Propaganda, Our Buying Habits, and Modern Medicine Part 1

This past week, headlines went out proclaiming the next major pandemic as a new strain of Staph bacteria that is resistant to many different kinds of antibiotics. And that got me thinking (scary thought, I know). It got me thinking about a singular concept that comes close to defying the logic that the mass media (to be known from here on out as Propaganda Networks) wants us to have:

Media manipulates our buying habits by creating new scares that the uninformed will buy into, and therefore buy products relating to. This boosts their ratings so that certain advertisers will benefit by having your eyes and/or ears for that much longer to peddle their wares.



Explanation:
The most recent scare about Staph has everyone running around like headless chickens looking for hand sanitizers, anti-pathogen wipes, and cleaning products. Unfortunately, the use of those products are what is directly attributable to compromised immune systems in many children and adults.
See, a few weeks ago, a little known article was published that says that sometimes, a little dirt is a good thing. That made the headlines for less than two days. Go fig, it allows for a common sense approach to cleaning without advocating dirt. Still, did the average person hear about it? Of course not, but for those of us who did, we suddenly have the Staph scare to scare us back into buying those same products that could have done us harm. Apparently, this Staph bit has been going on for a few years, but only after that article came out, did the need to reshape our habits become apparent to the marketers. Then again, if it was really a problem, would we know?
Or how about global warming? Soon after folks started questioning it, the news started showing the benefits of ethanol and bio-fuels. Yet again, facts were omitted that are only showing up now, such as how diverted food crops have lead to a surge in food prices and the potential that using food crops for fuel for things other than our bodies might be a bad idea. But our buying habits have been altered. Right down to those folks who bought hybrids that will never achieve the savings they think they will.

Part 2 will be written next week examining the role of modern medicine and how it is potentially damaging the species.