"The Consumer Society" — Jean Baudrillard

The Consumer Society — Jean Baudrillard

Reading this book may be the first time I've experienced such an oscillation of admiration and disappointment for an author. The Consumer Society deserves to be called a significant work. The neo-Marxist philosophical lens through which it exposes social conventions — demonstrating that Marx remains relevant — is extraordinary. In particular, the ability to construct a three-dimensional picture of the life we encounter every day and to pierce through to its essence is something only a true master could do. But I suspect I am not alone in feeling, as the book progresses into its second half, that the author becomes ensnared in the very logic he has constructed. They say a genius's brilliance leads them toward madness. The world's assessment of this book — "astonishing but frightening" — aligns with academia's description of him as a "terrible child." Baudrillard pushes to the extreme the things we had overlooked, or had recognized but refused to acknowledge — much like the protagonist of The Student of Prague, who pursued objective logic relentlessly. Yet paradoxically, the sociology he is rooted in is a world of enormously complex variables. His claim of "wrong" aimed at history, anthropology, cultural studies, and political science is arrogance. Isn't his later drift toward semiotics and metaphysics a result of precisely this academic narrowness?

Good afternoon. This is Annotator, host of Tea Time with a Notable Person. Today I have the pleasure of speaking with sociologist Jean Baudrillard — a leading figure of French structuralism, renowned for his profound engagement with metaphysics and philosophy.

Yeob: Good afternoon, Mr. Baudrillard. It's a pleasure to meet you.

Jean: Hello. Please, call me Jean.

Yeob: Of course, Jean. I'm not sure whether you watch television these days. Given your unfavorable views on TV and mass culture, perhaps you don't — or do you watch to learn "the enemy's makeup techniques"?

Jean: A world constructed in such a way has no value worth watching. A world produced and consumed regardless of whether it is true or false is simply false.

Yeob: You're starting with the difficult stuff right away. Well, I've recently been watching a drama called Boys Over Flowers. It was originally a Japanese anime that became a TV drama and then a film.

Jean: That would be a prime example of how capital can commercialize a single piece of content to its maximum extent, transforming it into a sign for consumption.

Yeob: That may well be. Actually, I mentioned it because I wanted to begin with the theme of "consumption" precisely through Boys Over Flowers. In around episode three, the male lead Gu Jun-pyo says to the female lead Geum Jan-di: "Do you think there's something money can't buy?" Jan-di thinks hard but can't answer. Another character, Yun Ji-hoo, says "Air." Jan-di says that makes sense — but thinking about it, even air can be bought and consumed. Buying a Scandinavian forest bathing travel package, or on a grander scale, the climate agreements and carbon trading markets — these all suggest that even air has become an object of consumption.

Jean: That is indeed the case. The world we live in, once incorporated into the market economy, has been constituted and operated by endless consumption. Not only air — we now consume even "care," such as smiles and emotions. Even abstract concepts like friendship, love, and hope have been transformed into signs and made objects of consumption.

Yeob: I'm not quite following — how can non-material concepts become objects of consumption?

Jean: Because they become commodities. If hope were genuinely abundant in our society, the value of the word "hope" would not rise so high. Similarly, our society is experiencing a loss of human connection. Humans yearn for warmth and consume it. In the current consumer society, a return to genuine warmth is impossible — only its commercialized consumption is available.

Yeob: So emotional marketing in the advertising world — what they call "affective marketing" — is exploiting exactly that kind of deficiency.

Jean: Precisely. But that deficiency is not visible on the surface. Rather, it is disguised as abundance. A myth of abundance is constructed. Consumer society is like a prosperous Jerusalem under threat and siege.

Yeob: So internally it feels like a land flowing with milk and honey, while in reality it is filled with the threats of war and conflict.

Jean: Correct. Only by piercing through the myth of abundance with a different logic can we see through the illusion of simple quantitative abundance. Look at how GDP constructs an exaggerated sense of abundance — a process that generates growth figures without distinguishing positives from negatives. They elevate growth into the ideology of society. They suggest that through growth, distribution is achieved and justice is realized. In reality, growth is the fuel that sustains consumption — nothing more.

