my partner habitually watches the us state media news… it’s gross but i can’t break a habit for someone else. i usually ignore it as much as possible, using headphones and avoiding looking at the tv, but every so often i catch myself watching because the tv is huge and my computer is at a 45 degree angle to it.

anyway, the past two days have been almost solely about how much money the little consumers are shelling out for crap they don’t need and can’t afford, and also the mandatory isn’treal 10 minutes of adulation and fixation.

It occurred to me that i can remember consumerism having always been the main focus of “the news” leading into Thanksgiving, and then intensely in the few days after, then it building up to a fever pitch just before christmas day. After that for a couple weeks the same old dribble about people spending beyond their means and having to worry about digging out of debt.

This time a question hit me unexpectedly, since i was watching but not really aware that i was, but also because it made me think about things i hadn’t really given much thought to before: why the fuck would any of us give a shit about how much money is being spent on junk? like why does grandma give a shit, why would i give a shit, or why would ANYONE but the bourgeois care to hear anything about it even once, much less every single day multiple times a day for weeks on end?

then i also realized that i recall way back when i was young that it sometimes felt like we were all being goaded into spending money we didn’t have to give gifts that weren’t needed, or even wanted sometimes, and then we were chastised for having gone beyond our means because we’re all just so irresponsible.

it’s so weird going from being someone who used to watch tv all the time without ever realizing what it is, to seeing it after decades of not watching it but then suddenly seeing it again with new eyes. it’s really fucked up, and it’s scary to think about how strongly i was programmed by it, and even what programming probably still exists unexamined within me to this day.

The article tries to balance out the news by pointing to the increase in spending, but I doubt that it’s too significant if there are fewer shoppers and worsening inflation. Do you think that the increase in online spending is significant?

I fully expect to see articles blaming consumers for not spending enough within a month or two. Telling people that they should stop worrying about “fearmongering” and that “the economy is doing great” so therefore they should just spend all their money on plastic bullshit instead of silly things like rent and food.

I swear they have an article like this every year.