In defense of consumer society, against grey uniforms

[CyM]

The consumer drive for better products was something that clearly did not exist in the Soviet union, where articles meant for individual consumption were of a low grade and full of defects.

Of course, there are all the economic and political factors that led to the bureaucratic degeneration of the plan.

But I want to go a bit further. If we were to take power in an advanced capitalist country or series of countries, the question of what to do with "socialism with an iPad" as John McDonnell put it would be a central one.

Of course, we have to close the loop of production and recycling, but that's a discussion for a totally different thread.

Here I'm interested purely in discussing the question: is the consumer culture something that can and should continue in a different form under a planned economy.

In my personal opinion, the first thing to do to neuter the worst aspects of it is to ban product advertisement entirely. A flat out ban on commercial ads would get us away from the distopian brain washing that happens beginning at an early age with flashy commercials made by the more than 50% of psychology graduates who end up in marketing to know how to manipulate minds.

But once that is gone, we have to admit that the consumer has to play a role in planning.

If our plan is based solely on the input of workers as workers, then we only take into account the worker when he is not himself, but a tool for production (even if social). To capture the wants of the workers properly, we would need to take into account their desires in the other swing of the cycle, the one that matters the most: whenever they are outside work. When they are consuming for pleasure.

I've got more thoughts, but let's talk.

[Rafiq]

But once that is gone, we have to admit that the consumer has to play a role in planning.

Not only does the consumer have a role, he is the only role in such planning, and he is no longer a 'consumer' as such. Allow me to elaborate:

A Communist society is socially self-conscious. Those who constitute a communist society are like a Spartan ******* (to use a word with very, very bad connotations associated with it, politically). Organized, discipline, but this social formation's destiny is controlled by those constituting it. But one must remember the relation between knowledge and necessity to this end: We should not expect such a society to be so 'creative' with what it chooses (i.e. choosing to make the world a giant theme park dedicated to Star Wars, etc.).

A communist society does not resume processes of capitalist production, simply in a more efficient manner (in the beginning, it may be forced to do this - but under the backdrop of a cultural revolution). A Communsit society entails not only the political mobilization of the broad democratic masses, but also a huge transformation in consciousness, the emergence of new social rituals, norms, taboos. The great revolutionary Communist ritual will probably entail the destruction of consumer goods (money, etc.) en masse, for example.

What we have to remember is that consumer products in capitalism sell, and are wanted, because life under capitalism itself produces those wants. But it doesn't even stop there. People do not even want consumer goods anymore so much because of their sue value, but because buying an iphone, or an ipad, gives one access to the 'spirit of the times', makes you feel less alien, a part of something more. Zizek talks about how the transition from the sublime consumer object, to pure shit, waste, is exemplified in buying a cold plastic bottle of coca cola - once it becomes warm, it becomes waste, shit, it loses its sublime dimension. Capitalist consumerism is nothing more than the mass accumulation of new forms of waste. There is a religious dimension to the desiring of consumer goods, that is far beyond any practical use those goods provide people. So yes, this would disappear, and this woiuld be crushed, the petty pseudo-individualism with it, but that does not mean Communist life would be ascetic in nature. For asceticism refers to the suppression of what one is predisposed to. Not so in Communism.

What makes a socialist society 'tick', so to speak, would have to be entirely different - and my wager, nay, my assertion is that it is the endless contradiction between the human mind and the natural world that will drive society, that will be the soul of society. If we abandon this theoretical insight, we are condemned to face the very real problem that the Austrians have pointed out: the calculation argument. Something entirely different must make a socialist society move, tick, and why? The only way one could avoid this calculation problem is the assumption that capitalist society can be ossified and made static. Then one could rationally calculate and allocate resources, goods accordingly. But society is obviously not going to be static: What will drive these changes will not be the drive for profit, but the regular transformation of society by technological means, the unending contradiction between the mind and nature that will bring peoples to the far reaches of - at least - the solar system, we should hope. Therefore, the wants, and desires of the people in Communism will necessarily be determined by a rational process of regularly changing technical revolution. The contradiction between man and nature will never end. Capitalism itself has proven this. Marx talks about the 'general intellect' of capitalist society, which is commons - the privatization of general intellect has been the prime mover of technical revolutions, and the practical implementation of knowledge that was previously common, under capitalism.

So to answer very briefly: Neither consumer society nor asceticism will reign. But this postmodern 'individualist' consumer culture will not only fade in communism, it will be actively and swiftly crushed in any revolution - as a cultural revolution. Why? because it is a sham and an illusion. There is no such thing as consumerist individualism. Every consumer is a selfless, religious devotee to the idols of capital. It is not some crazy thing to say. In every and each social epoch, superstition and religious rituals reproduced society. They have simply become more complex in capitalism. Ours is the religion that will abolish all religion.

