A Critique of Desire:

Distaste and Dislike in Consumer Behavior

RICHARD R. WILK

...The Commodity Critique

In the United States conservative elitists often adopt a moralistic anti-consumption position, since they see mass consumer culture as a symptom of what they hate; the commercialism of democracy based on wealth and power instead of culture, position and education. From this perspective, mass culture is a pale substitute for the real thing--an opium for masses who no longer know their place, and don't have the knowledge and taste to appreciate the finer things.

... The Primitive and the Modern

Our captivation with desire, wants, and needs also has roots in 19th century critiques of industrial commodity culture and modernity, the lament of the passing of authentic social values and their replacement with unending and insatiable desire for goods (see Falk 1994:109). Attention has been directed towards modernity as a system where desire is out of control, where the dream world of goods replaces the social and moral pleasures that restrained consumption in traditional society. In the literature on consumerism, objects build identity, and desire is an investment of meaning in things, in a process of building the self (Czikszentmihalyi and Rochberg-Halton 1981). Denial, in the form of disgust or phobia is on the other hand treated as a pathology, as the rejection of identity, failure to become a separate individual, to mature, or to form normal attachments.

Link for full text.

http://www.indiana.edu/~wanthro/disgust.htm

DESIRE AND THE UNCONSCIOUSNESS

Modern consumerism is more concerned with the feeling of desire rather than the established needs. It approaches consumption with desire.

There are several accepted reasons why people consume, from the assertion of social or professional status, the attempt to emulate others or the search of pleasure and fulfillment of desires.

"The reason people want to acquire, posses, claim and display goods is because they expect the goods will make them happy, satisfy needs, or give them some other pleasure. Whether you approve or disapprove of this hedonic search for pleasure, the strength of desire is the engine that drives the marketplace."1

Desire stimulates the shopper and can sometimes push the mind into an ambitious conducts. It is an emotion and state of mind that can progress to an overwhelming and exiting feeling or to unrestrained and unconscious behavior.

If we point directly to the relationship between the extremes of desire and unconsciousness, to how the unreasonable determination of obtaining goods is sometimes only possible thru the resignation the of consciousness. In this extreme desire, the mind is overpowered by the thoughts of wanting and partially abandons reality to enter this frenzy and distracting state. "I want this dress so much, I am going to get it!", "What color will look the best on me", "Ou... what are these for?... I need them."

In this thesis I will focus on consumers state of unconsciousness and conceptualize it as a condition of mental distraction. One abandons the regular line of thoughts and substitutes them for unilateral consumerist thoughts and emotions. So What happens with our regular line of thoughts? It is silenced and numbed, like in stasis.

This combination of frenzy distraction and stasis is how i would define the shopping state of mind.

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1 A Critique of Desire: Distaste and Dislike in Consumer Behavior, Richard R. Wilk. Anthropology Department Indiana University.

Introduction

One of the most important views on consumption was adopted by John Maynard Keynes on 1936 when he defined consumption expenditures as an important component of national income. He argued that with rises in income, consumption would also increase, but not as fast, since the propensity to consume more would go down as consumer needs are satisfied. Keynes regarded effective demand by the consumer as the principal vehicle of economic growth.

Consumption clearly contributes to human development when it improves the capabilities of people without adversely affecting the well-being of others, beings as fair to future generations as to the present ones, when it respects the carrying capacity of the planet and when it encourages the emergence of lively and creative communities.

Today’s society, however, has proven Keynes to be wrong. If we only look into the fact that the income needed on US Households in order to fulfill consumption aspirations doubled between 1986 and 1994. The imaginary line that separates needs and luxuries tends to be each day more blurry, thus creating heavy social pressure to maintain high consumption standards.