| ||||||
|
Arts & Entertainment Books Comics Health & Body Media  Mothers Who ThinkNews People Politics2000 Technology - Free Software Project Travel & Food  Columnists
Current Click here to read the latest stories from the wires. - - - - - - - - - - - -
- - - - - - - - - - - - Also Today For a full list of today's Salon Mothers Who Think stories, go to the
Mothers Who Think home page. - - - - - - - - - - - - Search Salon - - - - - - - - - - - - Recently in Salon Mothers Who Think Complete archives for Mothers Who Think - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - |
Lessons in consumption | page 1, 2
"Where once there was simplicity and limitation ... there is now social difference, and that difference proliferates into ever more diversity, variety, heterogeneity," writes McCracken in 1997's "Plenitude." "Teens, for example, were once understood in terms of those who were cool and those who were not. But in a guided tour of a mall life a few years ago, I had 15 types of teen lifestyle pointed out to me, including heavy metal rockers, surfer-skaters, B-girls, goths and punks." Also Today Consumed by consumption There is, then, not only more stuff in the world, but more ways of being in the world. The correlation is not accidental: Through buying in, holding out or negotiating our own terms, we use stuff to create our identities. But a richer world means an increasing number of choices to be made: How exactly does one pick from the 87 national soft drink brands available, much less between being a goth or a punk, or for that matter, a carpenter or a lawyer? Which in turn requires not a shrinking away from the world -- even and perhaps especially its expansionary commercial sector -- but immersion in it, familiarity with it and an understanding that choosing one thing often precludes choosing another (at least in the short haul). Stripped to its essentials, of course, this means simply that despite the cornucopia of things and choices around us, we still face that most basic human conundrum: How to square unlimited desires with limited resources? This is a question that wanders far beyond economics and into territory first mapped by existentialist philosophers. "Choosing determines all human action," wrote the eminent Austrian economist Ludwig von Mises more than 50 years ago, sounding more like Jean-Paul Sartre than Adam Smith. "In making his choice, man chooses not only between various materials and services. All human values are offered for option. All ends and all means, both material and ideal issues, the sublime and the base, the noble and the ignoble, are ranged in a single row and subjected to a decision which picks out one thing and sets aside another." And so my son and I watch "Pokémon": "I want one of those," says Jack, as a three-headed, ostrichlike Pokémon called Dodrio gallops across the small screen. "And one of those," he says, pointing to an purplish, oozing mass known as Grimer. "And one of those," gesturing toward Ivysaur, a blue-green toad with what looks to be a garlic clove on its back. "Why do you want those ones?" I ask. "Because they're cool. I like them. This one runs fast, this one is funny and this is a good fighter." "How much do they cost each?" "About $5." "And how much money do you have from doing your chores?" "About $5." "So what do you want to do next?" I look at my son as he furrows his brow and begins to ponder his options.
- - - - - - - - - - - -
- - - - - - - - - - - -
- - - - - - - - - - - - Search Salon | |||||
 |
 |
 |
 |
|||
