Alienation in the Post Cold War Era
Chapter 8
The Market Personality Today:
The Further Transformation of Human Beings Into Things
(page 11)
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The Mass Media, Busyness and Alienation
The mass media have learned how to take advantage of the alienation that comes from extreme busyness when they manipulate people for the benefit of the elite and its profits. The Economist magazine is one media source that is oriented toward the elite, and thus tends to be quite honest about what is going on under the surface, because the rich do not need to be coddled about the hard truths of capitalism. In a 1998 article on the news media, the Economist explained how the “news” and entertainment industry has used the ultra-busy personality of the 1990s directly to its advantage. The Economist first complains that busy people cannot focus on televised news, or more importantly, on the commercials between news segments:
“They [people] can no longer be relied on to sit down to the evening news. ‘When I was growing up my parents came home from work, had dinner at half past five and watched the news at six,’ says John Moody, vice president of Mr. Murdoch’s Fox News, an arm of the group that will be partially floated later this year. ‘I don’t know anybody in my neighborhood who has that regular a life.’ ”[15]
Busy, stressed-out people have no desire to watch serious news programs, which show the irrational and rotten nature of world politics, and how people suffer because of it. The newest trend on “news” programs is to marginalize national and world events and focus on fluff pieces that entertain and titillate. Socially and politically responsible news is too risky today for the ruling elite that controls the mass media. Not only can this elevate the deep anxiety of the market personality to consciousness, it can also re-politicize people in the West, after several decades of de-politicization by the ruling elite
Thus, the mass media taps right into people’s anxiety. Instead of serious news programs that cover what is really going on in the world, the media tends to focus more on “entertainment” news about lifestyle, with the message that “the people on your screen are doing fine, so you cannot be doing that badly.” The Economist explains that:
“A quick look at some BBC news programs from 20 years ago shows more facial hair and more foreign coverage. Certainly, in those days ITN would not have reported India’s nuclear test after the commercial break, following a story about a man in the Amateur Swimming Association. . . . The number of political reporters is shrinking and the number of consumer-affairs correspondents growing. . . . The way stories are covered is also changing. The new fashion in America, which is seeping into Britain, is “news you can use.” This means stories that are about you: how you are being ripped off, or how you can improve your life.”[16]
The same trend exists in the US. If the testing of a nuclear bomb that can kill millions is treated as no more important than the commercial break and the man in the Amateur Swimming Association, what does such TV coverage do for human sensitivity about our life and the planet? It dulls it, as it transforms human experiences to just another item for sale. Everything, including life and death, is just another product for sale. The news media do not treat people’s lives — their joys, pains, and tragedies — with humanity and sensitivity. The media’s main criterion is rather how sellable the story is and how it benefits the people in power who control the media. Thus, war, human suffering, the destruction of the environment, the irrational way in which the people in power treat each other and rest of humanity — all of these are treated like any other marketable commodity. The human value of the news only equals its sale value.
Since the market personality needs constant distraction to avoid the pain underneath the veneer, it is no longer sufficient just to raise a person’s psychological “blood sugar” level. Each sugar dose must have a slightly different taste and color to keep the person distracted. It must keep pace with the “busy” lifestyle and the growing pain behind it. Hence the news has to be shorter, and the number of TV channels must increase, to keep the market personality’s anxiety under control.
Thus, the fast pace of television coverage must correspond to the fast track psychology of restless TV viewers. According to the New York Times, the news industry is under great pressure to pack more news into the world of anxious people, in the shortest possible time. The news on the TV screen must run faster and faster, for people to focus:
“Nigel Baker, head of news operations for APTN in London [said that] ‘Five years ago, people had a hope for same-day pictures. Now they expect same-hour, if not same-minute, pictures.’ ”[17]
One quick flicker of news must follow the other, without depth, and then on to the next commercial and the next story. Serious in-depth reports that examine how people really live and feel under the surface are not allowed. They would only disturb the false sense of security derived from the ever-increasing busyness, which can be stated as follows: “I don’t have to face my real feelings and the meaning of my life. I only need to flip to the next activity, the way I flip through the dozens of TV channels.” Stopping and dwelling too long on how one really experiences oneself can only elevate the deep insecurity and anxiety of today’s market personality to an intolerable level.
The rapid pace of news reports, and the treatment of news as a product for sale, lowers the ability of the market personality to focus on events seriously. It reinforces the rest of the social conditioning that creates a shallow person with an eclectic mind. The introduction of dozens of new TV channels every year further fortifies the market personality’s short psychological attention span for social and political matters of grave importance. This is so because he/she treats political events of grave historical importance as just another thing to consume and discard, to be replaced later by “new” stimuli.
The development of an extremely shallow market personality who needs a constant “change” of news, amusements, and consumption of “events” has an adverse effect on all the social and political foundations of our society. Such a personality renders the process of “democracy” and objective dialogue meaningless, because objective thinking and reasoning are virtually absent. Participation in a rational dialogue requires a person who experiences herself as a human being with an authentic self, one that is independent from the pressure of the conformist majority and the political machines that control it.
The commercialization of social and political life is inseparable from the commercialization of our personal lives, which is also exploited by the media. The deeper the level of people’s anxiety and aloneness, the easier it is for the mass media to exploit it by running stories about “you” and “your” life, and what you can buy or “do” as a consumer to feel comfortable. Deeper human feelings, such as trust and compassionate humanity, are treated as features of a commercial product, as the following comment from the Economist illustrates:
“There is nothing wrong with treating news as a product for sale; but you must treat it carefully, because it contains ingredients like trust and decency that spoil easily.”[18]
The mass media can manipulate people’s thirst for such feelings successfully because they are becoming increasingly rare in real life. Trust and decency become ingredients like any other commodity. They have a high “exchange value” because they can be sold as “human interest stories” to fill in the void of people deprived of human trust and love. When deep human feelings such as trust, decency, and love become a commodity like fruit that can spoil easily, human life ceases to be human. The essential dilemma of market-personalities is that they must either regain their humanity or watch it be diminished as they are further transformed into things.
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[15] Economist, July 4, 1998.
[16] Ibid.
[17] The New York Times, Oct. 12, 1998.
[18] Economist, July 4, 1998.