Opinion | Needs or Market-Made Desires?

We live in a world where people do not simply buy things because they need them; rather things persuade people to buy them. The marketplace has changed from a place where we fulfil our needs into a powerful system that creates new desires in us every day. From the moment we wake up until we go to sleep, advertisements surround us. They appear on our phones, television screens, roads, newspapers and social media. They tell us what to wear, what to eat, which car to drive, which mobile phone to carry and even what kind of life we should desire.

The most powerful word in this entire commercial world is perhaps “new.” A new model has arrived. A new design has been introduced. A new version is available. A new lifestyle is waiting for you. Slowly, we have allowed the word “new” to become almost synonymous with “better.” This is where the real problem begins. Something does not become better simply because it is newer. A new product may be useful but at the same time it may also be unnecessary. An old product may be outdated, but it may also be perfectly functional. The real measure should be quality, usefulness, necessity and durability—not merely freshness or newness. But advertisements rarely encourage us to think in this way.

Consider the mobile phone in our hands. It may be working perfectly. Its battery may be good, its camera may satisfy our needs and it may perform every task we require. Then a new model appears. Suddenly, the phone that served us so well yesterday begins to look old. We are made to feel that our device is no longer fashionable even though nothing has actually changed in its usefulness. This is the subtle power of consumerism. The market does not always sell us a product; sometimes it first creates a feeling of inadequacy and then sells us the product as a solution. We are made to believe that our lives are incomplete, our appearance insufficient, our homes unimpressive or our personalities somehow behind the times. Then a product is placed before us as the answer.

When we feel that a new dress will make us attractive. A new car will make us respectable. An expensive watch will make us successful. A particular mobile phone will make us modern. Gradually, the product stops being an object of utility and becomes a symbol of identity. This is where the magic of brands becomes even stronger. A brand is no longer merely a name printed on a product. It has become a story. We associate certain brands with success, elegance, wealth, sophistication and social status. Sometimes two products of similar quality are placed before us, but we are willing to pay considerably more for the famous name. Why is it so? Because we are not always buying the object. We are buying the image attached to it. A branded shirt becomes a symbol of status. A particular car becomes a symbol of achievement. A luxury watch becomes a statement about personality. A smartphone becomes a sign of modernity.

The most successful advertisement is therefore not the one we see on television. It is the one that continues to operate inside our minds after the advertisement has disappeared. When a person begins to think, without seeing an advertisement, that he is inferior without a particular brand, that he is unsuccessful without an expensive possession, or that he is falling behind without the latest model, the advertisement has achieved its ultimate victory. It has moved from the screen into the mind.

This phenomenon deserves particular attention in the age of social media. Today, advertisements do not merely tell us what to buy; they show us how other people are supposedly living. Perfect homes, fashionable clothes, expensive holidays, luxurious cars and carefully designed lifestyles appear before us every day. We compare our ordinary lives with these carefully constructed images and begin to feel that something is missing. But the truth is that much of what we see is an advertisement disguised as a lifestyle.

The another casualty of this culture is contentment. The more we possess, the more we sometimes feel that we lack. Our wardrobes are full, yet we complain that we have nothing suitable to wear. Our homes contain countless objects, yet we constantly search for more. We replace things that still work simply because newer versions have arrived. In this endless race, satisfaction becomes temporary. The excitement of a new purchase lasts for a while, and then another desire appears.

In the race of chasing new things and new models we forget that there is something particularly beautiful about old things that the modern marketplace can’t sell. That beautiful thing is the memories associated with old things. An old watch may remind us of our father. An old chair may carry the memory of a grandparent. An old book may remind us of our youth. A simple piece of clothing may be connected to an unforgettable occasion. Such things may have little commercial value, but they can possess enormous emotional value.

A new object can be purchased with money, but a memory cannot. This does not mean that everything old must be preserved. Things that are broken, useless or unnecessarily occupying space should certainly be discarded. But an object should not be rejected merely because a newer version has entered the market. We need to recover the ability to ask ourselves a simple question before buying: Do I really need this? This question may sound ordinary, but in a world built around constant consumption, it is a powerful question.

Parents have an especially important responsibility here. Children are growing up in a world where advertisements begin influencing them at an extremely young age. They must be taught that expensive does not necessarily mean superior, famous does not necessarily mean valuable, and new does not necessarily mean better. They should learn that the value of a thing lies in its usefulness, quality and genuine necessity rather than in its newness.

Ultimately, the problem is not the existence of advertisements, brands or new products. These are natural parts of modern economic life. The problem begins when they start making decisions on our behalf. We should use the market without becoming its slaves. We should enjoy material comforts without allowing them to define our worth. We should buy new things when they genuinely improve our lives, but we should also have the confidence to keep the old ones when they continues to serve us and are useful to us. After all, a human being is more valuable than the things he owns. The real freedom of a consumer is not the freedom to buy everything. It is the freedom to say “I do not need this” even when the entire market is telling him that he does. Perhaps the day we learn to distinguish between need and desire, quality and fashion, usefulness and status, the spell of advertising will begin to weaken. And perhaps then we will discover an important truth: we do not need to own everything that the world tells us to desire in order to live a meaningful life. Things should serve human beings. Human beings should never become servants of things.

(The author teaches Geography at GDC Anantnag and can be reached at rather1294@gmail.com)