The film demonstrates to me the fact that in this country, you can buy anything you want. Money equates to power and then back to more money.
In any given city on any given day, we could look around and see giant billboards advertising products, we see people driving brand name cars and wearing brand name clothes or clothing that advertises a product. There are commercials in between segments of our TV shows, and there is product placement in the shows.
Nothing, anymore, is left unbranded. This method makes the consumer want. It's also given the corporations that run these ads and market to our citizens and our children control over our society. These ads tell us what it is that we want, how we feel about things, what our lives would be like if we had their products.
These corporations then take all this money that they turn into power and they can virtually run this country.
During this election season, Stephen Colbert has started his "Colbert SuperPAC" to demonstrate that money can buy you power. He has used this SuperPAC to pay for attack ads against candidates, he's used the money to provide support to people he's interested in, and he's even used the power the money has given him to attempt to buy and "host" a primary debate. He nearly succeeded. He is doing all this to be funny, but also to point out that Americans believe that "corporations are people."
We have given corporations so much power over our daily lives. They influence our choices, they insert themselves into our daily lives, they advertise to us everywhere. Corporations can then use this power they have politically and socially.
America is up for sale. The privatization of health care, the legality of SuperPACs, and the movies and music we like being entirely paid for by some outside corporation that wants to influence us being just a few examples. One with money can literally buy whatever he/she wants in this country. It's just another way that the rich and the poor are polarizing; those with money continue to get what they want and influence elections and political decisions, while having little or no money equates to the loss of your voice and at times your basic American and human rights.
Even our most sacred events like holidays, like Christmas, weddings, and birthdays have become a consumer craze. Christmas is secular and commercialized. We spend and we buy and we run ourselves ragged and stress ourselves out spending money and doing what ads and movies and marketing tell us the season about. Weddings are no longer about love and commitment; they're about wealth and status and making a statement with what you can buy.
We've let advertising and corporations into the most private and intimate details of our lives. We've let them take control of things that are meant to be for everyone, and we've allowed them to pick our leaders. When Morgan Spurlock signed on advertisers to be in the movie and ultimately pay for the movie, he was handed so many contracts and stipulations that had to be signed and agreed to. Many of the advertisers told him how to make the movie and what they wanted done for the movie quite directly. So it goes in many other ways that we let advertisers get involved.
Not only do they tell us what to think, they are advertising things in ways that ought to be unethical. Products that are known to be bad for us, products that market sex and money and partying to children and teenagers. The intimacy and privacy we've given up to these corporations and their advertisements is despicable, and the lies and the unethical way they manipulate our minds and their products is ridiculous.
This country runs more on money than on democracy, and the sale goes to the highest bidder.
--Megan
In any given city on any given day, we could look around and see giant billboards advertising products, we see people driving brand name cars and wearing brand name clothes or clothing that advertises a product. There are commercials in between segments of our TV shows, and there is product placement in the shows.
Nothing, anymore, is left unbranded. This method makes the consumer want. It's also given the corporations that run these ads and market to our citizens and our children control over our society. These ads tell us what it is that we want, how we feel about things, what our lives would be like if we had their products.
These corporations then take all this money that they turn into power and they can virtually run this country.
During this election season, Stephen Colbert has started his "Colbert SuperPAC" to demonstrate that money can buy you power. He has used this SuperPAC to pay for attack ads against candidates, he's used the money to provide support to people he's interested in, and he's even used the power the money has given him to attempt to buy and "host" a primary debate. He nearly succeeded. He is doing all this to be funny, but also to point out that Americans believe that "corporations are people."
We have given corporations so much power over our daily lives. They influence our choices, they insert themselves into our daily lives, they advertise to us everywhere. Corporations can then use this power they have politically and socially.
America is up for sale. The privatization of health care, the legality of SuperPACs, and the movies and music we like being entirely paid for by some outside corporation that wants to influence us being just a few examples. One with money can literally buy whatever he/she wants in this country. It's just another way that the rich and the poor are polarizing; those with money continue to get what they want and influence elections and political decisions, while having little or no money equates to the loss of your voice and at times your basic American and human rights.
Even our most sacred events like holidays, like Christmas, weddings, and birthdays have become a consumer craze. Christmas is secular and commercialized. We spend and we buy and we run ourselves ragged and stress ourselves out spending money and doing what ads and movies and marketing tell us the season about. Weddings are no longer about love and commitment; they're about wealth and status and making a statement with what you can buy.
We've let advertising and corporations into the most private and intimate details of our lives. We've let them take control of things that are meant to be for everyone, and we've allowed them to pick our leaders. When Morgan Spurlock signed on advertisers to be in the movie and ultimately pay for the movie, he was handed so many contracts and stipulations that had to be signed and agreed to. Many of the advertisers told him how to make the movie and what they wanted done for the movie quite directly. So it goes in many other ways that we let advertisers get involved.
Not only do they tell us what to think, they are advertising things in ways that ought to be unethical. Products that are known to be bad for us, products that market sex and money and partying to children and teenagers. The intimacy and privacy we've given up to these corporations and their advertisements is despicable, and the lies and the unethical way they manipulate our minds and their products is ridiculous.
This country runs more on money than on democracy, and the sale goes to the highest bidder.
--Megan
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