Thanks :)
What scares me most about advertising is that I am myself susceptible to it.
I walked down the street yesterday on a microdose of LSD and was acutely aware of the profound effect all the different billboards were having on my deep subconscious. Usually this would have been sub-perceptual.
Although I was not necessarily being drawn to buy any particular items, I was aware that I was being fed a cruel diet of fantasy landscapes and people that (had I not been on a microdose) would have contributed to a dull pervasive sense of being "not good enough" or needing something "more" to fulfil me.
Then, like many people I would probably have bought something to temporarily fill the hole amplified by the imagery.
One objective of advertising is to create anxiety.
I feel it's not just the enticement to purchase a specific item that makes advertising abusive, but also the idealisation of people and environments; the constant implication that we are incomplete and a product (any product) can complete us.
Ugh yes I agree. Materialism is so annoying, many people seem to feed on it.
I am also very surprised at how little people care about reviews.
"Oh look new Iphone, it costs 800$+ so it must be the best!"
"Oh look, headphones by Dre, they cost 3x more than regular ones so they must be the best!"
They don't realize what marketing is and its effects on making something that is the same as something else look better in your eyes and mind.