Yeob: So you're pointing to the fallacy of the trickle-down effect. I also thought there was a problem with this kind of linear model of development. Of course, in developing countries, some concentration at the starting point may be unavoidable — but when it solidifies, the result isn't trickle-down but an ever-growing pool at the top.

Jean: I am not interested in whether it is inherent to human nature. That "nature" itself may be a fiction required by the structure of society. Growth enables consumption, and consumption enables the current social system to function. It is a matter of survival.

Yeob: Let's come down to earth a bit. The current government has put economic development at the center of its platform — tax cuts for the wealthy, creating a business-friendly environment. The logic is that if corporations thrive and the economy grows, citizens will thrive too. Many people believe this. Even the backlash against the government is ultimately because the economy hasn't improved in practice — if the economic pie had grown, would that not be a problem?

Jean: That is precisely the fiction I am speaking of. The mechanism of growth contains a process of distortion. That rate of distortion actually increases with growth. Rather than manifesting as distribution, it accelerates national poverty and deprivation. Even if this government had revived the economy, income inequality would have widened and the trickle-down effect would not have occurred.

Yeob: But democratic theory in political science argues that without a minimum level of economic development, democratization itself becomes impossible. There is even a Chinese saying that a hungry Confucius cannot observe propriety. If the pie grows, can't at least the children who would otherwise starve be given enough to survive? The African development model also seems to follow this form.

Jean: Of course, unintended side effects can occur — what economists call "externalities." But considering the fundamental intention, growth begins with the desires of the ruling class. To maintain the existing power structure, one must project the illusion of "growth." The democratization that appears through economic growth is merely an alibi for the survival of the current system.

Yeob: So development aid to Africa and the Third World also has a dark motive behind it — expanding market territories and pursuing individual national interests.

Jean: Are you a realist too? You already know this is the case — so why ask?

Yeob: Doesn't it feel somewhat bitter? Is it truly impossible for humans to have genuine love for humanity and human dignity?

Jean: Interesting question. Let us think. Why is human dignity and love for humanity necessary?

Yeob: Well... because we are human? Or because seeing starvation and war and poverty breaks your heart — I suppose to relieve my own discomfort.

Jean: Precisely. That is what is called the desire to be happy. The desire to be in a state free of worry about others, free of inner discomfort. But have you not considered whether that happiness itself is a myth?

Pursuing happiness is not an innate human tendency. The myth of happiness is simply an ideology that gives concrete expression to the myth of equality. Reaching the material comfort measurable through objects and signs is equality — and therefore happiness.

Yeob: But what I am describing is not material. It is a matter of the heart.

Jean: Hmm... Let us think. Why does your heart become uncomfortable? It is because you know that poverty, deprivation, and war are unhappy. That knowledge may be experiential or educational. What matters is that it is an acquisition through external mechanisms, not your inherent nature. You must perceive poverty as unhappy in order to pursue growth; you must pursue growth in order for consumption to occur.

Yeob: So it is like Japan installing railways and electricity in Korea not for Korea's benefit but to extract more efficiently. But that sounds a bit conspiratorial... Even uneducated people recognize starvation and war as horrific.

Jean: Not quite. Think of Mowgli, born and raised in the jungle. What would he have thought about poverty or war? He would know hunger — but he would have had no concept of justice or injustice. In the same way, humans within a social structure are compelled to distinguish justice from injustice.

Yeob: I hadn't thought of happiness as a structured concept. I thought of it as the state where one's heart is naturally at ease.

Jean: That... may be a rather particular way of thinking on your part. In general, people describe happiness as having something more comfortable, more beautiful, more delicious, or better. But that happiness disappears the moment it is possessed, and gives way to desire for something even better than what one owns. An endlessly unfulfillable ring of desire — especially the desire for differentiation arising from comparison with others — constitutes the illusion of happiness. And that illusion drives consumption, functioning as the engine that keeps society running.

Yeob: So in the end, happiness is a relative and ultimately unreachable concept? I had thought that dreams, self-actualization, even love — all of it was ultimately for the sake of being happy. That feels somewhat hollow now. But in a sense, the happiness you define feels mechanical — a sign-like gadget of happiness, so to speak.

