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Academic Writing Sample:
Ritualizing Consumption
To be a member of modern industrialized society is to be a consumer. More so
than any other cultural act, consumption constitutes our identities and pervades nearly all
aspects of personal and social life. While ubiquitous, consumption is also a response to
specific and historically variable conditions brought about by modern sociopolitical
structures. The conditional nature of such structures implies that resultant social trends
are equally subject to shifts in cultural and political values. The factors that make
consumption a valued cultural ritual can be more effectively met through participation in
meaningful, satisfying activities that foster cultural cohesion.
Hope Through Nihilism
To assume that consumer culture is an inevitable manifestation of intrinsic human
greed is to ignore the metaphysical and sociopolitical factors that fuel consumption. The
experience of the modern individual is enmeshed in the social structures of contemporary
society, and thus cannot be empirically viewed as an example of human experience
across cultures and throughout history. I would argue that the characteristic materialism
and complacency that act as catalysts for consumerism result from a sense of social,
political, and spiritual impotency on the part of individuals who are barred from
participating in the creative aspects of culture. In other words, the pervasiveness of
consumption does not result from inherent greed and selfishness, but from the desire to
fulfill basic needs and the hopelessness that those needs cannot be fulfilled.
Thus emerges the problem of cultivating hope in the face of existential
hopelessness. Environmental/political writer Rebecca Solnit characterizes hope as giving
one's self to the future, thus making the present inhabitable (5). Hope stems from "a

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darkness as much of the womb as of the grave." To hope is to balance on the edge
between symbolic birth and death, to assert existential freedom as well as the recognition
of infinite variability.
Solnit’s description of dual-natured hope resembles Nietzsche’s concept of
nihilism. Nihilism for Nietzsche was a response to the inevitable contradiction of the
'Christian-Moral' worldview: a will to truthfulness that eventually finds its metaphysical
foundation to be untrue. This realization culminates in the onset of metaphysical
uncertainty, the death of God. Modern individuals are thrust into a central antagonism in
that we are "not to esteem what we know, and not to be allowed any longer to esteem the
lies we should like to tell ourselves" (10). That is, we are so frightened by the sudden
realization that we are masters of our own reality—instead of subject to the omnipotent
paternal figure on whom we previously relied—that we are temporarily barred from
social and moral agency. For Nietzsche, nihilism in its most positive form is a coping
stage, a mourning period in which we pine for the metaphysical certainty of unconscious
devotion to divine will. This stage can be a path into despair and further existential
paralysis, or it can be the jumping-off point for engaging in the creation of a
transformative, emancipatory, and participatory reality.
Solnit points to the collapse of the Soviet Union as an example of such
metaphysical agency. She writes, “By acting as if they were free, the people of Eastern
Europe became free.” That is, rather than continuing to accept the imposition of control
from repressive government, they simply rejected it in favor of social and political
autonomy. Of course, in the example of the collapse of the Soviet bloc, political
conditions made the situation ripe for this kind of cultural self-assertion. Soviet citizens

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responded to Mikhail Gorbachev's revocation of the Brezhnev Doctrine, an act that
essentially undermined the Soviet contention of socialism as a self-evident ideology and
instead adopted policy in favor of glasnost, or openness.
While the collapse of the Soviet bloc could not have occurred without these
favorable conditions, the contention that modern society is unripe for similar
sociopolitical shifts relies on the fallacy of metaphysical determinism. Our inability to
visualize similar possibilities in the current sociopolitical climate is due to the fact that
we are only made aware of such potential retrospectively, through the eventful
manifestation of that potential and its incorporation into history.
Nihilism presents a paradox in that it invites us to dismantle it through the
realization of that potential, to presuppose sociopolitical timeliness as a constant and
inevitable possibility. Society is always on the cusp of change, whether we as members of
society are conscious of it or not. This perpetual state of possibility is requisite for drastic
shifts—in politics, in society, in our metaphysical awareness. It requires a response. The
misconception lies in our failure to realize that we are constantly responding, whether
with action or inaction, consciousness or unconsciousness. We can—as we have in the
past—succumb to the trap of perpetual nihilism, what Solnit calls ‘obsession with the
enemy’, and thus fail to recognize the possibility for emancipatory—as opposed to
nonparticipatory—change. Conversely, we can utilize the opportunity that nihilism
presents as a tool to transcend itself, to fuel a shift toward existential, sociopolitical, and
personal actualization.
Consumption as a Nihilistic Response
Nietzsche presents three characteristic forms of nihilism: passive, active, and what

