The Things You Carry

Spending and God

OK, time to tick everybody off. How does anticonsumerism relate to the big G-O-D?

Religion is a contentious issue, but I’ll try to keep it light by putting a picture of handsome actor George Peppard somewhere in the entry.

This isn’t my issue. Matters of faith aren’t under my purview - I blog about buying stuff. But a quick Google search of “consumerism” and “God” shows that the folks behind almost 1.6 million Web pages think the two topics are linked in some way (assuming a lot of those sites aren’t the ones where people put down every word in the English language to increase hits). There’s even a movie coming out about it.

A recent column in the Seattle Post-Intelligencer goes so far as to say consumerism is becoming a religion itself. Faith columnist Anthony B. Robinson makes some interesting, thought-provoking points in the column, titled “Consumerism is a greedy society’s religion.”

Here’s part of the article:

“Is it too much to suggest that consumerism has become a kind of alternative faith, a religion of sorts? Religions are characterized by some vision of a good life, by their rituals and by a particular language. Consumerism seems to be developing all three apace.”

I’m not sure I buy that, so to speak. It’s a very broad definition of religion there. It could describe being a Notre Dame fan.

Besides, religions usually try to explain the nature of existence - both what it means for something to exist (ontology) and what the universe is (cosmology). Consumerism doesn’t, so I don’t think Robinson is really on the ball saying it’s a religion. But he does bring out a lot of interesting comparisons.

Across the country from Robinson, Penny Villegas wrote a column in the Orlando Sentinel that talks more about values than religion. It’s coming from the perspective of the economic stimulus plan to keep us out of recession by giving Americans more money to shop with.

Here’s, in part, what Villegas wrote:

“As capitalism slipped into consumerism, our values slipped. At one time, we had values that weren’t monetary. As little as 50 years ago we valued savings, honesty and loyalty. Companies valued their workers, rewarding long years of service with the proverbial gold watch. As consumerism morphed into materialism, we became developers and not stewards of the Earth.”

I think it might be a little naive view of history (strike-busters, anyone?) but the basic theme contained in the title “Shopping won’t save us,” is at the very least interesting. Food for thought, no?