culturally and socially tasteful. Readers are told what is in style (or of taste), and what is not.
Adorno and Horkheimer discuss the rise of the culture industry with the arrival of mass production, arguing that the ensuing result of the new mass culture is a distinctive high culture and low culture. High culture is unique, spontaneous, original, and authentic. Low culture reflects the mass produced goods. The magazine industry is a direct example of low culture as the magazines themselves are produced en masse. Additionally, magazines are simultaneously an indirect example of low culture, as they are filled with other mass produced goods and advertisements, persuading readers to consume them as well. Therefore, the goods featured in magazines are not unique, spontaneous, original, or authentic, as they have been mass-produced, and have been advertised and marketed to readers to consume, eliminating any possible opportunity for originality or authenticity.
George Ritzer thoroughly examines Max Weber’s theories of enchantment, rationalization, and disenchantment, arguing that the system based on rationalization (capitalism, bureaucracy) in which we live, has little or no room for enchantment (55-57). This train of thought can be tied to Adorno and Horkheimer’s discussion of high and low culture. The abundance of advertising simulacra in Western society has resulted in a disenchanted population. Adorno and Horkheimer state that there is no longer creativity or subjectivity in consumer culture. Magazines extinguish any need to use imagination or creativity, as they delineate exactly what is in style, what is available, at what cost, in what store. Magazines speak to a collective community of readers who objectively absorb the contents. Everything must pass through the culture industry filter, diminishing the imagination of the consumers of mass media, and their powers of spontaneity (Adorno and Horkheimer 7).
Malcolm Gladwell discusses the phenomenon known as “coolhunting”, which has become a way to learn, produce, sell, and capitalize from the trend-setting youth. “Coolhunters” seek out individuals who are setting trends, who know what is “cool” and what is not, in hope to discover the next big thing (Gladwell 360). The youth who is providing trends to the “coolhunting” business are at the start of the trend progression. Next, advertisers and marketers use this collected information to disseminate mass-produced messages to the world through multiple facets including the magazine. Next, celebrities (who, of course, readily have the financial means and leisure time to participate immediately) pick up on the latest trend. They are spotted wearing the latest trend, photographed, and appear in the next weekly gossip magazine. Magazine consumers purchase the magazine and read about the latest trend, see it on their favourite celebrity, resulting in the reader’s subsequent desire for the good(s).
With the advent of the Internet, we are able to access even more information about our favourite celebrities. Not only does each magazine publication have their own websites, offering online segments of their publications and further advertisements, photographs, and gossip, there are also fashion blogs, celebrity fan websites, and forums that constantly, and rapidly update internet users. Fashion blogs disseminating celebrity style features have direct links to online stores where you can conveniently purchase the exact outfit any given celebrity wore today.
Clothing companies each have their own websites, and an increasing number of them offer online shopping and product browsing. Online shopping is marketed to Internet users as a convenient method of consuming, as one need not leave the comfortable confines of one’s home in order to shop, spend, consume. Online shopping websites can be considered a new kind of “cathedral of consumption” in today’s media savvy society and increasingly stagnate culture. No longer must consumers venture out of their homes to consume. Advertisements and celebrity images bombard Internet users as they browse the web. Online advertising and shopping simultaneously create wants and desires, and then immediately and conveniently allow consumers to readily purchase the newly desired good, at an unprecedented rate. Within a matter of minutes, a desire for a commodity can be constructed, realized, consumed, and satisfied.
Furthermore, the increasingly popular website, Twitter, enables and encourages an unprecedented accessibility to celebrities. Anyone can go to the website, search a celebrity’s name, and see what they are up to in real time. Twitter users have access to simply view a celebrity’s page, or they can choose to “follow” their favourite celebrities, and receive updates on their homepage every time a celebrity posts a “tweet” message.
Other websites are developing in response to the celebrity-obsession surrounding Twitter. Celebritiesthattwitter.com is a website that is updated in real time, posting every single celebrity tweet. Rather than wasting time searching and navigating from page to page on Twitter, internet users can simply access this website instead and receive every celebrity Twitter post simultaneously in real time.
