Reykjavík Grapevine - 01.07.2011, Page 13

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The Reykjavík Grapevine
Issue 9 — 2011
consumption | Dysfunction
WHY! WHY MUST WE KEEP BUYING ALL THESE DELICIOUSLY EX-
PENSIVE LUXURY ITEMS! WHY ARE THEY SO IRRESTIBLE! WHY
GOD WHY!?!
Considering the vast size of the re-
cent Icelandic consumption boom that
peaked in 2007, it is remarkable how
little attention it received as it was hap-
pening and how few real explanations
have been offered for its emergence.
There are virtually no scholarly studies
of the origins and nature of Icelandic
consumerism during the boom years,
and very few critical analyses. Even
the daily press paid remarkably little
attention to the changes that were tak-
ing place in the consumption habits of
Icelanders. It wasn’t really until 2007
that we encountered critical public dis-
cussion about consumerism in Iceland.
And most of this public discussion was
neither particularly deep nor enlight-
ened.
“ReAL iceLANdeRS” ARe
coNSumeRS
It is not as if the rapidly growing con-
sumption and shifting consumption
patterns had gone unnoticed. When the
question of consumerism was raised by
politicians, it was in the context of en-
vironmentalism and was always framed
as a global problem—Westerners in
general had to consume less. There
were occasional complaints from art-
ists and academics, and when reading
the “letters to the editor” published by
the Icelandic newspapers one encoun-
ters an occasional reader complaining
about materialism and consumerism.
But these lonely voices only serve to
highlight the absence of any kind of de-
bate on the question. People grumbled
and complained, but that’s all it ever
amounted to. There was no real debate.
A closer look reveals some more sus-
tained and serious attempts to critique
or resist the advance of consumerism.
There were a few groups that voluntarily
withdrew from consumer society, mak-
ing “buy nothing” pledges—vowing not
to buy anything new, but instead rely on
sharing or fixing things that broke. Or
simply learning to go without. Some of
these were even featured in the media.
Within Icelandic youth culture we also
find criticism of consumerism and con-
sumer society. There was, for example,
a strong anti-consumerist undertone in
the “krútt” culture of the time. Bands
like Sigur Rós, múm and Trabant
presented a very critical view of con-
sumerism, materialism and the anti-
environmentalist policies of Icelandic
authorities. Furthermore, a radical crit-
icism of consumerism was central to
the anarchist and radical environmen-
talist movements that formed around
the protest against the hydro-electrical
projects and the government’s heavy-
industry policy.
In general, however, all of
t h e s e
impu lses
were met with indifference or
scorn by the general popula-
tion and the leading public in-
tellectuals. Commentators ridi-
culed the “krútt movement” as empty
and superficial, and environmentalists
were branded as spoiled or even delud-
ed middle-class children who were at-
tempting to sabotage the prosperity of
“real” Icelanders. This was the thrust of
an August 2007 op-ed by Guðmundur
Andri Thorsson, one of the most re-
spected authors in Iceland and a regular
columnist for Fréttablaðið. Guðmundur
Andri felt there was something unbe-
lievably silly about protesting Icelandic
consumerism and materialism. It was
something only a spoiled child would
do. Probably just to get attention.
A NATioN of SpoiLed chiLdReN
It is therefore interesting that at around
the same time as Guðmundur Andri
Thorsson wrote his article deriding
environmentalists and critics of con-
sumerism the extreme expressions of
Icelandic consumerism were gaining
greater attention, even from “real Ice-
landers”. We even encounter for the
first time something that could pass for
a sustained criticism of consumerism
in the Icelandic media. This discussion,
however, was almost offensively super-
ficial and simplistic: Its main thrust
was that Icelanders were by and large
simply big greedy babies who needed
to be taught a lesson. Columnists and
commentators pined for a good old-
fashioned recession to put the brakes
on the materialism of their fellow coun-
trymen. As the storm clouds of the
coming crash and crisis were gathering
they rejoiced, arguing that it would be a
good thing; it would teach people a nec-
essary lesson.
In April of 2008, for example, a col-
umnist for Fréttablaðið wrote about
how he had been sitting, eating his
lunch at a restaurant in
a shopping mall, all the
while wondering how
much better life would be
when the depression
finally hit and peo-
ple “would begin
enjoying the
t h i n g s
t h e y
a l -
ready had, instead of continually chas-
ing after something new”. Two months
later, in May, a different columnist
wrote about how discussions of an im-
pending recession had filled her with
anticipation: she would get to live in
“exciting times”. She then went on
about how Icelanders, especially people
of her generation, needed to learn some
tough lessons, arguing that standing in
line at a food bank would do the trick.
Comments like the above were a re-
occurring theme in newspaper opinion
columns from late 2007 throughout
2008, and while most (but not all) were
somewhat tongue in cheek, they also re-
vealed a certain attitude that appears to
have been very common: that Iceland-
ers were somehow so deeply wedded
to consumerism that only a recession
could cure them. The image of Icelan-
dic consumerism as a drunken binge,
complete with calls for people to “sober
up” was also frequently used.
