It’s been baffling and annoying this morning to see so much news coverage of the non-story that the National Trust and Cadbury have dropped the word ‘Easter’ from their annual Easter Egg Hunt event. First, it’s hard to work out who planted this story in the media as a bit of speculative PR. The most
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Yesterday I was at the launch of a new initiative, called the Centre for the Understanding of Sustainable Prosperity (CUSP). The event was chaired (and the centre is run) by Professor Tim Jackson, one of the country’s leading thinkers on sustainable economics, and the author of one of the best (and most accessible) books on
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Acquisition anxiety – how our constant need to acquire things is hurting us Picture the scene. You’re walking through a beautiful village in the countryside. The sun is shining, the birds are singing and the whole scene is idyllic. What is the first thought that enters your mind? Is it something along the lines of
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I like what the School of Life is trying to do – bringing philosophy, wisdom and broader thought into our daily lives. Indeed, Life Squared shares a similar aim in much of its work. Where we differ (apart from size, finances etc!) is that Life Squared is a not-for-profit organisation that aims to offer its
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I went to an interesting talk at the RSA today by James Wallman who has just published a book called ‘Stuffocation’. His basic argument was that in the society of scarcity of around a generation ago, what mattered in life was having more stuff – i.e. in a society of scarcity, materialism is not a
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I had a much-needed day off recently and decided to visit a few places in London – like the London Library (wonderful) and Westminster Abbey (claustrophobic in its conservativism). I ended up at the Westfield shopping centre at Shepherd’s Bush to meet a friend for dinner before going to a gig, and I had to
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My dislike of advertising grows stronger by the day – partly because of the corrosive and limiting effect it can have on people’s lives, worldviews and aspirations, but also partly because of the insulting, manipulative rubbish that the industry continues to pump out. Take this new McDonald’s ad for example – peddling the idea that
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It’s bad form I’m sure to put a second consecutive post from the same person but Charlie Brooker does know how to skewer the shallowness and depressing nature of advertising with some humour – certainly better than me ranting angrily about it for several lines! Here is his article about the glut of ’emotional’ xmas
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Great article by Charlie Brooker in today’s Guardian about the repugnant practice of advertising to kids, and how consumerism is finding new ways to enter our lives.
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A few months ago I wrote about the highly questionable presence of Bounty packs in maternity wards (see this post for a reminder) and the unpleasant form of ‘captive consumerism’ they seem to enforce on new parents. In the last week the Independent has also covered this issue in an article that explains more of
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