Dept. of No Shit, Sherlock

From Brandweeks’ daily email comes this teaser of a story titled “Media Blamed for Bad Economy“:

Consumers feel advertising encouraged people to buy things they couldn’t really afford

Ummmm….yeah. That’s what advertising does. It creates the impression that if you only buy this brand of floor cleaner, this brand of microwavable pizza pockets, this brand of lawn care product you will have the beautiful house/grateful kids/fulfilled spouse/immaculate yard/perfect family experience/whatever else you might be longing for that you aspire to attain. Most of those things, though, are wholly unnecessary and just create gaping holes in your checking account, as well as more stuff in a landfill and more toxins in the ground and water.

The media isn’t to blame for the bad economy. A culture that rewards the accumulation of stuff is.