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is described by Simon Critchley as ‘armchair nihilism’ (83). The first involves a
conscious but pessimistic acceptance of a “void” in one’s metaphysical beliefs, which
results in the affirmation of that void through superficial asceticism or spiritual practice.
Nietzsche somewhat maliciously called this form of nihilism “European Buddhism.” The
second manifestation of nihilism involves what Nietzsche characterized as the
“expression of physiological decadence” in response to the metaphysical void—i.e.
destructive acts and “wildly creative terrorism” as an affirmation of that void. The third
form of nihilism involves a “general cultural mood of weariness, apathy, exhaustion and
fatigue.” Nietzsche expresses this in Will to Power as the ‘theory of exhaustion’. He
writes, “modern society is no ‘society,’ no ‘body’…a society that no longer has the will
to excrete” (32). A similar sentiment was reflected by British Prime Minister Margaret
Thatcher when she said there is no such thing as society, but only a collection of
individuals. These individuals are disempowered through their social fragmentation, their
lack of community, and their inability to change their circumstances. In this regard,
nihilism provides the metaphysical conditions necessary for consumer culture to pervade.
These armchair nihilists may not have the energy to excrete or to create, but they
do have the energy to consume. In the midst of a fragmented metaphysical framework as
well as a splintered society, the nihilistic response of modern individuals manifests itself
through consumption. This response relies on market ideology as well as the creation—
through the elaborate psychological project of advertising—of consumer need.
From Mechanism to Commercialism
The modern cultural ideology of commercialism relies on the historically-
preceding metaphysical lens of mechanism. A mechanistic view requires the reduction of

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the whole to the sum of its parts, positing compartmentalization as an overarching theme.
One manifestation of the mechanistic reduction is the compartmentalization of theory, as
seen in professional specialization and the reluctance of the academic community to
engage in dialogue across disciplines. At the other end of this hierarchical spectrum is the
compartmentalization of sensory subjects and objects, i.e. consumers and consumer
goods. Taking the reductionist metaphor to its logical extreme, all members of society,
from corporations to individuals, are mechanisms of the market. From this emerges the
common acceptance of the analogy of the mind as a computer that mechanically
processes information created, selected, and inputted by an external source. This reliance
on an externally imposed source of information is an essential aspect of the
reductionist/mechanistic worldview.
Mechanism relies on the assumption of hierarchy, the ranking of parts, to
function. It shares this assumption with monotheism, postulating an omnipotent divinity
in both metaphysics—as in Aristotle’s “unmoved mover”, Descartes’ clockmaker of the
universe—as well as the market—as in Adam Smith’s invisible hand. Thus, the market is
the economic manifestation of the mechanized worldview whereas patriarchal
monotheism is its religious counterpart.
“Idleness is the enemy of the soul”
Complement to the mechanistic worldview is the modern conception of time.
Economist Jeremy Rifkin identifies the origin of our concept of labor time in the idea of
the hourly schedule, which he argues is the source of a revolutionary shift in the historical
perception of time. Originating with the Catholic Benedictine order, “schedule time”
subverted the earlier use of calendar time, a framework developed to coincide with

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natural cycles (e.g. lunar shifts, seasons, etc). Whereas calendar time is based on the
commemoration of past events, both actual and mythical, scheduled time divorces the
future from the past, effectively secularizing it. Rifkin writes that scheduling cultures “are
not interested in resurrecting the past, but in manipulating the future” (95).
The advent of the automated clock effectively synced and mechanized schedule
time, shifting Medieval society’s leisurely and sporadic pace from that based on
experiences, rituals, and natural processes to that based on abstract numbers to which
entire societies became oriented, even tethered, due to the proliferation of the technology
of mechanical clocks.
Eviatar Zerubavel, professor of sociology at Rutgers University, observes that the
Benedectines “helped to give the human enterprise the regular collective beat and
rhythms of the machine” (Rifkin 98). This mechanized view of the universe and human
enterprise is echoed in the dominant discourse of the Scientific Revolution, as in René
Descartes divine and detached “clockmaker”. Clocks and quantified time “became the
instrument of the merchants and factory owners to control the work time of their
laborers,” relying on workers’ destitution as well as disciplinarian tactics for its
implementation. Clock time was later incorporated by bourgeoisie society into all aspects
of life, becoming an effective socializing tool in homes, schools, and places of work.
Thus society was effectively oriented to hourly schedules and “the habit of industry”.
Clock time remained the dominant cosmological framework throughout the
industrial age. The clock served as a catalyst for both “reordering the time frame and the
temporal consciousness” of the period as well as the “metaphysics of the universe”
(Rifkin 59). This reordering served to legitimize and reinforce the reduction of

