News & Public Affairs

Is hyper-consumerism hurting our democracy?

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Tags: consumers, Dr. Benjamin R. Barber

LAcitybeat.com says of our next guest: "In his new book Consumed: How Markets Corrupt Children, Infantilize Adults and Swallow Citizens Whole, (Benjamin R.) Barber argues that American youth culture has metastasized, infecting society as a whole with a bad case of Peter Pan syndrome, an induced childishness easily manipulated by ideologies of privatization, branding, and homogenized tastes.

This phenomenon of "kidults" and "rejuveniles" gathers steam even as the country's population sk...