Consumer Apathy

I hope you haven't come here to gain insight into the problem of shopper malaise now that we've passed Black Friday. I can't do that, because early reports indicate that spending and absolute shopper volume are both up from last year. Things are looking positively rosy in the Land of the Midnight Capitalist.

No, the apathetic consumer is me.

I'd love to be buying stuff for myself, for my sweetie, for friends and family, whatever. I even have a wish list somewhere that I haven't updated (and no, I won't be linking it here). It's just that I don't want to think about making purchase decisions. I'm in a consumer funk that has no relation to religion, culture, finances, or other factors. As Johnny Rotten once sang, "I can't even be bovvered." I wonder:

• how many others there are in this condition;
• how it's going to impact the shopping turnout during the thrice-damned Holiday Season;
• how businesses will try to counter such apathy; and
• whether countering it is even possible.

The last bullet is the tricky one. Part of my apathy is actually antipathy—I don't want to see any more advertising, and any attempt to break through my disgust with the culture of conspicuous consumption is likely to push me further away. A reasonably wise man whom I recently interviewed said, "If you try to change customer behavior so that they come to you and remain loyal, you'll lose." Or something like that; like I said, there's apathy afoot.

There's definitely stuff I want to buy. Unreal Tournament III just came out for PC, and it's going to be mine someday. I like to play first-person shooters that have bots because I suck at shooters, and UT3 has some very good ones. I keep toying with the idea of picking up the much-hyped Nintendo Wii for Meaghan and myself. There are several metric tons of roleplaying-game manuals I'd like to have, even though my dice are currently gathering dust in the bottom of my closet.

We're glutted for choice. Having a few more tchotchkes won't make my life better, so why should I get them? The economy is finally catching up to my long-held belief that we've been living outside our means and it's gonna bite us in the ass. Even though acquiring crap has a momentary pleasure associated with it, in the long run it doesn't add happiness. There isn't a marketing campaign in the world that can break through that.

Plus, the one thing I really want to buy, the 3rd season of Battlestar Galactica DVDs, still hasn't been released and I'm going crazy not being able to discuss the events with Meaghan, who hasn't seen any of the episodes yet. Add to that the writers' strike putting production on hold for the 4th (and final) season, and you could say I'm right pissed. What's the point of life if I can't escape it with good science fiction?

On a side note, I'm making public my wishes for a speedy recovery for Paul Greenberg's mom, who is hospitalized with a painful but not necessarily dangerous medical condition. She's in her 9th decade though, so any hospitalization is big. Join me in sending good vibes.

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