[Thirsty Crow]

But once that is gone, we have to admit that the consumer has to play a role in planning.

If our plan is based solely on the input of workers as workers, then we only take into account the worker when he is not himself, but a tool for production (even if social). To capture the wants of the workers properly, we would need to take into account their desires in the other swing of the cycle, the one that matters the most: whenever they are outside work. When they are consuming for pleasure.

Yeah, I don't think that's controversial at all. In fact, the consumer side of things is obviously the most important factor in planning production if we take the notion of directly social production for meeting needs and wants seriously. Of course, this doesn't mean that such wants ("consuming for pleasure") are solipsistic and completely open to being freely met without regard for other criteria, such as the cost of production for instance, measured in energy output terms (first thing that springs to mind) or any other criteria which is rationally and collectively put forward. Anyway, I see this as the basic mechanism of a potential communist mode of production.

As for this psychological aspect of so called consumerism, first thing that comes to mind is Fight Club actually. And sure, the mechanism of modifying the sense of self-worth and personal goals by means of status luxury commodities is reasonably expected to become a thing of the past once the infrastructure provided by the competitive social relations of production is itself transformed. It's reasonable to assume a massive cultural shift, perhaps also including a move towards a different kind of a normative (social) value system which would emphasis creative and cognitive practice (more akin to free play, at least concerning the creative). I also don't see any purpose at all to product ads in this context, apart from maybe some information provision about newly designed products (since there's no reason to assume innovation in production for pleasurable use will actually stop, or even slow down significantly with the abolition of capital; say a group of friends comes up with an idea for a new kind of flavored soda, why not give it a go and see how it turns out and whether other people will like it).

But here I think I'm straying too far into the "blueprints for the future" kind of thing.

I also think that a ritualistic destruction of consumer goods as part of a cultural transformation would border on ridiculous superstition-like attitude towards objects that may be useful for people. I can't see people smashing their fridges, ovens, computers en masse. At least I hope such a silly thing wouldn't be a matter of a newly established set of social norms, even as a ritualistic prelude.

[Vladimir Innit Lenin]

Consumer is currently a label that transcends class boundaries. The bourgeois consume bourgeois shit, and workers consume some bourgeois shit but mostly stuff that is necessary to survive, plus whatever we are hoodwinked into buying in the sales, or whatever looks shiniest (we all do it, it's a logical consequence of the advertising industry's immense presence in our society).

I would like to ask OP a question: would the very nature of the 'consumer' be radically altered in a socialist society where there is no capital, and therefore no capitalist and no worker? I ask because the 'ban on advertising' proposed in the OP seems like a policy for a socialist society that is a response to a problem that exists in current, capitalist society - namely that false hope of 'aspiration' through consumption is given to workers through ubiquitous advertising and marketing of shitty consumer products. Whilst the experience of the USSR and to an extent East Germany shows that the instinct to consume is likely to exist in any type of society to some extent, does the OP think it's possible that the extent to which this is the case could be lessened due to different, more revolutionary social attitudes in a socialist society?

[Guardia Rossa]

I would like a grey uniform please. Six of them are more than enough.

Perhaps one or two pretty ones for more special occasions, one or two more sturdy...

A jacket/coat/whatever for cold days.

You get it.

[John Nada]

We have the technology for communism today. The "calculations problem", inflexibility and supposed lack of innovation without destroying the environment and threatening people with poverty is bullshit. An economic model can't claim it's more effective if this efficiency and choices only reaches a small minority and requires a mountain of bodies daily.

Workplaces use computers to plan schedules, quotas and logistics. Stores can rather accurately predict shopping habits. Everything is already "centrally planned". Problem is this capitalist economic planning is geared towards the law of value. So rather than the production and distribution guided by need, it's for exchange value and profit.

I say production and distribution can function perfectly fine without using price and exchange value as a measurement of use value. It's the equivalent of measuring length by your foot, arm, hands and head, weight by pinches, handfuls and rocks, time by sunrises and moons, and fuel by logs of wood. It's imprecise, subjective and outdated. We can now measure the moles of atoms and the energy contained in everything. Yet for some reason consumption and production must be measured crudely and subjectively, according to the capitalist apologists.

