[Column] Questions Raised by Consumption on a Century of Prejudice

Shin Jong-won, Chairman of the Consumer Dispute Mediation Committee at the Korea Consumer Agency

Shin Jong-won, Chairman of the Consumer Dispute Mediation Committee, Korea Consumer Agency

In the 1920s, shortly after the end of World War I, the United States was ushering in an unprecedented "era of prosperity" unlike anything experienced anywhere else in the world. Streets began to fill with automobiles, and refrigerators, washing machines, vacuum cleaners, TVs, and stereos?initially sold as "practical luxury goods" to the middle class?started becoming essential consumer products.

The highly consumerist society of the United States a century ago was driven by a rapidly growing mass production system. Since Ford Motor Company's implementation of the assembly line for mass automobile production in 1913, the expanded mass production system required a large market, leading to aggressive consumption policies that encouraged buying. To maintain the mass production system and expand sales channels for the flood of products, "planned obsolescence," the idea that "product lifespans should be shortened," became established as a production and marketing policy for many companies.

Amid the rising competition with the Soviet Union, the emerging consumerist rival, the government also saw that encouraging workers to focus on consumption would weaken their fighting spirit and help expand markets. This was why the government supported "planned obsolescence," which made products that had only recently come onto the market seem outdated.

For over a century, the perception has been that consumers are simple, passive beings easily manipulated by markets or companies, lacking judgment, and that their focus on personal consumption weakens communal solidarity. Sociologist Jean Baudrillard, who referred to consumers as "unconscious, unorganized individuals who are fools easily swayed by praise and flattery," exemplifies this negative view that has prevailed for the past hundred years: consumers are easily deceived and controlled, ignore social contradictions and problems, and are incapable of solidarity or action for social change. Fortunately, consumer movements began in 1922 with the publication of the first American product comparison book, which encouraged consumers to adopt a skeptical attitude.

Now, 100 years later, the market still fundamentally views consumers as simple, easily deceived, poorly informed, and passive. Planned obsolescence remains prevalent. Looking at imported luxury brands competing to raise prices on the premise that higher prices mean better sales, or the attitude that "who would sue over a few tens of thousands of won per person?" despite numerous consumer damages, it is clear that these century-old prejudices remain unchanged. Such views of citizens and consumers are widespread not only in markets but also across politics, media, religion, and other areas of society.

During the COVID-19 pandemic, there is a prevailing prejudice that citizens and consumers cannot understand how politically and policy-wise the government is attentively and effectively caring for their lives. This leads to the assumption that even if journalism produces subpar articles, citizen readers will simply accept and follow them.

Despite these prejudices of ignorance and weakness, many consumers are already skilled navigators freely sailing the vast sea of overwhelming information. Even though the stereotype of selfishness and self-satisfaction persists, it is understood that the use of disaster relief funds supports struggling self-employed individuals and contributes to the flow of the socioeconomy. In the face of severe closures and unemployment in industries hit hard by COVID-19, and the impossibility of healthy school attendance for children, many citizen consumers recognize that society cannot function normally and are taking action for the social community.

These individuals are the protagonists of the knowledge and information society with balanced information and judgment, the era of connection and sharing, and the hyper-connected society with a communal DNA. Now they ask the nation, society, and corporations: "Are you still going to underestimate consumers like that?"

This content was produced with the assistance of AI translation services.