Now, it's almost half a year, and it's time for the annual mid-year shopping spree. All major e-commerce platforms have aroused consumers' appetite for "6. 18", and many products have been pre-sold today. However, in every shopping carnival, the preferential rules of many platforms and businesses are often vague, and even the "overlord clause" is hidden, which makes consumers suffer "dumb losses".
At the same time of passion, we also need to be alert to the temptation of shopping addiction. Only rationality can avoid falling into the trap of overlord clause to the greatest extent. In today's consumer society, how to rationally consume and be a reflective consumer?
Author | Wang Qing
Can material wealth really bring people an imaginary happy life? The rapid development of technology has influenced people explicitly or implicitly. In the tide of women's rights being constantly discussed, how far is women from liberation?
Maonan Saito outlined the era of Japan's economic bubble for us through a large number of documentary interviews.
(1980s to 1990s)
Like 3354, an urban white-collar worker who struggles hard but is overwhelmed by debt, a housewife who fills the void of marriage with debt consumption, a single queen who has no sexual feelings, and a "perfect" wife who overeats and vomits behind her husband's back every night.
With the deepening of the interview, Saito pointed out that in the social system with capital and efficiency as the first priority, people try to turn time into money, try to make up for spiritual emptiness with consumption, unconsciously synchronize themselves with machines, and suffer from constant self-discipline and oppression. As the name implies, "what is hidden behind the bubble era is the scene of such a group of prisoners wandering from one place to another."
0030 10, (Japanese) Shigeo Saito, translated by Wang Xiaoxia, Movable Type Culture | Zhejiang People's Publishing House, February 2020.
This book has been published in Japan for 30 years, and the social reality and social problems reflected in it still have profound enlightenment to the present. Whether it is the 996 overtime culture, the prevalence of consumerism, or the frequent occurrence of female violence, are we unconsciously masturbating by "satiating and drinking enough" and ignoring the deeper social and human dilemma behind it?
The new poverty of social consumption
Screw, Desire and Disillusionment of Middle Class Dream
Zygmont Bauman, a sociologist, described the change of the meaning of "poor people" in the process of modern transformation in his book Eating the Poor. In the past, in a producer-led society, poverty meant unemployment and lack of money. On the other hand, the poor also represent huge labor resources, which is the surplus value that can create wealth.
After entering the overproduction consumer society, production itself
(or the work itself)
It no longer has noble moral significance, but becomes a means to provide more consumption opportunities. At this time, the "new" poor who were excluded from consumption were completely abandoned in structure because they had no purchasing power. However, trying to be a qualified consumer means never being satisfied with the trap of desire, which eventually leads to the trend of "obscenity" in society.
0030 10, by Zygmont Bowman, translated by Qiu Ziming and Li Lan, Sanhui Books | Jilin Publishing Group Co., Ltd., 2010 June.
Bowman's "new poor" also appeared in Work, Consumption and New Poor. Yujiro Sugazaki, a young man from a small town who came to Tokyo to work alone, drives a taxi and sells insurance companies. His dream is to be promoted to a monthly salary of 400 thousand yen through personal efforts.
(about 20,000 yuan)
After a series of promotions, Cunninghamia lanceolata found out the inside story of the insurance industry. In order to win customers, he had to pay insurance premiums for customers out of his own pocket to maintain the order volume.
where is the money to come from? After years of savings, Yujiro Sugazaki turned to the popular "micro-loan". After several years of lending, he finally took the enviable position of branch secretary, only to find that he was in debt of 6.5438+0.4 million yen. In the end, Cunninghamia lanceolata's dream turned into a heavy debt and the remains of credit cards, submerged in high-rise buildings in Tokyo. And he is just the smallest screw in the capital machine.
Another story is about a young bank clerk, Miko Liu, who sits in a small vault. Because the newly married husband's income is unstable, the beautiful girl who wants to get a perfect marriage life spent all her savings before marriage during her honeymoon. Because of a handbag of 30,000 yen, she opened the door of the loan company. In future loans, Miyoko can neither confess to her "indifferent" husband nor ask for help from her "competitive" friends. By the time my husband found out, the loan had reached 330,000,000 yen.
1030 10 Every ordinary person who works hard to have a "better life" does not get what he really wants in the end, but ends up disillusioned and becomes a new poor person in modern society. This kind of poverty is concealed by the appearance of "satiety" and has become a new poverty spectacle in modern consumer society.
On the one hand, with the continuous improvement of material consumption, they have solved the basic problem of food and clothing, and are not poor people who need to starve in the traditional sense. Both Miyoko and Kamizaki Shiro have made some savings through their efforts. On the other hand, encouraged by the wave of consumerism, they became what Bowman called "defective consumers". In order to seek self-identity and gain a place in society, they can only confirm themselves by spending in advance, and eventually fall into material and spiritual poverty.
