Archive for December 6th, 2008
Consumerism killing the soul
Consumption without excuses and without the need of justification – the beauty part was that it finessed the irksome question of values and of purpose. During the past decade [the 1980's], many people came to believe there didn’t have to be a purpose. The mechanism didn’t require it. Consumption kept the workers working, which kept the paychecks coming, which kept the people spending, which kept investors investing, which mean there was more to consume. The system, properly understod, was independent of values needed no philosophy to prop it up. It was a perfect circle, complete in itself- and empty in the middle
Source: Laurence Shames, The Hunger for More: Searching for Values in an Age of Greed (New York: Times Books, 1989), back cover
So what do you think about that?
