To be clear, not all marketing is malicious. Ideal marketing is informative and honest, giving people a good idea of the product to people who might benefit from purchasing them.

For the big fish in the pond however, this is not the case.

Keeping in mind the power of imagery, we know the influence and responses our minds can produce when faced with an image. A part of you is brought out in that instant, your brain responds as if you were seeing the thing itself or placed in a relatable character.





Images act like points of emotional reference, giving us cups to fill with our own thoughts and feelings. Sometimes we can even be triggered into an emotional response due to an image that may not be the actual cause of the emotion, but was at one point given its emotional charge when the object was somehow in put reference to the actual cause of the reaction.

In psychology this is called “Classical conditioning”. Many people are already aware of the effect known as “Pavlov’s Dog”, which is named after a study conducted on canines and their susceptibility to reactive programming. Pavlov would ring a bell (which has little to no emotional response of its own to canines) followed by giving them food, and over time the canines would salivate after hearing the bell because their psyche has been conditioned to follow the response pattern due to the constant association with the bell and the food.

Advertisers and marketeers have developed a whole science of manipulative psychology of their own to tame people’s cravings, like a system devised to create the best bait for the hook that is often the reality of the product. Using things like humor, promise of pleasure, common fears, and sadness to act as the perfect witch to gift the poison apple.

“Open Happiness” Coca-Cola spent over 5.8 billion dollars on advertising worldwide, and has set itself as a cultural staple due to constant reinforcement

What seems as an innocent gesture, inviting you to enjoy a refreshing drink is the perfect pleasing disguise for a system that at all times seeks to squeeze you dry while you’re asleep in their crafted fantasy. The bottle is made to look as appealing to the eyes as possible, surrounded by pleasing scenery only seen in fantasy worlds. The imagery association is chosen to give you as strong and distracting of an emotional response from how the product is framed that your feelings of the product no longer depend on its actual quality or contents.

In reality, what you’re buying is one of the most poisonous drinks ever produced for common consumption in any society. It’s well known by experts in dietary health that the key ingredients in many sodas, such as high-fructose corn syrup (or any excess of sugar), artificial food coloring, phosphoric acid, and etc. are known to make people at higher risk of a decline in kidney function, diabetes, cancer, obesity in children, heart disease, metabolic syndrome, and asthma.

Although it’s unfair to say that one product is the cause behind all of these things and our health epidemic as a nation, it’s clear that this pattern is prevalent in all aspects of our market and because of it our health as a nation suffers heavily. The most successful of our time being the ones who can master deception the greatest and have as little heedance to the negative effects caused to the very people who support them financially. And for our food economy especially, Our current model is dependent on taming and controlling our cravings and urges, putting you into a fantasy world so addictive and sedating most don’t even want to think how it can be hurting them.

Some of the most successful food companies use the color red to package their imagery, a color associated with our base, almost beast like cravings for food and sex. See for yourself, you will see red everywhere. The mouth-watering gleam of a ripe piece of fruit or blood from a rare steak are examples of the emotions certain colors can elicit, and they served us well in our primitive pasts. Women in red, and red lipstick are known to be particularity entisive to men and many strip-clubs use red lighting for their shows as well, maximizing the impact of the sensual dance.

For the most part, people don’t care to think beyond their surface reactions, not questioning their own fallibility or the reasons as to why they react the way they do. This isn’t to blame people, most are busy with their lives and only have so much attention and energy to spend during the day. People want to believe that they can trust those around them and don’t enjoy the feeling of foolishness when discovering their way of thinking was wrong or below standard causing many to double-down on their beliefs (ironic).

Apart from food, the automobile market has its own set of tricks. The focus of most car advertisements isn’t even on the specs or efficiency of the model, but the promises of adventure, power, prestige and value to your family you can obtain in owning them. Our choice of cars in our culture is seen as almost extensions of our personalities, status symbols of success and taste equivalent to your choice of clothing. If you’re a meat-and-potatoes kind of manly-man, you buy a truck. If you’re an environmentally-conscious good citizen, you buy the hybrid or a small sedan with good mileage. If you’re a financially successful man, you buy the show-off sports car so you can really feel the success (through overspending).

Will you be a King of the Road, or a sappy pedestrian?

We in the West are very proud of our technological achievements and high standard of living. The economic model of capitalism has been the most efficient and the most class-inclusive any large society has ever seen, but in focusing only on our material well being and comforts we lose sight of the little things and virtues that sustain our spirit. We’ve come so far to make the world perfect for our feeding mouths, yet we’re more depressed and anxious than ever. So many young people feel, surrounded by a culture wrapped in plastic and painted in bright colors that life itself has no real meaning besides self-entertainment and monetary success.

For the sake of our own health, and the health of our environment, we should become more aware and thoughtful to the things that really matter in our lives and embrace simplicity. Our crave-culture is like a self-reinforcing trap, the more you give in the harder it is to get out, and your mental, spiritual and physical health are deteriorated along the way.

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