Advertising costs entrench incumbents by replacing competition with exclusion

Evidence

On it, chalk-white, was a careful imitation of awkward writing. The words said: ‘What we want is Watney’s.’ The brand of beer was presented like a political slogan. Not only does this billboard give an insight into the nature of up-to-date propaganda, which sells its slogans as well as its wares, just as here the wares masquerade as a slogan; the type of relationship suggested by the billboard, in which masses make a commodity recommended to them the object of their own action, is in fact found again as the pattern for the reception of light music. They need and demand what has been palmed off on them. They overcome the feeling of impotence that creeps over them in the face of monopolistic production by identifying themselves with the inescapable product. — Theodor W. Adorno, The Culture Industry, 98 (#expands, via linked claim)

Categorization

• XREF: connects to: Advertising compels consumers to identify with and demand the products imposed on them — Theodor W. Adorno, The Culture Industry: Selected Essays…, 98; Advertising’s suspicion-inducing logic extends to political propaganda

Broader Connections

• Advertising compels consumers to identify with and demand the products imposed on them #expands (0.80) — Theodor W. Adorno, The Culture Industry, 98
• Advertising’s suspicion-inducing logic extends to political propaganda #expands (0.78)