AHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!

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While I was out of town, I read through two books. As I mentioned before, in my proposal, one of the books I read was called Consuming Kids by Susan Linn. I liked her book a lot. She discussed the media’s role in manipulating children and their parents to turn profits. She also talked about how Advertisers and the Market take advantage of child consumers because children aren’t fully mentally developed. Young children do not know the difference between their shows and commercials. Hell, entire shows are just commercials for brands and products (i.e. Pokemon). This really wasn’t an issue until the Reagan administration deregulated the media. Now children are bombarded with brands on T.V., their school buses, and even their classrooms (i.e. Channel One). Consumerism is inescapable.

In one of her chapters, Linn talked about Channel One News. If you didn’t know, Channel One is a 12-15 minute news program meant for students that airs in class. It also is current co-owned by NBC and CBS. My middle school, in North Chicago, and high school, here in Connecticut, both had contracts with the program. Apparently, if schools signed agreements with Channel One, schools would be handsomely compensated with nice media equipment that they otherwise would not be able to afford. So, it would be surprise for an underprivileged school to sign contracts with Channel One. The vexing thing about Channel One is that a third of their program are advertisements. And, of course, Channel One makes a TON from advertisement revenue because advertisers know that the kids are going to have to watch it. Really. In their contracts, Channel One requires that schools HAVE to show their program in class.

And it’s no surprise that kids “remember[ed] the commercials more than the news“.

Ugh. I can attest to that. Channel One always aired the same goddamn commercials. I also remember my class would recite the commercials when they aired.

Tomorrow, I’m going to see if I can find the film documentary version of Consuming Kids online.

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The other book I read was The Overspent American by Juliet Schor. It was a lot like her other book, that I read, Do Americans Shop Too Much?. What struck me the most with Overspent was Schor’s discussion about expensive lipsticks and cheap facial products. Women acknowledged that they were buying the expensive lipsticks because they would use their tubes in public and wanted people to see they were using the expensive brand (even a ‘downshifter’ admitted she did this). That’s why women were buying cheap facial cleansers and such, because it was a more private product. This behavior was again exemplified in how people lavishly decorated their livings rooms and kitchens over their bedrooms and second floors. Their living rooms, again, were meant to be seen by a more public audience, while their bedrooms didn’t have to impress anybody.

In general:

Basically, people buy to show off.

There are a lot of people who are unhappy with their jobs who buy stuff to try to make themselves happy (retail therapy!). Also, when those same people buy too much stuff, they have to work more at their job that they hate and the cycle repeats itself.

Middle-aged educated women are the biggest spenders of all. They have to show off that lipstick. Also, they happen to be the most status-conscious group of people.

‘Downshifters’ are people who realize that there is more to life than money and material happiness and they change their lifestyle to reflect that attitude. They are different from hippies and lot of them live near Seattle.

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I’ve checked out more books from the library and will read them in the next couple of days.

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As I mentioned multiple times, I was off vacationing in Disney World for a week with my fiance. For all of your amusement, I’ve included my thoughts on this trip (because it sort of relates to my s.p. topic).

It was my second-ever trip going there with my first being in May of last year. You will see people in jackets because Florida was going through a freak-freeze snap:

Disney World’s Christmas Creep is only 356 days before Christmas.

I find it amusing that Disney World tries to commodify every single little thing/detail about itself. Here we have a miniature Monorail Playset and you can even buy a miniature Model Contemporary Resort to drive your miniature Monorail through. In our room, there was a catalog where you could purchase bed sheets, mattresses, and toiletries used in the resorts. Another example are the Pins that Disney sells everywhere in its resort. There are pins for every resort, every ride, every character from every ride, multiples for every Disney animated feature, etc. etc. etc. They get expensive.

And, as most people know, every ride ends with a store.

Milk and juice are expensive. It’s more expensive than soda (due also in part to free refills for soda at the resorts). While it’s harder to find milk and juice, soda is pretty much sold everywhere.

However, I understand why Disney does all of this. It is a business and they make money doing all of this stuff. They need money to keep running and, hopefully, turn a profit. That’s what businesses hope to do. Disney just happens to be a larger and more successful business.

We’re trapped in a Hasbro nightmare!

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It’s not that I’m cynical about Disney World, unlike what you think CHRIS. It’s just that I find it a tiring place. I get tired of seeing the same Disney merchandise and stuff, in every store and every place, everywhere. I get brand fatigue. It doesn’t help that all the channels, save for the local ones, that were on the television in our room were all owned by Disney. A good chunk of those channels were just infomercials for Disney cruises, international vacations, and timeshares themselves.

To me, Disney’s Celebrate Something campaign translates as Disney customers, we can help you find a way to justify coming to our resort even though it is really expensive and probably out of your price range. But that’s okay, you deserve the magic. That’s the kind of thinking Schor discussed in Overspent.

Also, the key cards that Disney gives to resorts guests makes me uneasy. It can also link to one’s credit card, it just makes it all the more easier to spend money at Disney. Because of that, I have to admit, it’s a smart move on Disney’s part for profitability.