To experience Western media is to submerge yourself in the concept of alienation, and to be driven into the arms of commodification. Commodification thrives upon the entrapment of individuals in nets of instant gratification and the ease and accessibility of said products. Alienation itself “suggests separation and distance; it contains within it the word alien.” (Berger 50) Once someone feels isolated from any other individual, they become desperate for any form of gratification to give their life meaning. This gratification can come in the form of material possessions, buying food, finding relationships; they all are commodified methods to help subdue the loneliness. Since Marxist theory exists to critique the capitalist media system that depends upon exploitation of the individual, it only makes sense that the term ‘alienation’ be proposed to exhibit this common flaw in most Western media and economic practices.

As stated in Mosco’s The Body and Culture, “It is not only the consumer self that is commodified; the working self is similarly turned into a marketable product and a data point to be controlled” (Mosco 106). Therefore, each aspect of the individual is appealed to and alienated in an attempt to make them feel fulfillment, trying to earn gratification from a product they themselves may have had a hand in making. The company is telling the consumer and the producer that having acne is a detrimental trait, that it makes you the opposite of attractive in society, it alienates you. This is the first step of alienating the consumer, as stated by Berger in Marxist Analysis, as “they suffer from a false consciousness–a consciousness that takes the form of the ideology that dominates their thinking” (Berger 50-51). 

Once the company plants the seeds of their ideology within a consumer, it is simple for the producer to keep finding products that will appeal to the new false consciousness they engineered themselves. The theory of alienation also has precedence within the theories of the public and private spheres, as each one influences society in their own way. Within a capitalist society, it is extremely difficult to establish a strongly independent public opinion, since false consciousness and ideology inundate society at every level. The private sphere, or the people holding power and influence in society, create their own ideologies which they can release into society via mainstream media. This way, it influences citizens on a level agreeable to the government without many even realizing it, and it is successful largely through advertisements and subliminal imagery. If the government and corporations can influence society as a whole and commodify enough things, their ideology can influence what consumers buy and even focus on in their daily lives.

The only way to resist and defy these expectations and alienation is to establish independent and unwavering public opinion, and a real sense of worth when faced with commodified mediums. However, the first step to establishing resistance in a hyper-commidified society is to recognize an individual’s sense of alienation, and realize it is due to the agendas spread by corporations seeking to make a cycle of profits. It is impossible in a capitalist and commodified system to completely extricate oneself from the machinations of the powers that be, but it is entirely possible to consume media and products critically. By recognizing the ideology, both socially and economically, presented alongside a product, a consumer can practice making decisions based on their own consciousness and desires, as opposed to the instilled ideals of false consciousness and commodity fetishism. As stated in “Mass Communication, Culture and Media Literacy”, this can be helped through mass communication, “the process of creating shared meaning between the mass media and their audiences” (Baran 6). Through this, it is easier for audiences to discuss how the media affects them together, and question the agenda and commodities it is pushing. This inherently helps individuals improve their media literacy and realize the effects of alienation, because they can question if their very way of life is a slave to the commodity. 

In the end, a hyper-commodity society cannot thrive or push forth profitable advertisements without the assistance of alienation. Since it is a driving force behind commodification and the economic choice of the consumer, companies are always creating new ideologies to new and broader demographics. These companies are hoping to institute more dependencies on false consciousness, aided along by the lonely desires presented by alienation. It is dependent upon the consumer to deduce if the desire they are feeling for a specific product is as the result of commodity culture, or if it is truly something that meets their needs. Media literacy must be established so that audiences can critically consume media and products given to them by companies, but through a lens that allows them to identify the ideas of ideology and commodification behind their marketing strategies. The observations of the audience is what commodity and alienating culture seeks to demolish, and it is up to the audience to resist corporate interest, and instead focus on what gives them fulfillment and economic peace of mind.

References/Work Cited

Baran, Stanley J. Introduction to Mass Communication: Media Literacy and Culture. McGraw-Hill Education, 2019.

Berger, Arthur Asa. Essentials of Mass Communication Theory. Sage Publications, 1995.

Mosco, Vincent. Becoming Digital: towards a Post-Internet Society. Emerald Publishing Limited, 2017.