My sister spent her entire childhood being a consumer, basically. She plays with her Nintendo DS and has an iPod, a cell phone, a Nook, etc. none of which she needs. I can't recall her ever doing anything halfway imaginative or intelligent and she spends the bulk of her time watching the Disney channel on TV, which mostly broadcasts shows about bratty, unimaginative, materialistic teens.
Is it any surprise, then, that she's bratty, unimaginative, and materialistic? Not really. I tried to fight against it and teach her to do better things, but my mother's iron fist and her father's monetary influence won out, so she's a vegetable now and I loathe spending time with her, whereas once I actually enjoyed playing with her, etc. The mother blames this change in our relationship on me, as I suppose everything is my fault, but am I to expect anything else when she, too, is unimaginative and materialistic?
The issue is that children as well as their parents are mesmerized by the instant gratification of technology and thus are easily influenced by advertisements. Our society as a whole is deeply materialistic and unimaginative--case in point the stressed importance of so-called "education." Commercialized education which teaches you nothing other than to follow the system and jump through hoops. Does college teach you imagination? Not that I can recall. They sell the relevance of a degree to join a grey world and soon enough you will need three degrees, all equally useless, to get by in the world. And your child will need the latest useless technology, of course.
And we will all die knowing nothing. The End.
The only caveat I would insert are for the sciences and mathematics. You want those people to go to school, since the professions are so technical. But these days we get all our scientists and mathematicians from Russia, India, and China, so I guess that's an empty point to make. -shrugs-
Useless school is useless in Amerika because Amerika rolls on Dunkin' and little children pop Ritalin and Adderall with their morning Captn' Crunch while their college-aged counterparts snort the same before the Big Test, only to forget the information being tested for within a week of its completion. Also, everyone buy iPods and relish in that delicious pink paste they serve at your kids' schools. Mmmmmm. Amorphous meals are my favourite.
And it boggles my mind how they can afford brand new scoreboards, fields, and football uniforms for the resident d-----g jocks but cannot afford anything better than pink paste to serve to the rest of the inmates, I mean, students.
I'm a chipper one today, you can just tell.