Two curious news stories. The first comes from the BBC and tells of a shopaholic, a woman who purchased so much she could hardly fit it all in her apartment. When she passed away from pneumonia, it took more than a day to find her body underneath all the purchases. A friend commented, “It gave her pleasure to buy things, she only bought things she really liked.”“Shopaholic Died under Purchases,” BBC, July 28, 2009, accessed June 2, 2011, http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/uk_news/england/manchester/8173271.stm.

The second story relates that in India, according to a UN report, there are about 560 million cell phone users, but only 360 million people have access to toilets.“India Has More Mobile Phones Than Toilets: UN report,” Telegraph, April 15, 2010, accessed June 2, 2011, http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/asia/india/7593567/India-has-more-mobile-phones-than-toilets-UN-report.html.

1. Consumerism replaces the model of the consumer as someone who buys necessities in order to get on with their lives, with the model of the consumer as someone who buys in order to live. Can you put that definition in your own words?
2. How could the story of a woman buried and dead underneath her endless purchases be construed as an example of consumerism?
3. How could the story of India having more cell phones than toilets be construed as an example of consumerism?
4. One way of characterizing much of the work of advertising agencies is as nurturing consumerism. Can you make the ethical case that advertising agencies should be banned from society?
5. In ethical terms, make the case that consumerism is good.

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