Conspicuous consumption

Conspicuous consumption is a term introduced by the American economist Thorstein Veblen, in The Theory of the Leisure Class (1899).

In the context of psychoactive substances

Some link this also to chemical addiction, arguing that self-titration of psychoactive substances, or "self-medication", becomes near-pandemic in cultures where pleasure-seeking behaviors have reached such pathological proportions. Inflamed hedonic expectations among the affected population can then result in normalizing of anti-social, borderline and narcissistic behaviors as economic and political processes, e.g. a "moral panic" leading to mob violence, support for religious fundamentalism, or an unexamined push to a war. An alternate view is that most civilizations have accepted one or more drugs of choice and embedded them into their society, e.g. caffeine, coca, alcohol, tobacco, peyote, cannabis, and that it is encounters with strange poorly-socialized drugs that lead in general to these unpredictable behaviors, not the consumption urge as such. Historically, epidemics of pathological consumption among large groups have ended when a group exhausted available resources or when the pathology of consumption led to self-destructive behavior.

Related Topics:
Chemical addiction - Self-medication - Pandemic - Pathological - Hedonic - Narcissistic - Moral panic - Mob violence - Religious fundamentalism - War - Civilization - Drugs of choice - Caffeine - Coca - Alcohol - Tobacco - Peyote - Cannabis

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