Is Consumerism Killing Our Creativity?

At first thought, maybe yes. People are more likely to shop online for good deals than sit in their houses doing needlepoint. People waste their energy on "things" and in the process stop creating ideas. Excess spoils and we know artists only thrive on want. With the lack of things people create.

I landed on the article, Is Consumerism Killing Our Creativity via twitter. "But why is consumerism – and particularly, an online hunt for the ideal purchase – so addictive? It turns out that our consumerist impulse stimulates the same part of the brain that fires when we’re on the trail of a great idea. As we go through the trial and error of executing an idea – What if I tried this? Ah! Now what about this? – we’re using those same wanting, hunting, getting instincts but in a nobler pursuit."

Yeah, consumerism is product of our creative impulses. If we stop to consider the questions, we begin to realize consumerism is not killing our creativity, but fueling it. In a consumeristic world, there is competition for better and more creative ideas. Boring, old, and stale thinking is mercily trampled by the market, and thus without creative solutions, one is rendered crippled. Consumerism accelerates creativity. Among the many options out there, the only way to stand out and remain relevant is to infuse your art/product/service/being with the utmost creativity. Consumerism does not murder creativity but relies on it as the key ingredient in modern life.

Shop Until You Drop

Uruguayans are darn proud of their shopping malls. I don’t even know how many times I have been asked if I have been to such-and-such shopping center with great sincerity. And interestingly enough the word “shopping” has not been translated. So I hear something like, “Has ido a shopping?”


The malls are hotspots where everyone seems frequent and to rave about amongst one another. In Salto, the Shopping Center (which also doubles as the bus terminal) was the pride of city. In Montevideo the shopping locales seem to garner the same praise. When we visited Florida, the people were trying to convince us that Florida is a great town even though they don’t have a shopping mall. I got the vibe they might be a little embarrassed about the lack of a shopping center in their city, but to be honest, I could care less. What is a shopping mall? Don’t get me wrong—I love shopping. I even love shopping malls, but I’ve never thought of a shopping mall as anything really special. It’s just another place to me, as shopping malls probably are to most Americans.

I think the shopping mall frenzy is reflective many social, economic, and even political factors. For one, the novelty of stores in a centralized location under one roof makes buying goods much more convenient. Shopping at the mall also functions as a way to signal status. The stores in the shopping centers are usually those of higher caliber and so higher price tags. These stores are mostly chains that have stores in multiple locations (abroad and/or within Uruguay)—anything from Zara, Manos de Uruguay, Levi, Nike, To-To, Tienda Montevideo, to Daniel Cassin. Not just anyone can afford to shop at the shopping mall. Also, it seems that the malls are proud displays of modernity.


The buildings often are large, well-designed structures, definitely better than some shopping malls I’ve been to in the States. The atmosphere is also very consumeristic (of course, it’s a shopping mall) which I would argue is close synonym for modernitistic these days. The ability to shop for luxury items on a Friday or Saturday night is not something that Uruguayans were always able to do. Built in 1985, Montevideo Shopping boasts about being the first shopping center in the Rio de la Plata. It's no coincidence that the dictatorship plaguing the country happened to terminate that same year. Shopping malls are emblematic of the free society Uruguay is today.

At the risk of sounding patronizing, I find the fascination with shopping malls endearing. And at the same time rather troubling…