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individuals to units of labor to better serve the financial and social interests of the ruling
classes, and eventually the market. A secularization of the Benedictine order’s cardinal
rule—“idleness is the enemy of the soul”—could serve as the heading of the entire
industrial age as well as the emerging paradigm of globalized society.
The Emergence of the Consumer/Producer
As a result of the imposition of clock time as a socializing mechanism, individuals
in modern society have become members of an intrinsically economic culture. Our role in
the market is two-fold: we act as consumers of commodities as well as suppliers of
labor/time. Time becomes a commodity that we owe the market in order to sustain not
only a preconceived standard of living, but in some cases to sustain life. Bringing the
mechanistic/monotheistic analogy full-circle, we are born in original economic sin,
required to outsource the satisfaction of our basic needs through the selling of our
labor/time. In this sense, we are perpetually chasing a basic security that would otherwise
be readily supplied by functioning social institutions. We are not entitled to “a living”,
but must earn it through an almost religious allegiance to the market, to which we are
automatically indebted at birth.
Consumption emerges from this picture as a surrogate social ritual marketed as a
means of satisfying the psychological insecurity brought about by constantly
manufactured need. It is a self-perpetuating pseudo-solution imposed by market ideology.
Commercialism is the market counterpart to consumption: the former is required to
sustain the latter. It is the realm of commercialism, through the circuit of production,
distribution, and consumption, from which consumer desire to meet manufactured need
emerges, as well as the compulsion to sell our labor/time to meet those manufactured

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needs.
Consuming Goods: Magical, Spiritual, Ritual
Culture is no longer focused on directly meeting our needs through novelty,
creativity, community, and intimacy. Instead, as put by University of Mass, Amherst,
professor of communications Sut Jhally, culture has become an adjunct to consumerism.
It is a vehicle through which consumerism is made effective, and is only relevant to the
market insofar as it produces consumer need. Our social and emotional values are utilized
as advertising tools to create the illusion that products, and thus participation in the
market, can fulfill our needs. As Jhally puts it, advertising repackages our emotions and
sells them back to us.
The market co-optation of cultural values effectively renders those values relevant
only insofar as they are selling tools. In this sense, the values portrayed in advertisements
and media in general are phantom values: they are not actually realized either in culture
or the market. A diamond ring may evoke images of romantic love, fidelity, etc. but the
only value actually met through the purchase of the ring is a temporary aesthetic one. The
consumer confuses the purchase of a product, which has been transformed through media
into a symbolic representation of a social or psychological need (i.e. love,
companionship, community), with the acquisition of a tool that can satisfy those needs.
Cultural theorist Raymond Williams refers to this phenomenon as the “magic
system” whereby consumer goods are folklorically attributed with transcendent powers.
This illusion of consumer goods as “magical” objects can be attributed to the late-
capitalist social project of advertising, which Jhally refers to as an invention meant “to
make the dead world of ‘things’ come alive with human and social possibilities”.

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Psychologists Allen Kanner and Mary Gomes characterize corporate advertising as the
“largest single psychological project ever undertaken by the human race” (Roszak,
Gomes, and Kanner 77-91).
Advertisements rely on the perception that the product being advertised satisfies
some kind of desire, whether emotional, sensory, or both. This requires the dual
technologies of artistic creativity and an understanding of the psychological motives
driving human behavior. Rationally-based appeals for consumption have been abandoned
for more stylistic, emotional methods. Characterizing the emerging attitude of the
advertising industry, professor of media studies Stuart Ewen writes, “[s]tyling…must
speak to the unconscious, to those primal urges and sensations that are repressed in the
everyday confines of civilization. Like art, psychoanalysis was being evaluated as a ‘new
business tool’” (49). The synthesis of art and psychology became a strategy for
advertisers to tap into the emotional substrata of consumers.
A product that embodies the emotional, aesthetically-based motives for
consumption is Coca-Cola. Contemporary philosopher Slavoj Žižek calls Coke the “pure
surplus of enjoyment” in that it does not satisfy any need, even thirst. In fact, notes Žižek,
the more we drink, the thirstier we become. Referring to the 1982 coke slogan “coke is
it”, Žižek writes, “Coke is ‘it’ precisely insofar as it’s never IT, precisely insofar as every
consumption [of Coke] opens up the desire for more”. Coke is actually the non-thing,
pure image. When we buy coke, we buy a symbol, not a functional commodity that meets
our needs. Thus, we consume Coke simply for the sake of consuming, for the “beauty,”
or aesthetic appeal, of the experience.

