Ways of Seeing by Berger: Buying happiness
There is an underlying theme in this book. Whether we like it or not, living in this age means inevitably consuming a tsunami of images every day. Whether it be through publicity, social media or entertainment.
This was relevant to the first post I wrote about the reproduction of images and the violation of the sanctity of art. It was also relevant to the second post I wrote about the consumption of media cultivating the objectification of human bodies. There is a theme to this pervasive media exhibition. What is its purpose? Why is it happening? Why does our culture generate so much media?
The answer is tied to capitalism. John Berger explains.
It’s the Free World, remember?
Okay… but what makes it so free? The freedom to spend? What is so free about a world of capital that teaches us to accumulate more in order to attain happiness. The most poignant aspect of this issue is questioning how does advertising work? Why is it that capitalism is so successful? How am I so convincingly influenced into purchasing objects that I don’t need, making me objectively poorer as a result of parting with my money?
In answering this question, Berger draws us back to imagery and art, thereby coming full circle at the end of the book. We return to the discussion of the objectification of human bodies. Now we understand that media turns whole people into objects. It uses individuals who are presented as ‘transformed’ through material attainment and who are therefore enviable.
The state of being envied is what constitutes glamour. And publicity is the process of manufacturing glamour.
Publicity works because it offers the consumer an image of themselves “made glamorous by the product it is trying to sell”. It plays on our animalistic desire for pleasure. It subordinates us as humans. The unaware consumer comes out the other end being envious of this image of themselves as they might be. Because the consumer envies the person depicted in the advertisement, they implicitly assume that they themselves would be envied by others if they were in the person’s shoes. This is what motivates consumption.
The happiness of being envied is glamour
Publicity works in that it encourages the constant deferral of happiness into the future. The consumer herself ensures the credibility of publicity by relating it to her fantasies and this all works smoothly within the context of a society which values individualism and promotes the pursuit of happiness as a universal right.
Consumption is a disguise for the elements of true democracy which have not been attained. Through the use of publicity, consumers are tricked into feeling that they are ‘free’ and it therefore is the living force of our capital culture.
