the ethics of deluding people.

i was just reading an interesting article on ethical investing. usually these discussions tend to be about greener companies and responsible corporate citizenship and the like. this was an interesting perspective:

Gambling and Hollywood [for example] have disproportionate impacts on poor people – people at the bottom – particularly Hollywood. It gives people a vision of life, a way of thinking, a way of looking at the world, that’s antithetical to their success in many ways. However you look at it – whether it’s locking them into sexual license, whether it’s locking them into a vision of cynicism, or whether it’s locking them into a materialism where they think that’s the way to be human – the way to succeed is to have all this expensive stuff that you have to buy, some sort of ticket to the rat race.

i often think of the impact on people i see with the “keeping up with the joneses” syndrome. i really scratch my head at, for example, the premium people are willing to pay for automobile branding. i mean, a jaguar is just a ford these days, and a benz is a chrysler. yet people are willing to pay double for a different hood emblem. the car-as-status culture is not as pervasive here in berkeley as it is in my hometown of L.A., but i still see it everywhere i go. i know this might elicit comments from some that there are real “performance” and “comfort”and “safety” values to certain luxury cars. and i might concede the point in some cases. only to spare your feelings while we’re cruising in your ride.
and i really feel very sad for people who buy into the absolute fiction that diamonds are valuable. oh hey, valentine’s day is coming up.
i really enjoyed this article today as well, about leaving the information age and moving into the conceptual age. because i am all about conceptualization.