ReceSSioN AS biTTeR mediciNe
This was also among the first impuls-
es after the depression did hit: It was
somehow good; people would now have
more time to think about “what really
mattered”, they would be cured of their
materialism and greed. The media,
eager to deliver ‘feelgood stories’, ran
with this line. In early October 2008,
Fréttablaðið devoted several pages to
interviewing a young woman who had
turned a sizable inheritance into an
even larger fortune remodelling and
building luxury homes for the Icelandic
nouveau riche. Then, when the crash
came, she lost some money on an ill-
advised investment in a fashion chain,
GK, which had catered to an upscale
c l ien- tele along with
ordinary people
in the process
of maxing out
their credit
cards. But no
worry: this lit-
tle adventure
had taught
her an lesson
that she and
the jour-
nalist felt
was so pro-
found that
it had to
be shared
with the
e n t i r e
p o p u l a -
tion: There
was more to life
than money, fancy
things and consumer-
ism!
At the same time, Arnar
Gauti Sverrisson—who hosted a life-
style show on TV station SkjárEinn
entitled ‘Innlit-útlit’, which promoted
the most vulgar form of consumerism
and snobbery for luxuries and design
goods—appeared alongside fashion
retail queen Svava Johansen in SkjárE-
inn’s public service messages, where
they urged people to think about the
importance of all those things that
money could not buy. Which sounded
pretty funny coming from people who
had built their entire careers on con-
vincing people that they indeed needed
to buy happiness and that the good life
was defined by things, clothes, furni-
ture and other stuff from the mall.
In fact, it wasn’t until the harsh re-
ality of the economic crisis really hit
home, and the lines at the food bank
actually emerged, that this kind of silly
speculation stopped. A large section of
the population was cured of consumer-
ism all right. They could not afford to
feed their families.
iceLANdeRS ARe JuST Such
SpeNdThRifTS…
This reaction to the coming depres-
sion and its beneficial potential as the
miracle cure against materialism and
consumerism underlines one thing,
namely the view that when it came to
consumption Icelanders somehow
couldn’t help themselves.
Searching the public discussion
of the years leading up to September
2008, the single most common ex-
planation that is offered for Icelandic
consumerism is that Icelanders were
simply unusually given to spend money
and buy things—because they derived
such joy from consuming. It was some
kind of a national characteristic. The
lack of critical discussion about the
origins of the consumption boom and
the emphasis on it as caused by ‘the
nature of Icelanders’ is a ref lection of
the degree to which people felt it was
indeed a natural state of affairs: During
the boom people felt there was nothing
worthy of a deeper explanation going
on.
The scorn that met artists or activ-
ists who criticised consumerism or ma-
terialism during the boom illustrates
the same point: Criticism of the boom’s
materialism was somehow fundamen-
tally illegitimate. It was an attack on the
settled order of things, the very nature
of Icelandic society and culture.
What makes this all the more fas-
cinating is that after the collapse there
was an attempt to blame artists and the
“krútt” movement for what was now
seen as the superficiality of the boom
period. Musicians and artists were also
criticised for not having been critical
enough during the boom, and for thus
being complicit in the overconsump-
tion extravaganza. Which is “kind of
unsettling, [since] there are probably
few social groups that participated less
in all the boom bullshit than artists and
musicians[,]” as Örvar of múm put it
in an August 2009 interview with the
Grapevine.
coNSumeRiSm AS A pAThoLoGy
After the crash a new consensus has
been emerging, according to which the
consumption boom was not so much a
natural expression of innate national
characteristics, but a form of disease or
addiction. Icelanders became addicted
to consumption.
Both explanations have a common
feature: Icelanders were somehow un-
able to help themselves when it came to
consumption. Whether it was caused by
the cultural genome of the people or an
addiction or disease, people were some-
how at the mercy of some unexplain-
able forces outside anyone’s control.
Both explanations conveniently absolve
the banks that peddled “easy credit”,
advertisers who sold people “affordable
luxuries”, the lifestyle industry that
convinced people they needed a make-
over for themselves or their kitchens,
let alone the larger social or economic
structures.
It also diverts attention from the
commentators and columnists as well
as the cultural Brahmin, who not only
failed to raise serious questions about
the rampant materialism and consum-
erism of Icelandic society, but went so
far as to deride and scold those who did.
No, the focus is on the individual
moral failure of those Icelanders who
fell victim to consumerism, all those
people who bought f lat screen TVs or
travel trailers on credit.
whoSe fAuLT wAS The
GiANT iceLANdic
coNSumpTioN boom?
Banks, merchants and media are all innocent—so it must have been you!
“The scorn that met artists or activists who criticised
consumerism or materialism during the boom illustrates
the same point: Criticism of the boom’s materialism was
somehow fundamentally illegitimate.”
words
Magnús Sveinn Helgason
photography
Skari
Columnists and commentators
pined for a good old-fashioned
recession to put the brakes on the
materialism of their fellow coun-
trymen. As the storm clouds of
the coming crash and crisis were
gathering they rejoiced, arguing
that it would be a good thing; it
would teach people a necessary
lesson.