1) defines my view on consumerism (nominalism, consumerism is only a research object)

2) Describe the phenomena and characteristics of consumerism.

3) Sort out the origin and development of consumerism.

4) Our attitude towards consumerism and its future.

First of all, I want to declare that consumption is conducive to improving people's living standards, meeting people's material needs, stimulating domestic demand and promoting economic development. Reasonable and moderate consumption is a need of life. But we should pay attention to the influence of consumerism and not be deceived by consumerism. What I criticize here is consumerism, not consumption itself.

1) What is consumerism?

Consumerism refers to such a way of life: the purpose of consumption is not to meet the actual needs, but to constantly pursue the satisfaction of the desire to be created and stimulated. Consumerism refers to the consumption concept and values that people consume material wealth and natural resources without scruple and restraint, and regard consumption as the highest purpose of life. Consumerism is manifested as "unnecessary upgrading of material products, massive possession and consumption of various energy and resources, arbitrary abandonment of products that are still of use value, adoption of unbearable lifestyles, and so on". Under this definition, consumerism is essentially fetishism, which reflects their lifestyle, status and superiority through the consumption and possession of things. Their unrestrained consumption pollutes the environment, consumes too much resources and brings great negative externalities, but they have not paid the price for it. (Excerpted from MBA Think Tank Encyclopedia)

The "consumerism" I mentioned in this article is not a professional research term, but a word borrowed for the convenience of explaining the problem. Consumerism is an ideology, or values, that the value of life needs to be reflected through consumption. When consuming, it is not about your own needs and practicality, but more about the brand and its "identity", regardless of your own consumption ability and environmental resources, blindly pursuing the desire to consume.

2) the phenomenon and characteristics of consumerism

One of the manifestations of consumerism is perceptual consumption. Under the advocacy of the media, consumers blindly pursue the symbolic information of goods, and the consumption behavior itself is no longer rational and temperate, that is, whether it is necessary to consume a certain commodity is "follow the feeling" consumption. In addition, consumption is reckless, regardless of its plunder of natural resources and damage to the ecological environment.

The second manifestation of consumerism is wasteful consumption. Ni Ruihua believes that consumerism advocates a "one-time consumption" and "durable consumer goods" is a "quasi-one-time consumption". Whether a commodity is used depends not on its use value, but on whether it is "fashionable", "fashionable" and "whether I like it". Waste is also manifested in the excessive packaging of consumer goods, and even the cost of packaging is greater than the value of consumer goods themselves.

The third manifestation of consumerism is conspicuous consumption. Under consumerism, consumers pay attention to food and clothing, ostentation and extravagance, and strive for money.

From different angles, the characteristics of consumerism consumption:

Consumption observation under the influence of total consumerism;

(1) Consumption for consumption. People no longer tend to care about the result of consumption, that is, they no longer consume only for survival and development, but pursue the social significance of consumption behavior itself.

(2) Consumerism brings material desires, and consumption is everything. Taking consumption as the fulcrum of life, there is only consumption in life, only eating, drinking and having fun in time, and avoiding work as much as possible. Cross-flow wastes resources and pollutes the environment, which is a short-sighted behavior that undermines sustainable development.

(3) Everything is for consumption. Taking consumption as the purpose of life, living is to find ways to satisfy one's consumption desire.

(4) consume everything. Whether it is material materials, culture and art, or even people themselves, they can be the consumption objects of people's consumption.

(5) Desperate consumption. People's consumption is no longer strictly limited by their ability to pay.

Analysis from consumerism theory;

(1) Western consumerism culture is an industrial culture based on machine industry and characterized by large-scale commodity production and commodity exchange. It is characterized by distinct materialism, attaching importance to material consumption and achieving psychological satisfaction through material possession.

(2) The large-scale consumption demand of consumerism is created, and everyone is involved in it invisibly, which makes people pursue high consumption endlessly;

(3) Consumerism is the symbolic consumption of commodities, which is regarded as the main form of self-expression and social identity, as a symbol of higher quality of life and a symbol of a happy life;

(4) Consumerism, which permeates all fields of society, is gaining its legitimacy and legitimacy worldwide, becoming a new way of social governance and embodying a new type of social life organization.

On zygmunt bauman s theory of "mobile modernity";

(1) Consumerism is the internal logic of the growth of capitalism.