No, I say capitalism only still exists due to inertia. The bourgeoisie are completely obsolete. Unfortunately they can't lay themselves off.
In my personal opinion, the first thing to do to neuter the worst aspects of it is to ban product advertisement entirely. A flat out ban on commercial ads would get us away from the distopian brain washing that happens beginning at an early age with flashy commercials made by the more than 50% of psychology graduates who end up in marketing to know how to manipulate minds.Why not reverse it? Have propaganda to exalt not buying shit and being lazy as fuck?:lol:

I was think that maybe all that effort put into marketing could instead go towards setting quotas.There also won't be a need for a massive police state using up computers and labor-power to spy on everyone here:). This also could go towards planned distribution too. It doesn't have to be an elite class of workers either, anymore than other types of jobs.There could still be democratic participation, possibly peer review of sorts in select fields, alongside monitoring consumption patterns.

[Rafiq]

I also think that a ritualistic destruction of consumer goods as part of a cultural transformation would border on ridiculous superstition-like attitude towards objects that may be useful for people. I can't see people smashing their fridges, ovens, computers en masse. At least I hope such a silly thing wouldn't be a matter of a newly established set of social norms, even as a ritualistic prelude.

I agree, totally, but one should not underestimate the 'poetic' dimension of revolutions, symbolic gestures with the whole world as the audience, etc. - It would be quite silly indeed if people started smashing things with real, necessary utility - I just mean that I can envision such rituals (which would focus less on 'traditional' utilitarian consumer goods like fridges, and more on things like sports cars, luxury brand apparel, even iphones) becoming popular. At the same time, perhaps that is quite a romantic thing, perhaps people will not have to do this. I just meant that this would be the kind of underlying attitude - renunciation of the sublime dimension of consumer goods in a complete way, to the point where you could smash them without feeling like... Less of a person.

I think another, equally effective means by which this would be done, is for example the artistic or creative use of waste. That is, once an object loses its 'sublime' dimension, no longer makes the consumer feel connected to those TV ads, etc. that made them feel a part of the spirit of the times, it is - rather than forgotten about and thrown away - used in a creative or artistic way - to assert the power of the revolutionary subject over the old idols, the faded, impotent company logos, symbols which no longer have any real power.

But I agree, we should not get ahead of ourselves here.

[Rafiq]

Whilst the experience of the USSR and to an extent East Germany shows that the instinct to consume is likely to exist in any type of society to some extent,

But these are poor examples for the simple reason that the GDR and the USSR never actually superseded capitalism, rather - they struggled to 'catch up' to it.

Consumer advertising had an effect on people in such states, because it had a real ideological context there (i.e. post-industrial modern society). The ultimate evidence is that these societies had a knack for simply copying western goods in their own fields of light production.

[ckaihatsu]

s the consumer culture something that can and should continue in a different form under a planned economy.


We would see the consumer culture being more *incidental* and *emergent* -- or 'authentic' -- rather than the practically 'top-down' quasi-planned (finance-capitalist) paradigm that it is today.





There is no such thing as consumerist individualism. [I]Every consumer is a selfless, religious devotee to the idols of capital


I would have hit the 'Thanks' button on your post, except for this part, which is just too *dismissive* of individual capacities and potentials for self-determination, such as it may be.... Even in a sea of present-day commodity fetishism there is still going to inevitably be a subset of the population that prefers to emphasize use-values over exchange-values, regardless of the dominant social paradigm.





I would like a grey uniform please. Six of them are more than enough.

Perhaps one or two pretty ones for more special occasions, one or two more sturdy...

A jacket/coat/whatever for cold days.

You get it.


This is the economic / material equivalent of *primitivism*, and is an insult to the human development of society, modernity, and civilization.





I say production and distribution can function perfectly fine without using price and exchange value as a measurement of use value. It's the equivalent of measuring length by your foot, arm, hands and head, weight by pinches, handfuls and rocks, time by sunrises and moons, and fuel by logs of wood. It's imprecise, subjective and outdated. We can now measure the moles of atoms and the energy contained in everything. Yet for some reason consumption and production must be measured crudely and subjectively, according to the capitalist apologists.


No *overall* disagreement, but this particular section is just *hyperbole* and *formalism* at best, since there's nothing inherently (or socially) wrong with the use of objectively accurate and precise units of measurements, like moles -- or inches, centimeters, etc.





In my personal opinion, the first thing to do to neuter the worst aspects of it is to ban product advertisement entirely. A flat out ban on commercial ads would get us away from the distopian brain washing that happens beginning at an early age with flashy commercials made by the more than 50% of psychology graduates who end up in marketing to know how to manipulate minds.


This line is understandable, but I think it also inadvertently serves as a smokescreen against any incidentally *positive* material developments that are the result of capitalist-paradigm dynamics -- (Would we have any argument *against* someone owning a smartphone, computer, etc.)





But once that is gone, we have to admit that the consumer has to play a role in planning.


