"Is the American Dream Becoming Too Materialistic?" By Shanzeh Khurram
A Pakistan native shares her view of American society in this article about the growing impact of materialism in the American Dream. The way Khurram sees modern day America is, "...a nation obsessed with shopping and buying unnecessary products." People are no longer satisfied with a nice house and a couple of cars but are almost sick with a constant need for more, more, more, no matter what the cost. Ellen Goodman is quoted saying, "Normal is getting dressed in clothes that you buy for work and driving through traffic in a car that you are still paying for, in order to get to the job you need to pay for the clothes and the car, and the house you leave vacant all day so you can afford to live in it." This statement defines what the American Dream has now become.
American society is so caught up in having things, that we let material items control our lives and convince us that they are a source of contentment. People define their worth based on the cost of their possessions when in all reality, this in no way fulfills an individual's hunger for happiness. In fact, the worse materialism gets, the farther from happiness a person will be. The more things you want, the more you'll have to work. The more you work, the less time you have to yourself to be free and enjoy life, making you feel unfulfilled. This unfulfillment leads you to think that maybe you just need more stuff, therefore trapping you in a constant cycle of dissatisfaction. We live in a society where using your time slaving away at a job in order to pay for a ridiculously glorified pair of shoes is more important than pursuing your passions and spending time getting to know yourself away from society's touch.
One of the biggest things America's materialism leads us to be obsessed with is technology. Everyone feels the need to have the newest and greatest gadgets, even if we don't even remotely need them. This constant purchasing of fancy new electronics has led to an outrageous overuse of our technology as seen by the following graph.
American society is so caught up in having things, that we let material items control our lives and convince us that they are a source of contentment. People define their worth based on the cost of their possessions when in all reality, this in no way fulfills an individual's hunger for happiness. In fact, the worse materialism gets, the farther from happiness a person will be. The more things you want, the more you'll have to work. The more you work, the less time you have to yourself to be free and enjoy life, making you feel unfulfilled. This unfulfillment leads you to think that maybe you just need more stuff, therefore trapping you in a constant cycle of dissatisfaction. We live in a society where using your time slaving away at a job in order to pay for a ridiculously glorified pair of shoes is more important than pursuing your passions and spending time getting to know yourself away from society's touch.
One of the biggest things America's materialism leads us to be obsessed with is technology. Everyone feels the need to have the newest and greatest gadgets, even if we don't even remotely need them. This constant purchasing of fancy new electronics has led to an outrageous overuse of our technology as seen by the following graph.