Essay - Consumerism Sets Each Person Against Themselves in an Endless Quest...

Consumerism sets each person against themselves in an endless quest for happiness made possible only by acquiring more things. Consumerism is manifested in a never-ending cycle of purch*****sing of new goods and services. Consumers are programmed to pay little attention to their true needs, or to the durability of the product or its origin or ***** environmental consequences of manufacture and disposal.

***** is driven by huge amounts of money spent on advert*****ing intended to spur demand. Laurie Mazur writes in E that advertising has become more pervasive in the past 20 years. Advertising budgets have doubled since 1976 and most of that growth has occurred in the last ten years. The constant barrage ***** ads has created a phenomenon marketers called "clutter." In order to get over ***** clutter advertisers have taken ***** product placement, mock ********** reports, ***** other forms of stealth advertising. Mazur explains that consumerism encourages people to ignore the normal common sense desire for an adequate supply of life's necessities with an artificial an ongoing ***** for things and ***** ***** needed to buy them (Mazur 36).

Cynthia Peters writes in Dollars & Sense that children are exposed ***** materialism at a young age. They are taught to demand products from their parents and crave certain brands in particular (Peter 9). The spread of consumerism has been insidious. At first, there were a growing number of pleasant household conveniences, and then a car ***** every adult which resulted in the loss of mass transit. In the 1960s, the grow*****g availability of consumer credit and debt started what has been described as the rat race. People had to work harder and longer to buy the goods and services advertisers told them were required to be happy even if they had ***** borrow money to do so. By the 1970s, this trend results in total dependence on the *****, the necessity ***** full time work, and the two income household. It al***** resulted in a huge upsurge in imports of che*****ply made c*****sumer goods, ***** ***** sold at inflated prices to an image conscious American society.

David Guterson reports in Harper's Magazine ***** professional sport is a prim*****ry expression of ***** American character at the end of the twentieth century. An average day ***** *****s coverage may involve a National Hockey League play-off game, followed by a golf *****urn*****ment, followed by three NBA play-off games televised over the course of seven hours, followed ***** programs called Eye on Sports, Golf Club, and Sports Folly, a regular-se*****on baseball game, another NBA play-off game, and ESPN, the net***** devoted entirely to sports games punctuated by constant scores and updates and ***** news-format shows like Sports Report, ***** Center, and Sports Weekly (37).

Guterson believes ***** is no end ***** major sporting events ***** that ********** are sequenced in the calendar such that each ***** be watched by as large an audience as possible. New Year's Day is *****ly an occasion for college football bowl *****. Three weeks later fans