Better By Nightfall

Some classes are meant to inform you, to inspire you, to make you think. There are the classes that are pointless maybe even meaningless, the ones you take because you know they'll be easy and you really don't care about much else but a passing grade. And then there are those other courses, the ones that change your perception about the world around you. The ones that open your eyes to the way things have become, making you wonder how we got here.

My summer courses thus far have been the in the latter category. Day after day I've come back to the conclusion I've drawn before, only now with more evidence behind those thought. As enlightening as it has been, it's also borderline depressing. Today we watched a video about consumer culture which, of course, had a biased (contrary to what the creator may have said) about how "the persuasion industry" works to engineer our desires and necessities. The overall theme noting that our lives are empty, devoid of thought and fulfillment. As a result we strive to be fulfilled, to be encompassed; but most importantly, to be whole (regardless of the fact that we never can be whole in the eyes of advertisers).

It works, though. I admit that I succumb to advertising every now and then. But who doesn't? It's that drive to consume with growth and change. In many ways it's part of American culture. Or is it?

The expose raised more questions than answers. At it's core the overriding question: Is this a natural state of being, a part of being human or is it something that has come to be seen as natural? But it expands even further: Where do we draw the line on what symbolizes us a person, a people, or a nation and what others may make it out to be? Who determines the symbolic representations of the aforementioned entities and of a culture?

Who knows (and maybe even who cares). After all, the world and everything around it is what you make of it--how you choose to perceive it. Unless, of course, you question the world around you.