The main focus of Benjamin Barber’s first chapter of Consumed is the infantilist ethos that has taken hold of our society. Barber says that infantilization “points on one hand to the dumbing down of goods and shoppers in a postmodern global economy that seems to produce more goods than people need; and that points, on the other hand, to the targeting of children as consumers in a market where there are never enough shoppers” (p. 5). These are two powerful statements about the current state of our economy and our culture in general. The “dumbing down” of goods and shoppers is most apparent in our current advertising. It seems as if the majority of ads these days have little or nothing to do with the product they are selling. The primary focus of the ads is to capture the viewer’s wandering attention and to entertain him/her as much as possible in the least amount of time. Adults are often portrayed as silly or childish in these commercials, which is done for several reasons.
First, the silly actions of adults are good for a laugh, which equates to higher sales for most products. This is a bit of a sad, simple truth in our entertainment-worshipping consumerist society: by simply making people (or consumers) laugh, a company can expect their profits to rise. It’s as if proving a product’s value through its uses and benefits, the same hard-sell techniques that drove capitalism in its earlier days, is now old-fashioned and boring, replaced by a swarm of soft-selling ads, all vying for our emotional and subconscious attention. Sometimes the product is never even used in modern advertisements, but if it’s funny enough, it will sell regardless. Logic and reason have been ‘superseded’ by emotional responses to amusement in the minds of consumers. The second reason is that by showing the adults as absurd and infantile, advertisers are subliminally ‘empowering’ children, attempting to bridge generational gaps and to place all of their consumers on the same psychological level.
The latter part of Barber’s quote, regarding “children as consumers,” expands on that second reason. According to Barber, “the new capitalism must spark a ‘kidquake of kid-directed goods and services’ aimed at children old enough ‘to articulate their preferences—hence, children ages four and older” (p.12). My sister, who tutors at a preschool back in our home town, recently told me that the children at the school (ages 3-5!) are each given tablets in the classroom. No wonder that consumerism and infantilism are on the rise in our culture, when infants are forced into becoming consumers. I remember playing with Legos and action figures, digging holes on the playground and catching bugs when I was that age. How can the kids’ imagination be stimulated when computers are algorithmically prompting all of their thinking from the start? Exposing these small children to the power of branded technology (and, in effect, consumerism) before they even have a chance to develop a set of ideals or their own sense of identity, seems like a disservice to their cognitive development.
As we have discussed in class all semester, the danger of this infantilization of our culture (alongside the digital revolution) is not the infantilization itself, it’s the overall lack of awareness by the people it’s affecting. Barber quotes James Madison to address this issue: “the pathologies of liberty can be as perilous as the pathologies of tyranny; and far more difficult to discern or remedy” (p. 4). Most Americans still consider themselves to be free and liberated while they continue to shop without hesitation; constantly buying, constantly branding, slaves to consumerism.
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