Jean: That is because language is inevitably incomplete. But the truth closer to reality is not your individual definition, but the sociologically structural definition. One must think in social context.

Yeob: Hearing the word "truth" reminds me of something — in your writing you say there is no truth and no objectivity anywhere. Do you really believe that? I hold the position that facts exist as facts, while different truths can be constructed depending on one's perspective...

Jean: What I am referring to is the media. The claim that "truth" in broadcasting or newspapers is possible is what I dispute. What TV, a tape recorder, or newspaper text signifies is not the event itself. It tells you only one thing: that I was not there. What they show is closer to a "hallucination."

Yeob: That makes sense ontologically — that I was not present. But that does not mean the fact that occurred or the journalist who experienced it does not exist. As a proxy, aren't they constructing one version of truth?

Jean: No. I believe that once reality passes through media, reality disappears. Media gives it form. Like the Matrix. What we believe to be truth is not because it is true but because it is constructing truth.

Yeob: That is highly meta-cognitive. But isn't perception through the five senses not the only form of cognition? Facts exist as facts, I believe. Of course I accept that the war in Gaza shown on TV is constructed. But through broadcasting and newspapers, even if we cannot achieve 100% synchronization with reality, we can access a truth close to facts. Do you know why a periscope matters to a submarine? Because nothing is visible from inside the ocean. A periscope shows the world above the water — the world the submarine cannot inhabit. Isn't that the role of journalism?

Jean: You seem rather agitated. I am not talking about the people who practice journalism. I am talking about how journalism circulates and is consumed in society. It is true that humans enjoy external violence and inhumanity. We require external anxiety to justify our choice of safety over challenge. To use your metaphor, it is the psychology of watching through a periscope as a storm rages outside, feeling relieved to be underwater.

Yeob: But journalism and media also led the anti-war movement. The media coverage of the Vietnam War contributed to the movements of 1968 and the anti-war wave.

Jean: That too is merely a side effect.

Yeob: I see. Let's return to the discussion of "consumption." In your book, you describe "consumption" as a sociological system of signs — meaning our entire society communicates through the mechanism of consumption. And it seems you believe the consumer who performs that consumption has no subjectivity.

Jean: Correct. The individual as consumer has become reified — consuming their own body, consuming their own time. The defining feature of consumer society is that the subject and object of consumption have become indistinguishable.

Yeob: I see. But isn't it different now? Beyond the era when consumption was imposed through advertising and marketing, I believe consumer solidarity is becoming possible. You argued that consumer solidarity was impossible, but in an internet-based society, consumption is no longer purely in the individual realm. Buyers can make autonomous choices based on product reviews and purchase histories. They can produce journalism themselves as individual media. The "prosumer" has emerged. Of course there is noise — but the notion that consumption is unilateral seems no longer valid in today's society.

Jean: The foundations have certainly changed since I wrote the book, so change in those foundations is possible. But as long as the masses remain settled and comfortable within democracy — that is, as long as they do not intervene politically and socially — as long as they are satisfied being consumers of democracy and public opinion, they remain consumers. If they are no longer satisfied with the status of consumer and have begun taking responsibility for production and playing a social role, that may be the beginning of another change.

Yeob: That is the first positive response you've given. I too believe that experiences like the candlelight protests are the beginning and the seed — a departure point, a starting point for emerging as subjects rather than mere objects in a democratic consumer society.

Jean: True. But honestly, I don't find the discourse produced in internet spaces particularly trustworthy. The internet is a place where consumption happens for entertainment purposes, without reflection.

Yeob: What do you mean when you say the internet is entertainment-oriented?

Jean: The internet is a place of nearly simultaneous access and sharing — that is its foundational nature. On this foundation, what is actually produced and consumed is almost entirely for entertainment. The flows called gossip or public opinion on the internet, webtoons, videos — all of it is grounded in entertainment.

Yeob: So something like webtoons? I enjoy webtoons myself... but can't they also be creation? Especially in fields like art?

Jean: Webtoons or pop art are not art. Think about "pop" — what pop ultimately pursues is to be embedded in civilization and absorbed into the world. This is mere commercialism — not play, not realism, not anything.