Andrew Houston examines the notion of the celebrity. He explores the ways in which individuals have the capacity to fantasize and desire, basing his discussion in psychoanalytic theory and more specifically, Lacanian theory, which analyzes the recognition of the self, the formation of fantasy, and the realization of desire. He asserts that desire must be constructed. Houston analyzes the work of Hal Niedzviecki and his theory of “peep culture” which concerns the construction of desire and celebrity in contemporary society where digital media and communication is constantly changing the ways in which celebrity status is “defined, discussed, and disseminated globally” (Houston).
Steven Johnson explores the world of Twitter, concluding that the media experience is “quite unlike anything that has come before it, strangely intimate and at the same time celebrity-obsessed” (Johnson).
Tamara Shepherd discusses Twitter and the celebrity Twitter user’s ability to maintain popularity through the website. Gaining popularity in 2007, Twitter has redefined the U.S. celebrity landscape. Celebrities are using Twitter to maintain their celebrity status and to achieve personal public relations campaigns, effectively acquiring media attention, regardless of their current film roles or lack there of, deeming their current celebrity status and popularity in the real world irrelevant and insignificant compared to their online personas (Shepherd).
In summation, evolving realms of media including the fashion industry, television, advertising, magazines, and the Internet are re-shaping the way society consumes. The ongoing fascination with celebrities has burrowed into every facet of media, constantly presenting these unattainable lifestyles and consumption patterns, which, with the uninterrupted messages and images disseminated through various media, has created the allusion that this higher standard of living is not only attainable, but is also the norm.
Works Cited
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Baudrillard, Jean. “The Ideological Genesis of Needs.” Schor, Juliet and Douglas Holt. The Consumer Society Reader. New York: The New Press, 2000. 57-80. Print.
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Bourdieu, Peter. “The Aesthetic Sense as the Sense of Distinction.” Schor, Juliet and Douglas Holt. The Consumer Society Read. New York: The New Press, 1984. 205-211. Print.
Ewen, Stuart. “Images Without Bottom.” Schor, Juliet and Douglas Holt. The Consumer Society Reader. New York: The New Press, 2000. 47-54. Print.
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Gladwell, Malcolm. “The Coolhunt.” Schor, Juliet and Douglas Holt. The Consumer Society Reader. New York: The New Press, 2000. 360-374. Print.
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Johnson, Steven. “How Twitter Will Change the Way We Live.” Time Magazine. June 4, 2009. Online.
Marx, Karl. “The Fetishism of the Commodity and Its Secret.” Schor, Juliet and Douglas Holt. The Consumer Society Reader. New York: The New Press, 2000. 331-342. Print.
McRobbie, Angela. “A New Kind of Rag Trade”. Schor, Juliet and Douglas Holt. The Consumer Society Reader. New York: The New Press, 2000. 433-445. Print.
Ritzer, George. Enchanting a Disenchanted World: Continuity and Change in the Cathedrals of Consumption. 3rd Edition. California: SAGE Publications, 2010. Print.
Schor, Juliet B. “Towards a New Politics of Consumption”. Schor, Juliet and Douglas Holt. The Consumer Society Reader. New York: The New Press, 2000. 446-462. Print.
Shepherd, Tamara. “Twittering in the OECD’s ‘Participative Web’: Microblogging and New Media Policy.” Global Media Journal. Canadian Ed 2:1. Canada: Concordia University, 2009. 149-165. Online.
Twitchell, James. “Two Cheers for Materialism”. Schor, Juliet and Douglas Holt. The Consumer Society Reader. New York: The New Press, 2000. 281-290. Print.
Veblen, Thorstein. “Conspicuous Consumption.” Schor, Juliet and Douglas Holt. The Consumer Society Reader. New York: The New Press, 2000. 187-204. Print.
Wilson, Elizabeth. “Feminism and Fashion.” Schor, Juliet and Douglas Holt. The Consumer Society Reader. New York: The New Press, 2000. 291-205. Print.
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