On this topic I'll point to the already-pre-existing open-source social norm -- it's an ad-hoc, extra-exchange-value culture, though existing within the larger exchange-value capitalist paradigm, and is thus going to remain a subset to capitalist exchange-value economic norms.

The relevance here is that, within this limited scope, there are no exchange-value barriers to the complete interaction and interactivity among (free-software) consumers and (free-software) producers.





If our plan is based solely on the input of workers as workers, then we only take into account the worker when he is not himself, but a tool for production (even if social). To capture the wants of the workers properly, we would need to take into account their desires in the other swing of the cycle, the one that matters the most: whenever they are outside work. When they are consuming for pleasure.

I've got more thoughts, but let's talk.


I'll note that the communist goal / ideal is for there to eventually *never* be a reality in which the worker has to be 'a tool for production', because at that point everything -- humane, at least -- will be *automated*, so that consumption and social life would turn out to greatly overshadow any time at 'work', proper.

At *that* point any 'work' would be along the 'finer points' of social activity -- producing for *luxury*, in short -- across-the-board, universally.

[Luís Henrique]

In fact, the consumer side of things is obviously the most important factor in planning production if we take the notion of directly social production for meeting needs and wants seriously.

In a capitalist society, people are schyzophrenically divided into their worker personality (that reigns on them from 8 AM to 6 PM, Monday to Friday, eleven months per year) ant their consumer personality (that possesses them during evenings, weekends, and vacations).

I suppose that in a communist society, consuming and producing will cease to be polar opposites in such a weird relation. Starting with "consuming" being part of a "self-production" that needs no longer to be just the re-production of labour power. And continuing with "producing" being also a process of consuming one's energies and time in a pleasurable way.

Luís Henrique

[Thirsty Crow]

In a capitalist society, people are schyzophrenically divided into their worker personality (that reigns on them from 8 AM to 6 PM, Monday to Friday, eleven months per year) ant their consumer personality (that possesses them during evenings, weekends, and vacations).

I suppose that in a communist society, consuming and producing will cease to be polar opposites in such a weird relation. Starting with "consuming" being part of a "self-production" that needs no longer to be just the re-production of labour power. And continuing with "producing" being also a process of consuming one's energies and time in a pleasurable way.

Luís Henrique
Sure, but the underlying point, which I didn't manage to communicate properly, is that workers at the point of production shouldn't get to decide either the kind of products they're producing or their specification since this is contrary to society wide, planet wide in fact, planning for meeting needs and wants. This has to do primarily with consumer goods while the creation of the means of production might be somewhat different.

[Guardia Rossa]

This is the economic / material equivalent of *primitivism*, and is an insult to the human development of society, modernity, and civilization.

I thought running around naked was primitivism, well, I was debunked, wearing glorious grey uniforms is primitivism.

[ckaihatsu]

In a capitalist society, people are schyzophrenically divided into their worker personality (that reigns on them from 8 AM to 6 PM, Monday to Friday, eleven months per year) ant their consumer personality (that possesses them during evenings, weekends, and vacations).




I suppose that in a communist society, consuming and producing will cease to be polar opposites in such a weird relation. Starting with "consuming" being part of a "self-production" that needs no longer to be just the re-production of labour power. And continuing with "producing" being also a process of consuming one's energies and time in a pleasurable way.





Sure, but the underlying point, which I didn't manage to communicate properly, is that workers at the point of production shouldn't get to decide either the kind of products they're producing or their specification since this is contrary to society wide, planet wide in fact, planning for meeting needs and wants. This has to do primarily with consumer goods while the creation of the means of production might be somewhat different.


These two points get at the perpetual 'gray area' that is macro-to-micro and micro-to-macro: Will a post-capitalist society need *society-wide* (macro-to-micro) planning -- ? Of course.

And will that same society need to consistently empower the individual in the act of production (micro-to-macro) so that each person's own 'producing' also decisively contributes to *their own* 'self-production' -- ? Of course, as well.

Whether what's at-stake is producer goods or consumer goods, the overarching dynamic remains the same -- there has to be a balancing-out of the three distinct interests of liberated-labor, of consumers, and that of social administration.

Here's from my blog entry:





What's called-for is a system that can match liberated-labor organizing ability, over mass-collectivized assets and resources, to the mass demand from below for collective production. If *liberated-labor* is too empowered it would probably lead to materialistic factionalism -- like a bad syndicalism -- and back into separatist claims of private property.

If *mass demand* is too empowered it would probably lead back to a clever system of exploitation, wherein labor would cease to retain control over the implements of mass production.