(2) Consumerism is used to fight against uncertainty and insecurity.

(3) Consumerism supports the construction of self-identity

(4) Consumerism is regarded as the law of happiness.

3) the origin and development of consumerism

1. Essential reason. Consumerism is essentially determined by the internal logic of capital. The essence of capital is to pursue profit, economic growth and produce more and more products. After the appearance of Fordism, the focus of production shifted to the production of means of subsistence, which inevitably required large-scale consumption.

2. Economic reasons. In the 20th century, especially after World War II, the economy of capitalist countries developed rapidly and the material wealth of society increased greatly. The living standards of all social strata have improved to varying degrees, which makes many people think that the reserves of the earth's resources are infinite, the supply of material products is infinite, and social wealth is inexhaustible. As a result, the consumerism thought that people can possess and consume wealth at will came into being.

3. Political reasons. After the economic crisis of the last century, Keynes's economic theory was adopted by many countries. Keynes believed that the economic crisis was caused by insufficient effective demand, so it was necessary to stimulate consumption and investment, increase effective demand and promote economic development. In order to ensure the stable operation and moderate growth of the national economy, governments of various countries usually adopt the attitude of acquiescence, connivance and encouragement to consumerism. It is in this political environment that consumerism has gradually become an idea of people's consumption behavior.

4. Psychological reasons. Consumer goods can not only meet people's physiological needs, but also show people's relative ability to pay, meet the needs of self-esteem, or more accurately, meet vanity, so conspicuous consumption appears. Some scholars also believe that in capitalist society, people are not free in production, so in order to pursue freedom, people turn their attention to the field of consumption, trying to eliminate their sense of freedom and realize their potential equal aspirations by buying consumer goods freely. Therefore, the lack of self-expression and intention in labor makes people rely more and more on consumption behavior and regard consumption as everything.

Dai Rui believes that one of the reasons why China accepts consumerism is also psychological problems. After the reform and opening-up, people in China demanded to restore their repressed living needs and pay attention to the improvement of material living standards, which provided a psychological starting point for the abnormal expansion of living needs and the emergence of consumerism lifestyle in the future. Besides, the people of China have only begun to live a truly independent consumption life. Coupled with the gradual advancement of many social changes, people are no longer adapted to the new economic life and their consumption psychology is immature. They are obsessed with fashion, conformity and comparison, and are afraid of price increases and counterfeiting. Therefore, they have a strong dependence on the consumer guide of the media, so they are easy to accept consumerism.

5. Cultural reasons. The rise of consumerism has profound philosophical roots. In the view of western philosophy, man is a real "rational animal", and the mission of human beings is to know the world with their own physical strength and intelligence, reveal the operating rules of all things in the universe, and then conquer and control the world, become the master of all things in nature, and make it serve mankind. This philosophy does not regard the relationship between man and nature as a friendly relationship of harmonious coexistence, mutual assistance and mutual benefit, but as an antagonistic relationship between conquest and being conquered, deprivation and deprivation, which is manifested in the field of consumption. It advocates that human beings have the right to possess and squander material wealth indefinitely to meet people's sensory needs to the greatest extent. In addition, hedonism occupies a central position in the cultural system of modern society, leading to the crazy pursuit of materialism and the emergence of consumerism.

6. Promotion of mass media. Domestic scholars agree that mass media has contributed to the emergence and development of consumerism. Dai Rui believes: "People are increasingly accepting the concept of consumerism. If we want to trace the source, the driving factor should be the mass media. " The formation of consumerism lifestyle is driven by the interests of business groups and promoted to the public through the advertisements of business groups attached to their mass media or other cultural and artistic forms.

4) How should we treat consumerism?

The harm of consumerism:

1. Resource crisis.

On the one hand, consumerism leads to unlimited expansion of production and unlimited demand for natural resources; On the other hand, consumerism advocates unlimited personal consumption, which leads to the increase of per capita consumption and total consumption of resources, while the limited stock of earth resources brings about resource crisis. In addition, consumerism advocates high-grade consumption, excessive consumption, fashion consumption, advanced consumption and one-time consumption, which not only accelerates the upgrading of commodities and consumes a lot of natural resources, but also makes consumers abandon a large number of commodities that are still of use value, leading to a huge waste of resources and exacerbating the resource crisis.

