Sell, Sell, Sell!

The reason why I repeat the same word three times in the title isn't because I think you didn't get it the first time. It's not because I wanted to portray frantic trading on the stock market floor. No, it's because just selling once isn't enough if you want to be successful under capitalism.

There's just no way that a capitalist economy doesn't turn into a consumerist economy. Competition and growth compel entrepreneurs to sell more than the competition and more than you, the consumer, needs. Ultimately, under capitalism products aren't made to satisfy needs and not to last. Contrary to the popular belief that the forces of competition and markets lead to better products, this competition leads to worse products, intentionally made to wear our, to become obsolete. It's a widely accepted strategy in economics and industrial design to produce products with an artificially limited useful life or a purposely frail design, so that it becomes obsolete after a certain pre-determined period of time after which it needs to be replaced. Why sell something only once, when you can sell it two, three or even more times? This is called planned obsolescence, and has culminated in the sale of stuff as a subscription.

This started long ago with William Painter, who invented the crown cork, a bottle cap that can't be reused. King C. Gillette was inspired by Painter, when he was a salesman for the Crown Cork Company, to invent the disposable razor. If you want to become rich, argued Painter, you have to make a product that keeps the customer coming back for more. We're perfectly able to produce refrigerators, washing machines, stoves, cars and so on, that last a lifetime, or that are easy to repair by replacing parts. Now you know why your iPhone and other mobiles are sealed shut, and don't come with an easily replaceable battery anymore, and why the charger for your previous mobile doesn't fit your new one.

The other strategy to sell, sell, sell, is advertising. Capitalist enterprises don't spend billions of dollars on research to improve their products in any meaningful way. They do spend those billions on finding new ways to sell you more of the same, and hire entire armies of psychologists to attack your mind and prey on your most fundamental human needs. They've found ways to associate your need to be loved, recognized, your need to have meaningful relationships and so on, with their products. Are you not happy? With our product you will be! We've reached a point where we're attacked from every corner, with all the TV commercials, billboards and targeted online ads, there's no escaping this onslaught of our psyche to make us want more.

Capitalism and capitalists don't care what this does to our mental health or the health of the environment. When I say that everything, down to our very survival on this fragile blue planet, is made subservient to the demands for growth and profit, I'm not exaggerating. Everyone who spends more than a few seconds thinking this over knows that this is built into the very foundation of this socioeconomic system. But not many are ready to follow that up with the obvious conclusion: we can't make capitalism better. This is all we get. Without profits and growth the system does not work. We can't improve capitalism, we have to abolish it entirely. That's the part most people don't want to hear, but it's true, I'm sorry. There's a beautiful article on how we're the only species that doesn't put its own survival first: Capitalism is killing the planet – it’s time to stop buying into our own destruction. I recommend you read it in full, but I'll close this post with its opening:

There is a myth about human beings that withstands all evidence. It’s that we always put our survival first. This is true of other species. When confronted by an impending threat, such as winter, they invest great resources into avoiding or withstanding it: migrating or hibernating, for example. Humans are a different matter.

When faced with an impending or chronic threat, such as climate or ecological breakdown, we seem to go out of our way to compromise our survival. We convince ourselves that it’s not so serious, or even that it isn’t happening.
_{source: The Guardian}

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