Thirty years later, we seem to have entered the same repeater mode. The endless stream of flashy advertisements keeps giving us the illusion of a middle-class dream. Not enough money? Ant grey and JD.COM white stripes help you realize your wish in advance. Life is too tired? Taobao live room makes you ten times happier. However, when we move towards such a slogan step by step, can we really realize the beautiful vision of "middle class life"?
Under the topic of Douban's "frugal life like me" and "enlightenment of consumption degradation", many young people began to reflect on the realistic predicament of zero savings, shopping addiction and even high debt caused by deep consumerism. In the article "Plan not to buy anything for a whole year, experience for the first time", a bean friend shared how he unconsciously fell into the trap of "consumption first" and made up his mind to re-establish the concept of consumption.
Although we are still far from the "consumer society" mentioned by Bowman, the wave of consumerism has swept everyone in most first-tier cities. Whether it is the "invisible poor" still trapped in the trap of consumption and desire, or
How conscious consumers who actively reflect on consumerism get rid of the predicament of "new poor" is not only an important personal life problem, but also a structural problem that society needs to deal with.
Alienation of human heart in network society
Charm, overwork and the closure of interpersonal relationship
The second dilemma of feeding the poor is the network dilemma of physical and mental overwork and interpersonal indifference caused by the increasing convergence of individuals and machines under the wave of urbanization and electronic superposition.
In 1980s, the wave of microelectronics and computers swept through Japan. Computerization is not only widely used in various industries, but also in enterprises, technologies such as automatic design devices and monitoring microcomputers are becoming more and more perfect. At the same time, high-tech industrial bases with complex R&D institutions began to appear all over Japan. There are "super factories" around Tokyo.
"Every morning, the bus bound for the industrial cluster around the city is full of office workers with high-tech fighters. They are professional technicians in the wave of computer and network development, and their main force is mostly the single younger generation. "
We can't be beasts.
At the beginning of the second chapter of Eating Poor, Maonan Saito follows the life track of Gongping Murakami, a system engineer, and reveals the influence and alienation of the rapid development of computerization on computer practitioners.
On the one hand, due to the close relationship with computers from morning till night, many programmers began to be fascinated by this "irrelevant answer" relationship. As long as there are no mistakes in programs and commands, the computer will never resist and will give correct calculation results soon. On the other hand, they are afraid of being left behind by the ever-changing technology, so they are under great psychological pressure. "In this industry, the accumulated experience will soon be eliminated. This is why some people say that engineers have to retire at the age of 35. "
Obsessed with the black-and-white logic of computers, he is gradually autistic and indifferent to interpersonal relationships in real life, and shows subconscious indifference to things without logic. As a female engineer admits in the book, "in the world of computers, all illogical things have no place." If I stay in such a' logical society' for a long time, I will have a strong resistance to illogical things and things that have no objective basis. "
From Professor Yamazaki's long-term study of "the influence of technological innovation on workers", we further know that being "brainwashed" by computers is not only a phenomenon within the computer industry, but also a reality that extends to the whole business field. Whether it is the daily sales targets such as workload management and time management of fishing nets, or the office equipment used to monitor whether the management items are properly implemented, everyone lives in a cruel and anti-human overwork environment-high-intensity overtime, long-term work, attendance on rest days and working all night.
"In a society where computers are more and more popular, faster and more efficient, and life is more and more convenient, can we human beings continue to maintain the identity of' human beings'?" When we have gone deep into the internet wave, Saito's problem is more like a prophecy from the last century.
The Age of Karoshi (Japan) by Hiroji Morioka, translated by Mi, New Classic Amber | Xinxing Publishing House, 20 19, 1.
In fact, in the information-driven digital space-time, individual autonomy and control feel unprecedented impact. In order to catch up with the digital age, we are caught in the dilemma of "996" for work or "996" for life. Even if I can get off work on time, I often brush my mobile phone unconsciously after work and immerse myself in the 24-hour sleepless cyber city.
At the same time, the rapid development of information technology and the rise of platform capitalism have also changed our interpersonal principles. Anthropologist Xiang Biaozeng pointed out in an interview with Thirteen Invitations that informatization not only brought about changes in people's perception of time and space, but also made the system of trust and meaning highly centralized. "I don't trust you very much, but we all trust Alipay." In the end, we can't build trust and love around our lives.
"Thirteen Invitations" column, Xu Zhiyuan interviewed Xiang Biao.
Self-revenge in a patriarchal society
Physical anxiety, addiction and pathological resistance
"After eating vomit, continue to eat after spitting-every night, Shou Meidai will carry her sleeping husband to the toilet and carry out such a tragic ceremony."
In the third chapter of Eat Enough for the Poor, Shigeo Saito turns his eyes to a young woman who suffers from refusing to eat, overeating and vomiting. Some of them are housewives who are deeply disappointed with their marriage, so they choose to go on a diet or have eating anxiety, some are self-loathing because they can't stand the jokes of their peers or boyfriends about their bodies, and some are young female doctors who are gradually out of control because of the burden of pursuing perfection for a long time.
