Some may claim that consumerism is remarkably superficial. For example, buying a stylish sports car is purported to “say” something about the driver/owner. It may be true, but all this is merely the perception of the beholder. If I associate sports cars with yuppies, I would readily assume that sports car owner = yuppie.
Still, it must be noted that the very vocabulary from which I draw the term “yuppie” is really from the language of my culture - both spoken and unspoken. Humans have created multiple levels of nonverbal communication to compensate for their relative inability to read others’ minds.
Unfortunately, these nonverbal ways to communicate have led to rather unfortunate consequences for those who do not understand them. I could “accidentally” select a vehicle that “says” all the wrong things about me, and be totally clueless about it (assuming that I couldn’t read minds or nonverbal communications, of course). Conversely, I could simply deliberately choose my wardrobe to deceive others about my “true” nature.
Language is actually meant to be superficial: a word means only what it means (to facilitate ease of communication). It is really human perceptions and consensus that leads to words developing arcane and obscure connotations. If anything is superficial, it is the vocabulary set up within a culture to communicate ideas related to consumerism. One may think that an item’s mere appearance influenced the buying decision and thus the buyer must be superficial. One who thinks that way may be guilty of being superficial, too, by demonstrating a possible ignorance of the deeper symbolism of the item. To be sure, much of this stems from the negative connotations of the word “superficial”…
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