'Fetishism Of Commodities'

In “The Fashion Industry: Free to be an Individual” by Hannah Berry, Hannah emphasizes how social media especially advertisements pressure females to use certain product to in order to be considered beautiful. She also acknowledges the current effort of advertisement today to more realistically depicts of women. In addition, these advertisements use the modern women look to advertise products to increase women self-esteem and to encourage women to be comfortable with one’s image.

In this paper we will explore how advertisements cultivate a woman’s need for consumerism as a part of their own self image. George Gerbner, the founder of cultivation theory, argued that television has the ability to impact the way that people percieve certain message and influence their everyday life. In this study, we will conduct a content analysis of quantitative and qualitative measures that will study fashion advertisements. Each advertisement will be critiqued by a set of questions to help find any pattern or correlation between attributes that may have an impact on female consumers. A sample population will be drawn at random on three different occasions containing women from the ages of 18-30. In the first group each individual

On a clothes advertisement, well shaped and beautiful women came out to introduce new clothes. In hair, clothes, and other many advertisements, usually glamor and really good looking women are main models of the advertisements. Not only in advertisements, but also in many films and dramas, the main character is always a tall, thin and beautiful woman. This situation can be explained by John Berger’s book, “Way’s of seeing”. John Berger is an English art critic, novelist, and painter, and this book is about how people can see something critically and find deep meaning of things, especially art paintings. In chapter 2, there are only paintings and photos, and no words. However, pictures in this chapters show explanation about the phenomenon. According to chapter 2, women always consider themselves and other people’s eye and are treated as objectives as sexual ones.

Anywhere in the world, someone acquires something, whether it be money, a car, or even an idea. We can “own” many intangible and tangible items in life, but how does ownership relate to a sense and development of self? This question has been constantly answered for centuries through intelligent people like Plato, Aristotle, and Jean-Paul Sartre. However, the question has received no agreeable answer. In the end, people will agree that there is a strong and positive relationship between ownership and a sense of self because the things you own will define and develop who you are positively by exhibiting what you like, what you can and cannot do, and in the end, characterizes you, as long as you use the things you own properly.

Chris shows his discontent for materialism as he reacts with futility and disgust when his father offers to buy him a new car. Chris exclaims that: “[This car] runs just fine!”, once again justifying his lack of care for materials. Holden similarly sees the human attachment for materialism in a comedic style when he observes his roommate’s actions as stated in this quotation: “The day after I put [my suitcase] under my bed, he took them out and put them back on the rack...he wanted people to think my bags were his” (Salinger, 108). What society fails to realize is that while materials might go away, wear out or disappear, happiness is something that will never expire. Thus in an attempt to show that materials are not advantageous to life, Chris and Holden abandon their homes and go on an adventure in search for something much greater; happiness.

Next we saw pictures of a coat company that went bankrupt. It was full of racks and racks of coats some still in perfect condition I couldn’t understand why they were still there then almost like Matthew was reading my mind he went on to say when a company like this go bankrupt the bank will just go lock the doors and sell what’s inside to make up some of the money that is owed. He then went on to say that in most cases they won’t bother selling what’s inside because the time and effort won’t be worth anything really so what’s inside will just go to waste.

Anna Quindlen, a novelist, social critic, and journalist wrote an intriguing essay “Stuff is Not Salvation” about the addiction of Americans, who splurge on materialistic items that have no real meaning. The ability to obtain credit is one of the main reasons to blame for society’s consumption epidemic. However, Quindlen feels the economic decline due to credit card debt is insignificant compared to the underlying issues of American’s binging problems. Quindlen’s essay gives excellent points regarding the differences in America’s typical shopping habits. Additionally, she mentions how people acquire all this “stuff” but seem to never realize, “why did I get this?”(501). Quindlen makes her

Like John Freyer, I am the type who holds onto objects, whether it is useful or not, as I tend to think that I may have some use for them in the future, and would regret getting rid of it. I am very conservative of my money, so I end up keeping what others would call trash most of the time. However, I did not really think much about the items that I stashed in my drawers and shelves, as they were just insignificant objects that came to play a part in my life. But in Freyer’s “All My Life For Sale,” he had written that through voluntary dispossession, he had begun to see how his possessions had portrayed him and what it symbolized for him, allowing him to see what the problem he had was. Reading this article made me remember the time when I realized that possessions can a different meaning to them if you look at them in a different way.

In discussions of our susceptibility of delusions and false beliefs, Plato argues that humans can choose whether they want to follow the false beliefs in the darkness, or go into the light by facing all aspects of reality with honesty. Bacon’s argument is similar to Plato’s, and Bacon combines the four mistakes of human nature into four different idols. Idol of the tribe, cave, marketplace, and theater. Bacon’s idols help explain how we are vulnerable to delusions Although Plato and Bacon claim that we are susceptible to delusions and false beliefs, I claim that the human understanding is vulnerable to distortion because people bring their own background into their thoughts which distort the truths.

“The things you used to own, they now own you,” says Tyler Durden. The entire film is focused on a consumerism-based society in which people are beaten down by a system that wants to shape them into a mold based on advertisements. The movie opens with The Narrator going through his whole apartment, which is filled with IKEA furniture. He had this perfect lifestyle set up for himself, yet couldn’t be any more unhappy. He didn’t sleep and didn’t feed himself well, shown through his refrigerator mainly consisting of condiments, then his lack of caring when he returned home to his apartment on fire.

Everyday we are bombarded with images of perfect hair, luxury cars, and a life of extravagance we all desire. American society glorifies the rich and broadcasts their life of ease. We watch movies like “The Wolf of Wall Street” and “American Hustle” in order to make our lives more exciting. Escapism has become part of our society; we fantasize living like the Kardashians or the Real Houswives of any city. Because of reality TV, we have become infatuated with the extravagant lives of others rather than our own.

The narrator tries to build his own empire by collecting material things in his house thinking that he will achieve by this, somehow, peace of mind but it appears that he is "trapped in your lovely nest" (Palahniuk 29) which took him "whole life to buy this stuff" (Palahniuk 29).One can see directly the effect of the industrial revolution over the postmodern man and how it assert the consumerism, as the more people consume, the more the factories produce. The industrial revolution is a double-edged event in the postmodern man's life, as it makes our lives easier yet it asserts the urge on people to consume more and

as If they were more than what they actually are and how they perceive all

The ‘object’ is stated as an object of fascination, which can include a brand, product, person (e.g. celebrity), television show, or other consumption activities (e.g. sports). Fanatics are inclined to insist their ideas are the correct ones, ignoring any facts or arguments that may conflict with their thoughts or beliefs. Brand fanatics often refuse to believe or even consider facts or arguments conflicting with their worship of brand, regardless of how strong or true the source of the information maybe, classifying them as biased and certainly unreasonable at most instances. Their enthusiasm is so extreme it is sometimes considered excessive. Examples of fanaticism to a brand, product, or activity can be found in seminal studies of extremely loyal, brand-worshipping consumers, such as core participants of brand communities, brand cults, and various subcultures of

Judge one’s character by its appearance seems to be our natural way of understanding. But ultimately this structure of understanding is unconscionable imagination of bias. Since concepts should turn in to sellable