Thread: Consumerism / Materialism

Originally Posted by Carôusoul

Misssingg thee pointtttttttttttt

I'm with Xaqaria on this one, I think its you who missed the point! I agree with Luanne

Well our modern free-market based societies are all based on materialism. It forces us to become and stay materialistic. Surely our societies are modelled after our desires.

And material desire to some extent is nececairy for survival. (House, Food, Cattle, Land, Crops)

The way I see it, is that people just totally lost all perspective and lost themselves in the extremes of materialism. Materialistic desire has gone stampede and turned into obsession.
And having modelled our societies after that compulsive, out of control desire; greed, we now have ended up in a sort of Catch 22 where the system keeps forcing and shaping people to stay in this imbalanced, materialistic state.

Yes we innitially shaped our system, but we became materialistically obsessed and this obsession has made us a slave of our own device. Our system.

The system we people forged from unbalanced minds(Greed, Lust of power, and the resulting ignorant tunnelvision) and now generation after generation is being forged and shaped by this out of control system.

It's like a downward spiral. A circle of destructive behaviour and suffering.
It's mankinds bad habbits that are troublesome to break, because they've become so deeply conditioned into our minds.

If we are to break free from this behaviour we are to go to the core: Our minds. And we are to decondition our minds. Get rid of all these destructive beliefs, thoughts and feelings that are the cause of our destructive behaviour.

Originally Posted by juroara

I'm with Xaqaria on this one, I think its you who missed the point! I agree with Luanne

What luanne said was missing the point that Xei was trying to get across to here. It wasn't relevant to what he was saying. In that sense she missed his point.

Xei's point was about everything being fulfilled, so I would have imagined he meant everywhere explored as well. Because the point was just that everything has been done. It's a hypothetical situation.

Wow... it's like a feeding frenzy in here!!

I'm a little afraid to say anything... somebody might jump all over my case...

But what the hell, here goes anyway ---



My personal solution to the materialist/consumerist merry-go-round most people seem to thrive on:


Rather than get a high-stress job with loads of prestige and money so you can afford a better car and a bigger house, I prefer to live a pretty humble life, making enough to pay the bills plus do what it is I love to do.

Which is stop motion animation. Wait... this is not completely irrelevant. See, the money s just to support the art... (not just hobby.. art). The art feeds the soul. Coming up with stories, and making stuff and filming it etc takes a lot of time and effort... it fills the hours where most people just watch TV or whatever... and gives a sense of direction and purpose. Live for art, do art to live. Prestige doesn't enter into it.

Damn... hope I'm not bleeding into the water anywhere....

Originally Posted by Darkmatters

See, the money s just to support the art... (not just hobby.. art). The art feeds the soul. Coming up with stories, and making stuff and filming it etc takes a lot of time and effort... it fills the hours where most people just watch TV or whatever... and gives a sense of direction and purpose. Live for art, do art to live. Prestige doesn't enter into it.

Yeah, that's exactly what I was saying (when I was evidently trying to impress the troll ); we live in a material world, almost everything requires money. But there is a difference between buying a new mobile phone that has one extra feature which you simply need to have, and buying a piano for the purpose of playing it.

Originally Posted by Luanne

As I wrote that to impress you?! Seriously?

Originally Posted by Luanne

Yeah, that's exactly what I was saying (when I was evidently trying to impress the troll );.

To assume such a thing that would imply I have an interest in you. I assure you, that is not the case. But, to answer your question:

Why don't you believe Idolfan? What is so hard to believe?

I don't believe Idolfan, because people who say they don't love money or possessions are just lying to themselves. You may not literally love money like you love a spouse, but you like to have it in order to acquire possessions that make you feel comfortable. If someone came into your house and stole your possessions you would undoubtedly be pissed off and want them back. Luckily, this void would be filled by more money, and more possessions. If he or anyone else who claims such a thing really didn't care about money or possessions they wouldn't go to school or get a job; they wouldn't have any interests or hobbies (because those generally cost money). Money also buys food and I don't see how anyone could not love food it's basically an instinctive love to ensure survival Since food is dependant on money you essentially love the money that gets you food.