No, but it's planting the thought in their heads and convincing them that their lives will be infinitely better for it. It's more akin to saying that people were only racist in the 60's because they were brought up in a society where racism was encouraged, condoned, and seen as a healthy part of everyday life. Those who opposed racism or fought the racist system were ostracized, threatened (if they were outspoken or active enough, or if the crowd was OK with violent threats being made towards people who weren't like them), or faced prison time (see Loving v. Virginia for a case dealing with miscegenation laws). Think about all those anti-consumerist guys you know (or, if you don't actually know any, then think of the archetype). What do you think when you think of them? How are they portrayed in media?
That's called "advertising." Crazy Wolf, you're a cool person, but you are wrong. People always have a choice. They can choose to not buy the product. If they're dumb enough to fall for advertising schtick (with the exception of false advertising), they deserve what they get. AND I'M FOR THE 99%'ERS! I'm tired of corruption in politics.
Conscious decision, you have a choice in. The society you're in, for most people, will determine more or less what decisions you will be presented with, generally the decision you'll make, and will put certain influences on you. For the most part, it'll even give you stuff so that you don't really have to *make* a decision yourself. How did you come to wear blue jeans? Do you pick bitchin' cars by looking solely at their specifications, or do other factors come into play? How many of those other factors can be said to come from inside your own head, with no societal input? It's hard to fight a lifetime of programming. Some do and win. Most don't. If you're born and raised in a culture where newer is always better, you don't think that's going to rub off? I'm assuming your hair currently is falling somewhere within the boundaries of what is "appropriate" for males in our society. Did you choose what haircut to get, completely devoid of the connotations and significance it might have to the people around you? I'm not saying that it's impossible to not consume shit you don't need. It's just not the way we're wired currently.
Let's focus on the real marketing asshole here, Hallmark. They arbitrarily picked a couple random days and made them mother's day and father's day and decided that from now on if you don't send a card to your parents on those days you're an ungrateful piece of shit. And society as a whole accepts it.
Well the second DeBeers executives step foot onto US soil they can be arrested. They exemplify a whole other level of greed and exploitation with penny-on-the-dollar pay for their miners and alleged violence against competitors. But hey, happy engagement.
This strikes me as being, fundamentally, one of the sticking points that gets run into in discussions about the OWS movement, and the right/left divide in general. If we break this down, there's a moral claim being made here; that people "deserve" what they get, which is strongly predicated on a conception of free will that strikes me as being a tad too strong. There's a good rule of thumb in any debate of ethics/morality, "Ought implies can". That is, to be morally responsible for an action, you have to be able to do otherwise. Many of the arguments against the OWS message (and the arguments saying that the "system", whatever that may connote, isn't broken) boil down to a belief that people are free to choose, and, should they chose wrong, ought to be free to fail. Anyhow, what I mainly wanted to get at is the idea that Crazy Wolf has been trying to make as well, is that the typical conception of free will is horrendously archaic, and doesn't model reality all that well. Wikipedia covers it decently, if you're interested: <a class="postlink" href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Neuroscience_of_free_will" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;">http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Neuroscience_of_free_will</a>. Look, I'm not about to advocate some ridiculous form of determinism and decry free will, but if we're going to create ethical policies, they need to be grounded in realistic conceptions of morality, and the human condition. The case for absolute free will just can't be made all that strongly, and it leads to us not acknowledging the illegitimacy of unethical power structures that get put in place, because, under the supposition of absolute free will, those self-same structures are not only legitimate, but laudable. And, really, that's kind of sad.
Everything in an attack ad like this is intentional. Notice how she's referred to as "Professor Elizabeth Warren?" That's intentional, and it's because "professor" plays as a negative amongst their target demographic. I honestly have no words for how pathetic that is.
Didn't you see the movie Inside Job? We're supposed to hate academia now too, their intertwined with big banks and all evil and such. But I know that's not what you mean. Is it pathetic to think people who have only dealt in one sided philosophies only in an academic setting might be out of touch with reality? I am sure you could find similar material aimed at Milton Friedman when he was advising the Reagan administration. Having lived in Ohio, a huge battle ground state, with the wall to wall shit I see every election cycle I could care less if they banned all political ads. I really don't think any of these idiot 30 second segments are actually changing peoples mind. It seems it does focus squarely on demographics who are already entrenched one way or the other.
The point of those 30-second political ads is not to change people's minds. It's to infuriate opponents ("You mean that the other candidate did THAT? I'd better vote to keep him out of office!") and to demoralize supporters ("Well, I support him regardless, but now I'm not sure if other people are, so I'm going to stay home.")
Read "Why we Buy" by Paco Underhill or watch "The Merchants of Cool" (2001) to see how the marketing agencies manipulate consumers. There's a ton of "behind-the-scenes" books and documentaries about how the advertisers bald-faced lie to the consumer, those are just two I have seen/read. False advertising has become the rule, not the exception. If you need proof, go into a GNC store. In another note, this is the most jaw-dropping thing I have yet seen from my incredible government: <a class="postlink" href="http://rt.com/usa/news/detention-legislation-torture-senate-891/" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;">http://rt.com/usa/news/detention-legisl ... enate-891/</a> This is downright frightening, and it's something that a vote can't fix. This quite literally puts the population against the military, in a "who knew V For Vendetta would be a Goddamned documentary" situation. The most chilling thing about this is that the vote wasn't even close.
I stand corrected: <a class="postlink" href="http://politicalgates.blogspot.com/2011/12/citigroup-plutonomy-memos-two-bombshell.html" onclick="window.open(this.href);return false;">http://politicalgates.blogspot.com/2011 ... shell.html</a>
OK, I just read the whole things.... what exactly is the issue here? They're largely descriptive rather than normative, and outside of being earlier than most similar pieces, not particularly original. They don't seem substantially different in tone or content from this article published earlier this year by The Atlantic Monthly. So Citigroup isn't blind, and noticed the increasing economic stratification of Western economies. And they analyze the potential consequences of this for their investment customers. What exactly is nefarious here?
Agreed, i don't see a mention of non-public info. It's not illegal to have a mailing list, first amendment rights and all...
This new Occupy the Ports spin-off is already out of hand even though the premise is insane and destructive to begin with. http://weaselzippers.us/2011/12/14/...during-protest-to-shut-down-port-of-portland/
New Orleans had an Occupy movement and, like everything in New Orleans, it was ineffectual and useless. It was, however, vastly superior to all of the other Occupy Movements in one respect. It had strippers.