In the conversation with psychiatrists, Saito gradually discovered that there are deeper social reasons behind the abnormal diet of women. In 1980s, Japan successively passed the Convention on the Elimination of All Forms of Discrimination against Women and other bills advocating women's independence and equality between men and women. Therefore, women began to move from the private sphere to the public sphere. In other words, besides becoming housewives, they began to have more career and life choices.
However, can the implementation of this bill ensure that women get more rights and freedoms? The answer is obviously not. Under the traditional patriarchal structure, most women still suffer from violence and domination. On the one hand, although parents and elders encourage their daughters to strive for independence, their behaviors and lifestyles send the opposite signal-"Relying on their husbands is the shortcut to happiness, so women must be lovely and feminine."
On the other hand, mass media and commercial advertisements have shaped women's images and exerted invisible pressure on women trying to be independent:
"Now, whether it is TV or advertising, a large number of women's images are projected through various media. It is an indisputable fact that figure is a necessary condition for modern society to be recognized. Although women think they want to lose weight because of their own aesthetics, in fact, I think this is the result of their being completely swallowed up and brainwashed by male-dominated social values. "
The same is true of the women in Saito's visit. They are either deeply involved in the misfortune of marriage, or deeply involved in the addictive family relationship that depends on * * *. As Saito said in his book, this painful and repeated way of refusing to eat-overeating and other addictive diseases-"is like reflecting, satirizing and confronting a society that does not allow excesses."
On the other hand, in today's women's situation, are we still trapped in the shadow of patriarchal system? Saito's book How Women Find a Way Out between Self-reliance and Dependence is also an unavoidable topic.
Various advertising words on the screen to encourage women's independence, and the sexy definition of more than one yuan in commercial blockbusters have shaped a series of "liberated" female images for us. Back to real life, we find that the mainstream society's criticism of women is still like living in the last century. Last year, actress Rayza was "humiliated by sluts" by netizens for wearing low-cut suspenders. In Han Xing, Su Li dared to be herself, was subjected to cyber violence, and finally committed suicide. In fact, public opinion has not relaxed the rigid requirements for women's "pure desire" and "thinness is beauty".
At the same time, on social media, more and more women bravely express themselves and fight for rights and interests. However, since this year, we have been repeatedly hit by reality. Whether it's the incident in Room N at the beginning of the year, the sexual assault case, or the recent dispute over naming rights and name rights, we not only see the difficulty of love between the two sexes, but also see that even in the same gender camp, division and reform are often too much love and understanding.
Where is the road to women's liberation? Saito's suggestion in Eat the Poor may provide us with some reference:
First of all, it is necessary to doubt and critically think about the so-called femininity pursued by society. Why do women have to stay beautiful? Who is it for to stay beautiful? Why do women have to be so thin? Why are cosmetics advertisements all over the street? You need to learn to doubt first.
Secondly, we should realize that women are the only masters of their own body and mind. Maybe we can call it feminism, but now many women are too ignorant about it.
Author Wang Qing
Proofread Wang Xin
Related question and answer: Have you had enough food and clothing in loans overdue? "When applying for a food and clothing loan, you don't check the credit, and the applicant doesn't have to worry about the bad personal credit affecting the loan. Simply put, food and clothing loan is a consumer credit product, which can provide users with convenient and fast loan services. Users only need to provide their mobile phone number, sesame seeds and personal provident fund to apply for a certain amount of loans. It must be said that the applicant can get the loan amount in 30 minutes at the earliest. " Related question and answer: A sheep can sell for thousands of dollars. Is it possible to borrow money to raise sheep? In our Xinjiang region, a big sheep can be worth 1800 yuan and a little sheep can be worth 1 100 yuan in those years. If it is a loan to raise sheep, I will give you a detailed account to see if you can live a good life.
Ten ewes need a loan 18000 yuan. When you bought it, ten ewes might not be pregnant. According to general estimates, at least one ewe is empty, and only nine out of ten sheep can survive (one in ten mortality rates is normal). Well, ten sheep were fed for a winter, and one died, leaving nine. Nine sheep gave birth to nine lambs. This is not a profit, but it is still necessary.
That's not all. This is only a winter's fee. In spring, sheep have to eat grass in the mountains. The monthly grazing fee for each big sheep is 20 yuan, lamb 10 yuan. Now a * * * size 18, grazing for six months. Calculate, the size of one month is 270 yuan, and six months is 1620 yuan.
Ok, now let's calculate the general ledger. 18000 yuan bought 10 big sheep and gave birth to 9 lambs. The market value of a sheep is 1 100 yuan, and the income of a sheep is 9900 yuan.
99O0- 1620-2500
=4 120
Add a dead sheep 180O yuan, leaving 3300 yuan, deducting interest and medical expenses 1000 yuan, leaving 2300 yuan. After deducting 300 yuan from the depreciation of water, electricity and sheepfold, you only earned 2000 yuan. Remember, this is just the salary you earn when you feed yourself carefully in winter.