And, if the *administration* of it all is too specialized and detached we would have the phenomenon of Stalinism, or bureaucratic elitism and party favoritism.




http://www.revleft.com/vb/blog.php?bt=14673


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I thought running around naked was primitivism, well, I was debunked, wearing glorious grey uniforms is primitivism.


Well, I'm using the term *elastically*, obviously.... I mean to indicate that a mass-abdication of decision-making over details of production -- like that of style for types of clothing -- is just ridiculous, as ridiculous as primitivism, since we're obviously more than capable of addressing such details and social (production) policy, at whatever scales necessary.

[Prof. Oblivion]

Consumer culture is a rather ridiculous concept to begin with. If you've learned anything about marketing, you know that consumers are very brand-dependent. Why? Because in a system where there are 200 different versions of the same thing, consumers need a way to navigate that and make a choice. In other words, branding is a great way to show the limitations of "free choice" in a capitalist society. Where we are so proud of having 200 versions of a product, in reality consumers only consider 2-4 brands as a purchase option. What does this mean? It means the consumer isn't really choosing between 200 hundred different versions of product but four. It essentially shows that consumers not only don't need so much choice, but that they can't even handle it.

Yes, it's definitely important to have multiple versions of one product in order to allow choice and determine what works best, so that you can set up an iterative system of improvement. But more than a couple choices is too much for people. They don't need it or want it, despite claims to the contrary.

[ckaihatsu]

Consumer culture is a rather ridiculous concept to begin with. If you've learned anything about marketing, you know that consumers are very brand-dependent. Why? Because in a system where there are 200 different versions of the same thing, consumers need a way to navigate that and make a choice. In other words, branding is a great way to show the limitations of "free choice" in a capitalist society. Where we are so proud of having 200 versions of a product, in reality consumers only consider 2-4 brands as a purchase option. What does this mean? It means the consumer isn't really choosing between 200 hundred different versions of product but four. It essentially shows that consumers not only don't need so much choice, but that they can't even handle it.

Yes, it's definitely important to have multiple versions of one product in order to allow choice and determine what works best, so that you can set up an iterative system of improvement. But more than a couple choices is too much for people. They don't need it or want it, despite claims to the contrary.


This is interesting as an 'f.y.i.', but I sincerely hope that neither you or anyone else is seriously *arguing* it, as a potential matter of *policy*.

In a post-capitalist economic context many people could simply say that they want to spend their self-determined time (if at all different from time spent at empirically / objectively 'socially necessary' tasks) at the work of making *chairs*, and suddenly the world would have a *plethora* -- maybe millions -- of different 'brands' to choose from, assuming some kind of centralization of information for the same.

The way to bring order out this "chaos", though, and in a way that's meaningful to the individual consumer, is to systematize the information for the production factors of [1] quality, [2] time, and [3] cost, with the 'cost' component being defined in some non-currency way, like supply-chain additional-laborers and their cumulative labor efforts.

Here's from an image web search:


http://eastcoastbuildingdesign.com.au/wp-content/uploads/2013/09/image3.png

[JaffaRed]

Capitalist consumption is very one-directional - someone, usually in the pay of a profit-driven corporation, designs the goods. Then the consumer consumes them. The system is rigged so that you'll accept whatever goods designed by the corporations. Consumer input into the production process is minimal at best even with "consumer choice". "Consumer choice" is between a small number of brands all made for their exchange value, not their use value.

The same goes with bourgeois culture - someone with a profit motive produces the cultural material, and the consumer consumes it passively. You sit at the movie theatre or in front of your TV, and passively watch something prepared for you by media corporations who want to make a profit.

Communism means that the consumption and production processes will go both ways - with integrated consumer input. Rather than have goods shoved into your throat by corporate marketing, you will participate in planning them - probably online.

Also at the revolution, workers are bound to ask themselves many questions about the products around them - do we need this? Is that worth the effort? Do we really need to waste labor and arable land on producing horribly unhealthy snacks and junk food full of fat and sugar/salt with zero nutritional value? Do we really need to burn our lungs with cigarettes, again wasting arable land and labor? Do we really need shoddy products made with planned obsolescence and "vampire charges", rather than more durable and energy-efficient products? Would cooking your own food and doing your own laundry be worth the effort compared to a high-quality community dining hall and mechanized communal laundry systems? Should we give antibiotics to sick people without finding out the bacteria behind it - if any - and the most efficient drug to combat them? What features on a smartphone would really be useful for the average worker, how should it be designed for the most comfortable use, and how could we make it more durable to save the labor of our friends who make it and save the solid waste throwing it away generates? Everything is going to be questioned, and the production and consumption processes re-designed for the interest of working people rather than the profit interest of capitalists.