The End of Manipulative Consumerist Capitalism

No more using our own psychology against us

Capitalism in and of itself is a great thing. It’s the opportunity to create products that are needed in the village, offer them, and expand and grow your business as people enjoy and love your products. There’s nothing wrong with that.

There’s also nothing wrong with advertising so that people know that you’re out there. To have a sign or an advertisement so that people know who can fix their furnace or who they can purchase a chair from is a true service to the community — a total win/win.

The twist comes when we try to sell people things that they don’t need — and often don’t even want. But when our desire is simply to make money, to “be successful”, to grow our business, to put money in the shareholder’s pocket, to look good for the neighbours, etc, it is easy to lose sight of the fact that we are actually taking advantage of people.

In the words of Thomas Merton, we are placing artificial desires within people simply so that we can make more money.

Well, I had no real background in psychology. In fact, I had a Bachelor of Mathematics which definitely wasn’t helpful. So, I went back to school to get some “proper” training.

The most shocking thing I learned there was that 70% of all psychology experiments were done for the sake of marketing. In the class, this was just treated like it was the most normal thing — and perhaps because we live in a consumer-driven economy where constant advertising is the norm…

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