Lead Us Into Temptation - Hardcover

Twitchell, James B.

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 0231115180 ISBN 13: 9780231115186

Publisher: Columbia University Press, 1999

Synopsis

Coke adds life. Just do it. Yo quiero Taco Bell. We live in a commercial age, awash in a sea of brand names, logos, and advertising jingles―not to mention commodities themselves. Are shoppers merely the unwitting stooges of the greedy producers who will stop at nothing to sell their wares? Are the producers' powers of persuasion so great that resistance is futile?

James Twitchell counters this assumption of the used and abused consumer with a witty and unflinching look at commercial culture, starting from the simple observation that "we are powerfully attracted to the world of goods (after all, we don't call them 'bads')." He contends that far from being forced upon us against our better judgment, "consumerism is our better judgment." Why? Because increasingly, store-bought objects are what hold us together as a society, doing the work of "birth, patina, pews, coats of arms, house, and social rank"―previously done by religion and bloodline. We immediately understand the connotations of status and identity exemplified by the Nike swoosh, the Polo pony, the Guess? label, the DKNY logo. The commodity alone is not what we are after; rather, we actively and creatively want that logo and its signification―the social identity it bestows upon us. As Twitchell summarizes, "Tell me what you buy, and I will tell what you are and who you want to be."

Using elements as disparate as the film The Jerk, French theorists, popular bumper stickers, and Money magazine to explore the nature and importance of advertising lingo, packaging, fashion, and "The Meaning of Self," Twitchell overturns one stodgy social myth after another. In the process he reveals the purchase and possession of things to be the self-identifying acts of modern life. Not only does the car you drive tell others who you are, it lets you know as well. The consumption of goods, according to Twitchell, provides us with tangible everyday comforts and with crucial inner security in a seemingly faithless age. That we may find our sense of self through buying material objects is among the chief indictments of contemporary culture. Twitchell, however, sees the significance of shopping. "There are no false needs." We buy more than objects, we buy meaning. For many of us, especially in our youth, Things R Us.

About this title

Review

Is consumerism a spiritual dead end? Isn't it true that mere things can never make us happy? Why, no, says James B. Twitchell, in a sequel of sorts to his popular Adcult USA. We are what we buy, says Twitchell, and we like what we buy. After food and shelter, the next step in the needs hierarchy is self-actualization--and in contemporary society, what better way to self-actualize than to co-opt the mojo of recognizable name brands? The semiotics of purchase are important, he argues: durable goods make us comfortable, provide us with a sense of security in an age when religion no longer works the way it was designed to. The new high priests are celebrities who hawk basketball shoes, cars, telecommunications infrastructures, Carnival cruises, cosmetics, nicotine patches, and medications. Shopping, in this sense, may even be the ultimate act of self-identification with the divine principle. Radical though it may be, the hypothesis of Lead Us into Temptation is strongly supported by the evidence. Never before has the science of selling been so well understood, the market's ability to measure consumer satisfaction so complete. Read Twitchell and weep--or better yet, go shopping. --Patrizia DiLucchio

Book Description

Twitchell embarks on an insightful, fearless, and funny exploration of two of the central themes of modern American culture―materialism and consumerism―and counters the notion of the "used and abused consumer" with an unflinching look at commercial culture, starting from the observation that "we are powerfully attracted to the world of goods (after all, we don't call them 'bads')."

About this edition

• Publisher: Columbia University Press
• Publication date: 1999
• ISBN 10: 0231115180
• ISBN 13: 9780231115186
• Binding: Hardcover
• Number of pages: 310