Fr. John Kavanaugh worries about advertising because it is shaping our cultural values, our images of what it means to be a person, and our thoughts on what happiness is. Advertising is starting more and more to define us and control us rather than reflect us as people. We acquire a want for something many times after seeing it advertised. More often than not, this want is simply a desire or yearning, and not really a need or necessity. We don't need the product itself, but we many times want the values associated with the product. Some people think that to look good, they should buy a BMW, because they associate wealth, power, and looking good with a BMW. If there were an easier and perhaps cheaper way of looking good or cool, no doubt this person would take the easier way to this goal. This advertising often lessens the value of humans. Women are most oftenly devalued in advertising. They many times become just the means to sell a product. People will associate this product with a woman and therefore find a reason to buy the product; to get the woman. In a sense, women have become the product desired for. Advertising makes us want to acquire products that we think will make us happy. To be happy according to advertising means that we should acquire all of the latest and greatest products and the values associated with them. Fr. John Kavanaugh thinks that there is a real danger in falling victim to advertising. "The Merchants of Cool" has the same message as Fr. Kavanaugh in that our popular culture defines who we are. The meaning of life becomes more about what we wear, what we drive, what we drink than who we truly are. Humans become objects defined by how many products they have and how cool those products are. Without "coolness", we are nothing in this world. Coolness also takes over as our primal instinct. We often care more about looking cool than doing what is reasonable or what is healthy like drinking in excess, perhaps even when we don't really want to do this. Fr. John Kavanaugh and "The Merchants of Cool" have the same main message, that is, humans are becoming more and more dependent on pop culture and advertising which in turn leads us to devalue humans and lose control of our lives.

Back To Theology Website