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Dr. Herb Ruhs & grandson
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Less is more, and tarnished is better
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by Herb Ruhs, MD, Unknown News April 16, 2008
Cultures always die from their most successful inventions. Our culture is
dying from our success in marketing.
Most of my life I was immersed
in the advertising culture. Its effects linger, but, as a result of
years of not watching TV or listening to commercial radio, not
reading mass market magazines, avoiding to the point of compulsion
any and all advertising messages and promotional campaigns, I am in recovery. Only now do I begin to see the insanity of responding to
messages that contain words ending in "-er" or that include
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the
concepts of more, free or improved.
However, I doubt if I will ever completely recover, at the level of
behavior. The conditioning is just too deep. I still use too
much shampoo, too much toilet paper (why does it have to be white
anyway?) and too much of many things that I know, at a conscious
intellectual level, I can do without or are perhaps even harmful to
me (get thee away from me, refined sugar!). I still want to keep the
thermostat at 75 in the winter and 65 in the summer, but I resist. I
have learned to enjoy the warmth of a sweater or a fan instead.
As a result of my recovery, I find many public places
uncomfortable. The mall, for example, is maddening -- too noisy, too hot or too
cold, depending on the season, too rushed and stocked with too little
of what I am looking for. Popular music blaring from ubiquitous
speakers sends me running. In almost every space I need to transit --
a waiting room, any store, even coffee shops, where I would like to
find refuge and a simple cup of tea -- I am assaulted by marketing, and
attempted seduction to impulse buying. I end up feeling diminished
and disrespected. So I spend a lot of time at home. Saves a lot on gas,
though.
As our nation enters a time of involuntary austerity and material
sobriety, we will
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OLD &
NOT AT ALL
IMPROVED!
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need to begin de-conditioning
ourselves from the
effects of a lifetime of advertising excess. It will be painful, but
necessary.
What has helped me most is to try to think of
imperfection as a sign of grace. My beat-up auto is practically
burglar-proof, even though the doors are unlocked. My old clothes
really are softer and more comfortable. Food prepared from scratch
may not be a success every time, but on the average it tastes
better. Produce that has been nibbled on by pests inspires more
confidence than the perfect items on display, because I understand now
that if eating it did not kill the pest it is less likely to be
killing me. Insects are my food testers. Looking better is not
being better.
Please spare me from bigger, better, prettier, brighter, quicker,
faster, cleaner, cooler, hotter, freer, slimmer, fitter, fancier,
trendier and more of anything than I need to get through my day.
© by the author.
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