Rampant mass consumerism is so evil. Hey, can I have a sip of that Frappucino?

Consumer culture is a hideous thing. Yes, it is currently extending its massive tentacles all over the globe, making sure that people in developing countries know that they too need sneakers manufactured by their own children at 10 cents an hour. Making sure than war-torn nations know they need to eat their Wheaties so that they can build strong healthy bones (which are more resistant, I'll have you know, to landmines).

Yes, consumer culture is insidious. Certain advertising campaigns champion individualism by assembling a gaggle of attractive young people, (making sure of course to represent every racial or ethnic group ever conceived of), all arrayed in the same plain-front khakis and V-neck stretch cardigans. Singing the same song. With faces that have had every hint of expression pounded out of them with a meat-cleaver. Yes, the Gap is a propaganda machine for some fascist state soon to emerge...

Yes.

I agree.

Now shut the fuck up.

It's either that, or action.

You have a few choices. You can use a home-made pipe bomb to dislodge a large mobile piece of corporate art so that it trashes a franchise coffee bar. Please do this. A part of me would love to see it happen in the real world.

However, not all of us can afford to get arrested.

So, instead, stop buying these products. Do not feed the animals. Do not shop at Gap or Banana Republic or Abercrombie and Fitch. Do not patronize Starbucks or McDonalds. Boycott Exxon, Sunoco and the like. Do this.

Do something. Despite the fact that it's inconvenient. Despite the fact that your actions aren't going to bring these institutions down. Do something that will make you less comfortable. Perhaps then I will have the patience to listen to your condemnations of consumerism.

Coffy's suggestions are good. But here are a few of my own:

• Patronize local small businesses, even though prices may be higher and selection may be less. When you do so, money circulates in the immediate community instead of being locked up in the bank account of a corporate behemoth. Remember that money is the lifeblood of any corporation.
• Work out arrangements with your neighbors to take care of your mutual needs together. By pooling your money and other resources, you can do interesting things like buying staple food at wholesale quantities from local farmers or farmers' markets, or watching each other's houses instead of installing expensive alarm systems.
• Use less stuff. Buy less stuff. Shop with a critical, suspicious eye.
• Sell your television. Or shoot it.
• If you are extremely ambitious, for about $6000 you can buy a house and a decent-sized plot of land in Oklaholma. Of course, your average noder knows about as much about farming as a cow knows about noding, but it's still possible. With a good artesian well and solar panels (or simply learning to live without electricity) you can go off-grid entirely.

Every dollar NOT spent in Walmart is a drop of water NOT poured down that sewer.
People can, and do, vote with their feet.
How many of you still have cable tv?

A very small number of people can make a small difference because, at least in America, numbers matter.

Remember New Coke? How about divx?

OK, let's get to work.

Shanghai became a fanatical Maoist stronghold, no doubt a backlash of the capitalist excesses prior to 1949. Collectivism was installed here much more rigorously than the rest of China, the rapid deconstruction of consumerist society caused an overnight collapse of the regional economy. Money itself was removed, in its place were "goods coupons", which could be exchanged for (inferior) consumer goods. There was no consumer choice, everything was government issue. Shanghainese left their home in a mass exodus in the early 50's, many went to Hong Kong, some went to America.

Incidentally, some stores retained their consumerist traits, but they were patrolled by armed guards, and only the communist elite were allowed to shop in its glitzy grounds.

The 1980's brought about an economic restructuring. Consumerism rushed back into Shanghai, overnight there were massive shopping malls for the common people. Like an opiated mass, the Chinese people gleefully subjected themselves to consumerism. They embraced consumer culture and everything else that goes with it. While Americans were mourning the loss of their culture to the monster that is consumerism, the long deprived Chinese were plunging headfirst into it while a smile on their faces.

What does this mean? Not much. Just that Americans have had the privilege of capitalism for so many decades, they will never know how it would be to live in another system of government, say communism. People dissatisfied with capitalism should give some serious thought about the execution of its alternatives in history. Incidentally, and this is in all honesty, every single person I've ever met who is not satisfied with capitalism has never lived under anything else other than capitalism.

Every time I meet an American who rambles about the evils of capitalism, I have to think, "You fool. You should be glad you live in a capitalist society. I know 1 billion of my countrymen would die to live in a place like this." Consumerism may be ugly sometimes, but the alternatives are all much, much worse.

There I go again. Look. To the anti-capitalists out there, the next time you start to ramble about the evils of Americana, just give this a thought. Be glad you live in the greatest nation on Earth, because admit it, capitalism made it the way it is today.