Analysis Of Framing Class, Vicarious Living And Consumption

He remarks on how most Americans seem much more interested in what goes on in the daily lives of celebrities and reality television, as opposed to the detrimental health of the nation, the “bank collapses, wars, mounting poverty or the criminality of its financial class.” He goes on to compares Americans to psychopaths, stating that they share many similar traits like an incapacity for feeling guilt or remorse, grandiosity and self-importance, and a need for constant stimulation. We Americans are only concerned with ourselves, we view fame and fortune as the ultimate goal and have no qualms with stepping over friends and family to achieve it. With consumers in this state of mind, media and corporations make billions of dollars by helping assure everyone that we don't have to worry about others, that “everything is

Alexander and Shaler state that “at the beginning of the 21st century, for rich and poor people alike, jobs disappear on short notice, communities are weak and unstable, people routinely change lovers, families, occupations, coworkers, technical skills, languages, nationalities, therapists, spiritual beliefs, and ideologies as they navigate the shopping malls, real estate markets and employment agencies.” (4) A free market society is supposed to maximize people’s wellbeing, happiness and wealth, but the truth is people are forced to compete against each other and lose their sense of belonging, meaning and identity, eventually turning into slaves in a money-oriented society. Whether rich or poor, people become disconnected from their cultural identity and fail to fail to establish their intimate relationships with friends, communities an co-workers. According to Alexander and Shaler, this is when people “cannot achieve a reasonable degree of psychosocial integration” (5) and become dislocated from the society. Dislocation cannot simply be eliminated by food, shelter or the attainment of wealth. The poverty of spirit leads people to search for a substitute lifestyle to fill the emptiness of fast-moving life. As a result, people turn to substitute lifestyles that can be dangerous and addictive. Bruce and Shaler argue that today’s free market ignore all previously understood limits and have gone too far to the extreme.

In Margaret Lyons’s Vulture article, “On the Briefcase, Poor Americans have to ‘Prove’ Themselves,” was posted on May 26, 2015. Lyons ' discusses how ‘The Briefcase’ follows “Middle Class” American families that are experiencing financial hardships. The context of this article is economical situations present in American “middle class” families, as represented on a television show viewed all over the world. Lyons ' exigence is how the game show is purposely exploiting middle class Americans are using their setbacks against each other. She supports her claims with the ethos through opinionated information such as the real reason why the briefcase actually helps middle class people; logos, sharing the evidence on Les Moonves on how they make more money than the game show does in a month, pathos; how a woman is so overcome with joy she vomits.

Heather Havrilesky sums up what is wrong with a lot of Americans in the first two paragraphs, in that we are never happy with what we have and always wanting more. If we would just step back and take it all in, we might all be surprised for at least a moment. “In show creator Matthew Weiner’s telling, the birth of the advertising age coincides directly with the birth of our discontent as a nation-and what got lost in the hustle were our souls” (Havrilesky 175). The 50’s and 60’s was the coming of age for advertising and the beginning of our dissatisfaction of our daily lives as Americans. Heather Havrilesky says “Slowly we come to view our own lives as inconsequential, grubby, even intolerable” (170). We see this as every day, as Americans

Before reading the excerpts from “The Overspent American” I was not familiar with Juliet Schor’s work. While reading however, I saw that her views were different from many of the other authors that we have read so far. When I had finished the reading I found the reading enjoyable and fascinating. The reason that her writing intrigued me was because of her multiple perspectives while writing. Not only does she concentrate on the economics of American people, but she also uses a sociologist lens to show the purchasing habits of our culture. “The Overspent American” focuses on how we as a society have changed our spending patterns from the past. During the 1950s the phrase “keeping up with the Jones’” was coined and it represented Americans trying to outspend their neighbors and friends. For example, my friend buys a boat and I also need to buy a boat to make sure my friends saw me as being wealthy. Today our society as changed in many ways but Schor finds that our spending habits have altered the most since the 1950s. By analyzing and evaluating her work, one can see how Americans spending habits have changed over time and how our economics have been overtaken by television and broadcast media.

In “Life According to T.V.” written by Harry Waters and published in Newsweek in 1991, Waters examines the effect that television has on everyday lives. He says that TV has given Americans an unrealistic view of how life works. From jobs to minorities to how women are portrayed to crime rates nearly all aspects of TV are unrealistic or exaggerated. George Gerbner was used to back up Water’s theory on how television impacts people. Water states that heavy viewers of TV are more unrealistic in their view of the world than light viewers because they are exposed to more of the unrealistic ideas portrayed in TV shows than light viewers. The jobs on TV are often expressed as high ranking jobs like lawyers, doctors and athletes rather than blue collar or service jobs such as small businessman or teacher. According Waters the elderly are depicted as being sick and weak when they are actually the opposite. Women are also portrayed as mothers and lovers more often than successful working women.

In the excerpt Framing Class, Vicarious Living, and Conspicuous Consumption, Diana Kendall outlines the various media frames on social classes and analyzes how each frame contributes to the portrayal of each class. Kendall describes and explains eight different types of media frames and illustrates the impact on their cultural perceptions. She demonstrates America’s distorted view of inequality through the media frames’ construction of a “socially constructed reality” that is not an accurate reflection of America. She also argues that people still have the ability to develop other frames that better explain who we are and a more accurate reflection of our nation regarding class. Kendall is writing to an audience of high-educated, middle aged men and women, and it is assumed they want to read on social class injustice. This is made clear because of her academic profession, and the placement of the excerpt in a textbook.