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Meaning in the Face of Splintering Truth and the Metaphysical Void
The suppression of primal urges to which Ewen refers can be viewed as a
symptom of the Nihilist’s “metaphysical void”: the absence of unified structures of value,
community, and spiritual groundedness. Referring to Foucault’s conception of a “regime
of truth,” or the unified cultural narrative developed by dominant social institutions,
philosopher Judith Butler asserts that contemporary society’s cultural narrative is
increasingly splintered, leaving individuals without ethical direction (215).
The resulting lack of cultural foundation provides fertile ground for a nihilistic
response, specifically through the act of consumption. In the face of metaphysical
uncertainty and a lack of unified social structures, the advertising industry has effectively
created a mythic framework for the ‘armchair nihilist’ to take refuge in. That framework
includes, first and foremost, the role of the individual as a consumer, a view sanctioned
by social values and around which identities are built. The prevalence and consumer
emphasis on brands is an example of this. Individuals and groups increasingly associate
themselves with brand names as a means of expression and self-identification,
participating ritualistically, even religiously, in the consumption of goods. Social rituals,
including consumption, can be considered creative acts meant to constitute value and
meaning. Consequently, individuals engage in consumption to construct meaning where
other cultural institutions have failed to provide it.
Consumption as Pathology
Conspicuous, non-subsistence consumption is arguably the most consistent shared
behavior among citizens of industrialized nations. According to the World Watch

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Institute, 12% of the world’s population, living in North America and Western Europe, is
responsible for 60% of private consumer spending (“Consumer Class”). Such statistics
indicate that consumption activity, the vast majority of it recreational or non-essential,
has come to occupy a considerably important role not only in the economy but also in the
cultural identity and social interactions of the people in the First World. The political,
social, and environmental consequences of such widespread non-essential consumption
have been well-documented by institutions such as World Watch, situating consumption
as an ethical dilemma of central importance. While consumption may serve as a surrogate
for fulfilling certain social and psychological needs, it poses a simultaneous threat to our
well-being that cannot sustain itself.
Psychologist Allen Kanner argues that consumption serves as an artificial means
of emotional and psychological fulfillment, leading the consumer toward a sense of
never-ending need, want, and inadequacy. He also notes that materialism is often fueled
by subconscious fears of death related to the desire for structure and stability associated
with affluence. University of Arizona psychologixt Jeff Greenberg acknowledges the
function of consumption as a “secular religion” in a time of widespread loss of faith
(Kasser and Kanner). The language of both Kanner and Greenberg implies parallels
between consumption and existential/spiritual matters: anxiety about death, and the lack
of an authoritative religious structure to address it. From an existential understanding,
consumption has been adopted as a means to satisfy historically and culturally-specific
needs induced by the increasingly evident absence of unified social values in modern
society. In the language of psychology, consumption might be considered pathological.
The pathology of consumption is our attempt to provide a surrogate source of cultural

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unity where the method for doing so is wildly destructive and dysfunctional.
A New Source of Cultural Cohesion
It is necessary for an initiative that hopes to counter the negative environmental
and cultural impact of consumption to provide a superior substitute if such activity is to
be redirected toward more sustainable and psychologically healthy social patterns. In an
examination of ethical consumption practices, Hélène Cherrier provides a prototype for
an alternative social movement that defines its identity in response to the pervasiveness
of consumption; the voluntary simplicity movement, in which the acquisition of “stuff” is
traded for creative, participatory social activities (324). The increasing prevalence of
social trends like the voluntary simplicity movement implies a growing cultural
awareness as well as a decline in the acceptance of consumption as a source of emotional
satisfaction.
Alternatives such as the voluntary simplicity movement can serve as the basis for
a new cultural direction based in historical, cultural, and social awareness. Within such
movements is a response both to the environmental destruction and sociopolitical
consequences brought about by the prevalence of consumption, as well as the potential
for establishing an alternative lifestyle that can satisfy the cultural need for meaning
through engaging not with products, but with community.

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Bibliography
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Continental Philosophy (2002): 212–21.
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recognition.” Journal of Consumer Behaviour 6.5 (2007): 321-335.
Critchley, Simon. Continental philosophy: A Very Short Introduction. New York: Oxford
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Ewen, Stuart. All Consuming Images: The Politics of Style in Contemporary Culture. New York:
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Jhally, Sut. Advertising and the End of the World. Media Education Foundation: 1997, DVD.
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“The Rise and Spread of the Consumer Class.” World Watch. 15 Aug. 2008
<http://www.worldwatch.org/node/810#1>.
Žižek, Slavoj. "The Superego and the Act." European Graduate School. Switzerland, Leuk-Stadt.
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