2. Ecological crisis.

Consumerism has led to a global ecological crisis by supporting the modern lifestyle of "mass production, mass consumption and mass abandonment", because the human desire induced by mass production and mass consumption will exceed the tolerance limit of the earth's ecosystem, while the waste surplus caused by mass abandonment will exceed the self-repair and transformation limit of the ecosystem. Selfish producers and consumers seldom consider the carrying capacity of the environment and are unwilling to pay the necessary price for maintaining and supporting the environmental, energy and ecological consequences caused by this material consumption pattern. The result will inevitably lead to the destruction of natural resources and the pollution of ecological environment.

3. Crisis of values

(1) Consumerism does not bring happiness.

True happiness is social relations, work and leisure that are covered up. In a consumerist society, social relations, especially those between families and groups, are neglected. In addition, with the improvement of national industrialization and commercialization, the pace of life is accelerated, and people can enjoy less and less leisure time. Therefore, in a consumerist society, although consumers can get rich material satisfaction, they are not particularly happy. In addition, consumerism believes that consumption is the fundamental way of people's spiritual satisfaction and self-satisfaction, which are synonymous with happiness, that is to say, the satisfaction of consumption is equal to the acquisition of happiness, but this is extremely illusory. The satisfaction of material desire is perceptual happiness, and perceptual happiness is not equal to happiness.

(2) Consumerism abandons freedom.

In capitalist society, people are not free in the field of consumption, and consumers are always contradictory in the face of unprecedented market temptation. Free choice is increasingly becoming a psychological burden, rather than the enjoyment of economic rights. In addition, people's tastes are arranged, demand is stimulated, and consumption behavior lacks initiative. People don't actively participate in these activities, but passively absorb all this.

(3) Consumerism desecrates equality.

Consumerism advocates that everyone is equal before consumption, but consumption cannot be equal. First of all, consumerism is basically the result of manipulation. As long as it is involved, it reflects the inequality of consumerism. Secondly, consumerism consumption is based on the disparity between the rich and the poor, social injustice and the continuous crisis of mankind, at the expense of the survival needs and basic needs of some or even most people in society. As far as a country is concerned, at a certain level of productivity development, the total material wealth created by society is limited. Therefore, excessive consumption by the rich inevitably means insufficient consumption by the poor; The finiteness of the earth's resources determines that the global total supply is bound to be limited. Therefore, excessive consumption in rich countries means insufficient consumption by people in poor countries. Excessive consumption of resources and wealth by contemporary people will inevitably affect the living conditions of future generations.

4. Destroy people's all-round development.

First of all, people in a consumerist society attribute the purpose of life and the realization of human value to material consumption, and he only cares about personal material enjoyment. It is inevitable to lose interest in politics, give up social responsibility and historical mission, and therefore lose the ability to criticize the real social system and social problems, lose the ability of dialectical thinking, and become a one-dimensional person. Secondly, consumerism regards material consumption as the standard to measure people's value, and thinks that self-value is only reflected in self-consumption and enjoyment, denying people's intrinsic value, making people become passive greedy consumers and losing their moral beliefs, initiative and creativity. Third, consumerism intensifies the alienation tendency of "man-made material service". Consumerism is materialism, which makes people become slaves of money, wealth and desire, and become a body without thought and spirit. All goods are originally for people, and they are heterogeneous things created by people to meet their own needs. However, the excessive pursuit of goods and money advocated by consumerism makes people controlled by goods and even become slaves of them. In this way, people pay more and more attention to making money and enjoying, while ignoring the cultivation of virtue, character and philosophical wisdom that guide people's all-round development. In the end, people's moral standard gradually decreases, and people's wisdom is tired of things and shows a tendency of degradation, and people's comprehensive quality is getting worse and worse.

Discuss an idea:

When I was discussing consumerism, I heard an argument: consumerism is a false proposition. Consumerism is the inevitable product of social development and represents social progress. The development of consumerism promotes industrial production, people's consumption can be upgraded, and culture and experiential consumption further promote cultural development. People can adapt to human existence through artificial food and the transformation of natural society, and the change of the earth's ecological environment may not have such a great impact on human beings. Through machines, computers and automated production, human beings can meet the needs of consumers. Consumerism promotes social progress, and the criticism of consumerism is simply alarmist. Who can stop social development?

Obviously, I am not so optimistic, and I am not so confident about the future and social development.