As a minority gets older they realize the hard truths of society. These truths involve many different types of stereotypes that contribute to racism and overall surround the idea of inequality and framing in social economics. In Diana Kendall’s piece “Framing Class, Vicarious Living, and Conspicuous Consumption” social inequality is viewed as a heavy topic, that the media abuses. In fact, Kendall uses the Census Bureau to point out that “the net worth of the average white household in 2000 was more than ten times that of the average African American household and more than eight times the average Latino/Latina household” (338). Based on the facts from this source minorities are financially at a disadvantage and are presumed to be unhappy due to lack of wealth. However, money does not control or even affect happiness rather Kendall makes a point that framing does, which can be seen through James McBride life story “The Boy in the Mirror”, where the world McBride’s mother framed for him, one without inequality, begins to crumble . McBride paints a picture of the dramatic change that happened when arriving at adulthood when he writes, “We did not consider ourselves poor or deprived, or depressed, for the rules of the outside world seemed meaningless to us as children. But as we grew up and fanned out into the world as teenagers and college students we brought the outside home with us, and the world that Mommy had so painstakingly created began to fall apart” (415). The simple

It can be said that money is power in the United States, and this is brought out in the essay, “Class in America---2012” written by Gregory Mantsios. He says that even though many Americans do not like to discuss class, “it can determine where people live, who their friends are, how well they are educated, and what they do for a living” (Mantsios). Many Americans do not speak about class type, and most find it unacceptable (Mantsios). Unfortunately, we can see that there are laws that are built to help and better the wealthy, while it cripples the rest of us. According to the Economic Policy Institute, “The richest twenty percent of Americans hold nearly ninety percent of the total household wealth in this county” (Institute) Gregory Mantsios without reserve describes the majority of people are at a disadvantage in their social class, while the upper class is compensated.

Sachs explains that TV viewing brings little pleasure and close to being an addiction with little benefit and almost no happiness. This appeals to the readers emotionally since most can identify with some sort of addiction and its fallout. Most Americans have some sort of addiction, whether it is food or television and relate when the author uses this analogy to compare. Sachs goes on to claim that this addiction is leading to the decline in our social development since we spend less time face to face and more time in front of a TV or other media devices. Time that was once spent with family is now in front of a television screen or other media devices. This hold true as much now as it did in 2011 when this essay was written. Just this one statement can draw a reader further in since now almost all of us have a device that fits in our pockets that takes our attention away from other people. We end up looking down at our phones or tablets more than we look at other peoples faces. This, unfortunately, is becoming a sad truth in our society today. We would rather look into a world that is hard to distinguish what is real and what is made up instead of enjoying the real world. Sachs does state that there are other factors contributing to the decline of our social state in America

In today's society, having the biggest and best products is valued above everything else. From new technology, to homes, and even automobiles -nothing is off limits to our ever-growing expectations. This growing trend of owning bigger and better things without being satisfied is more apparent in today’s society than ever before, and it doesn't seem to be ending anytime soon. The need to have the newest products is“stuffing us up” and creates a problem for future generations. The article “Swollen Expectations”, written by John De Graaf, David Wann, and Thomas H. Naylor, provides some interesting insight into the standard of living in past generations. I also conducted an interview with my father, asking him a series of questions about life when he was younger, material possessions, and how he has seen it all evolve throughout the years.

It is believed that there is a tension between social classes in America. Typically, people of lower classes choose to imitate those of higher social status. As a result, advertisers have a tendency to take advantage of this tension in order to profit from people of the lower and middle classes. In "The American Upper Class," G. William Domhoff says that "exhibiting high social status… is a way of exercising power" (Domhoff p.34)," which is something important to all social classes. According to Judi Puritz Cook, author of "Consumer Culture…Sales Discourse," advertisements in print as well as in visual media seem to create "the promise of status mobility through consumption (Cook p.373)." In the article, Puritz explains how television

All ranks of Nazi officials played a significant part in the reign of propaganda that impacted the world. The creation of the “Final Solution” to annihilate the Jews and enemies of Europe was heavily culminated with propaganda efforts to keep death camps hidden from the view of media outlets globally. Originally this plan was to systematically remove the Jews, then with the establishment of ghettos and mobile killing units, SS Officers, German authorities and their collaborators were able to kill upwards of six million Jews. This was impactful on the society with almost two-thirds of the Jews in Europe killed by poison gas, shooting and other means.

Affluenza is a painful, contagious, socially transmitted condition of overload, debt, anxiety and waste resulting from the dogged pursuit of more. It is a powerful virus that has infected the American society, threatening our wallets, our friendships, our families, our communities, and our environment. Since the United States has become the economic model for most of the world this virus is now flowing freely on every continent. The costs and consequences of this disease are massive even though they are often concealed. Left untreated however, it can cause permanent discontent. Affluenza is based on our culture and how it encourages its citizens to measure their worth by financial success and material possessions. The media such as the

In the society we live in today, I believe that everyone, in some shape, way or form falls into the trap of “living up to standards”. However, who sets these standards? Are these standards acceptable, should they be acceptable? Are these standards an accurate representation of our society? Unfortunately, we live in a world where all individuals are defined by the clothes they wear, the car they drive and how much money they have. In no form should this be the case, but it truly is. Money. Money is a huge part of our lives, as it is something that allows us to obtain items that we use to enjoy life, and should only be used for that purpose. It is funny, but strange how we are defined by how many pieces of this special paper, called money, we own. But, when is there a limit to set to this specific standard that is being a social norm? Why is that we always find ourselves looking up to those who have the most money, but have never made a difference in the society we live, to those who have the most “out of this world” looks, and to those who own the newest gadgets and cars? Do all of our things really define who we are? Media is one of the main causes that make us fall into this materialistic world. The radio, newspaper, news channel, magazines, news websites, journals, and television have the most influence on our society. They work on convincing us what they believe is correct is truly the correct way to follow life. Weather it is from little kids to teenagers to adults, or