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Money makes the world go around, and the easiest way to make money go around is to buy and sell things. Which results in good and bad things. Perhaps the biggest pit-fall of a consumerist society is that a good consumer is an unhappy consumer. When we are unhappy, we buy things to fix whatever we think is wrong, so it's in a seller's best interest to convince a consumer that they are unhappy, and then sell them a "cure." What this basically boils down to is that Americans today -- who see an average of 3,000 ads a day -- are constantly confronted with the message that there is something wrong with us. We are not tall enough, short enough, thin enough, muscular enough, dressed well enough, housed well enough, financially secure enough, sexy enough, relaxed enough, professional enough -- and we never will be. If we are content, we have no motivation for buying products to change ourselves. But this is not the only way we are pressured not to love ourselves. Growing up, we are told by our parents and friends not to be conceited or selfish. Unless you're lucky, those people had no more idea than you did how to distinguish between self-love and self-centeredness in a child. Religions and social ideals are culpable too. We are told we must "give till it hurts" and "put others before ourselves" and that is it "better to give than to receive." These are true in their way, but they can be wrongly interpreted to mean that we are not worth as much as other people. Grace says, "If it's a good thing to help Mark or Jenifer, it must be good to help myself. I'm worth as much as they are, and they are worth as much as I." |