An epidemic of stress, overwork, waste and indebtedness caused by dogged pursuit of the American Dream. Affluenza is a disease. Carefully researched psychological manipulation in the images and messages act mostly to reinforce commercialism and support new cases of affluenza among the young. We MUST consume. Students of advertising basically learn to manipulate consumer opinion and behavior so that the dollars will follow.
Truth often takes a back seat.
We are pounded daily, hourly, incessantly, by advertising messages, some of which you can see by shifting your eyes a bit to the left and then way over there to the right on these pages. Corporate predators literally force their messages upon us from all media, from the mail, from billboards, from e-mail spam, on the telephone, even from clothes, and on every other little piece of potential mindspace they can purchase. I don't know about you, but my mailbox brims every day with catalog after catalog from places that never benefit from my purchases. Still the catalogs keep coming. Come-ons from mortgage loan companies are camouflaged to look like notices from the government to trick you into opening the envelope.