Yeob: But isn't entertainment simply its own characteristic? What you're describing sounds as if entertainment is just a sugar coating for commercialism and consumption.

Jean: Indeed. In our time, culture is subject to fashion. This is what I call the "recyclage" of culture. Art becomes popularized through trends, and those trends drive consumption.

Yeob: Like the massive crowds that flock to Van Gogh, Monet, and Matisse exhibitions in Seoul?

Jean: Yes. Van Gogh's work is art — it contains soul and thought, independent of consumption. But as this art entered the age of industrial production, its essence remained the same while its meaning was corrupted. It was industrialized. What we now call culture can be described as "industrialized culturality."

Yeob: Of course, some people go to Van Gogh or Monet exhibitions out of a sense of snobbishness — a desire to distinguish themselves from others through "culture." These phenomena of snobbism are widespread. But I believe snobbishness and kitsch also construct their own artistic domains and carry their own meaning.

Jean: That is because people have a mistaken understanding of art. The contemporary masses don't try to understand art and culture in terms of their essence — they perceive them as signs. And they play by combining the system of those signs. In this sense, culture has fallen to the level of entertainment consumption.

Yeob: But can we say that is wrong? Doesn't the understanding of culture also shift with its historical context? Before Gutenberg, books were the property of intellectuals and nobles. After the invention of the printing press, knowledge was shared and thought advanced cumulatively. Doesn't the popularization of art and culture also contribute in a similar way? The fact that we pay money to buy a book to read does not make that book low-quality. Is art not the same? Is it not a blessing that emotional and cultural enrichment can be purchased at low cost?

Jean: I want you to look at the structure that produces this essence. Today's pop is nothing more than an accomplice of commercialism that promotes consumption — a "gadget." The purposiveness and utility that art once carried have been lost; only its entertainment value is emphasized. It functions as an accelerator that artificially compels people to consume through trends. With the essence gone, people are cleverly manipulated and misled.

Yeob: It's hard to respond when you speak from such a high altitude — the big picture is difficult for me to draw. My view is that art occupies its own domain. Commercialism can objectify and sell it, but it doesn't necessarily follow that the recipient is merely consuming it. The recipient may pay money to view art, but depending on perspective, that can be seen as appreciation or the pursuit of culture. Paying money is not all consumption. Art theory belongs to the domain of art; questions of money belong to the domain of market society — aren't these separate realms?

Jean: We live in a society where they cannot be separated. We are homo consommateur (the consumer person), living in a shopping city where consumption has become daily life — consuming time, consuming emotions, the endless drugstore of everyday life. The city is the space where consumption is most efficiently organized. What "city" signifies is motivation, desire, encounter, stimulation, the constant judgment of others, the provocation of desire, information, the seduction of propaganda. All of this constitutes a kind of abstract fate of collective participation — on the basis of what is called universal competition.

Yeob: That brings to mind the recently popular "chick lit" novels. Books like Confessions of a Shopaholic from the United States, or Korean equivalents like Sweet My City and Style — they seem to reveal these urban attributes quite vividly. Of course readers engage with these novels to empathize with the protagonists and find comfort. But perhaps the authors have captured the essence of contemporary reality.

Jean: I don't enjoy novels, so I haven't read them.

Yeob: Is that so? You could afford to enjoy life a little in this consumer world... you seem to live quite austerely. Thank you for your valuable time today. It was a pleasure.

Jean: Thank you. It was an enjoyable conversation — someone had actually read The Consumer Society, a book that barely sells, and we could discuss it together.

Yeob: I'm not sure how it sounded to our listeners, but it was a meaningful conversation for me — an opportunity to hear profound perspectives on society and the world. That said, I can't help feeling that Jean has a rather too-negative view of social construction and its intentions. From a high vantage point, the world may indeed look dirty, ugly, and messy. But if you come down just a little, humans are living there, loving, struggling. Maintaining a meta perspective is valuable — but it seems like a somewhat sad way to live. Thank you all for joining us today.

Note: I tried to base Jean's responses as closely as possible on the content of the book. But there may be parts I misunderstood, and because of the conversational format, some context may have been distorted slightly. Please point out anything that seems inconsistent with his logic or his philosophy. I apologize for the length.