Consumerism's Role in Shaping Progress

Consumerism’s Role is Shaping Progress The drive necessary to create newer, more effective technology is within all human beings. It is a yearning to make life easier, to change the lives of many with a single object or idea, and to succumb to progressive impulse. Inventions like the wheel, printing press, telephone, automobile, and lightbulb, were each created by men with admirable ambition, as their products have significantly altered the day-to-day lives of their posterity. However, the progress that shaped these inventions has recently been reformulated. Progression no longer means creating mechanisms that will better human life. It means producing merchandise that will sell well, even if it lacks the cutting-edge aspect of its predecessors; a blanket with sleeves, for instance, gains popularity every day. It means fueling the consumeristic society of the present, feeding the infinitely hungry customers that cry out for the “next best thing.” Marketers convince the masses that every new commodity will change the world, indubitably supporting the idea that progress continues in perpetuity. Those living currently, then, must always represent the pinnacle of society. But how can this be true? Are oversized bathrobes really the best this world has ever had to offer? Of course not. Egotistical conclusions that consistently place present-day society at the forefront will not generate genuine progression. Therefore, in order to return progression to its original formula, we must remove the blindfold of consumption that has left us in the dark for so long. To fully comprehend the instability of contemporary progress, it is necessary to analyze true progression in its finest forms, starting with the wheel. A product so ancient that its origins are uncertain, the wheel redefined what it meant to travel. To limit its uses only to transportation, though, would do it a great injustice. Tens of thousands of other inventions depend on the wheel to function. These