#10 My Beef With Ads

Hello Again,

Advertisements really piss me off. Don't get me wrong, there are a few good commercials and ads that actually have a good product/service and explain what it is and how it works in an interesting way. Bonus points if it's funny. The issue is that most ads aren't at all like that.

Sometimes you don't know what the product is, or what it does, or why it exists. It would be really nice if they listed the prices on every ad too, so it's easy to know what might be worth your time and what you should avoid. Some things are worth their price and some are expensive for the sake of being expensive. I always appreciate ads where they tell you the price. Every business should be doing that.

Mobile ads in particular are the worst. I hate when they don't let you escape them. There's no "x" to click on to close the ad. Sometimes it takes time to appear and sometimes it never does. I have to exit out of my mobile games sometimes cause I've been sitting here for two minutes waiting for some stupid x to appear and it's not appearing. That's how you make a person hate your company.

Not to mention when you click on the ad, even to get rid of it, and it takes you to the page to buy that thing. You can't force someone to buy or download whatever your advertising. Ads like that are the worst.

It really really sucks that so many things around us are designed to sell us things. There are ads and billboards and commercials and tiktoks and ad placements in shows and movies. It's everywhere. Everywhere you turn someone is trying to get you to give them your money in exchange for some thing that you probably don't need and possibly won't care about a month from now. It's horrendous.

Obviously people can live how they wanna live, but I don't think we should be consuming everything all the time. The things we buy should be things we'll either use, cherish, or both. They should bring us ease, comfort, joy even.

My grandpa owned a lot of things, and when he died it was tough to go through it all and decide what to do with it. He had things everywhere, some products still in unopened boxes, even expensive things. Turns out, he was spending his retirement money on things he didn't need, and he had so much that he didn't even use some of the things he bought. That was wild to see and made me realize that I don't want to even risk going down that path. Now obviously I'm not a lonely old man, but even as a young person I still think it's important that I make an effort not to become a shopaholic like he was.

For a while it was a struggle. I'd grown up a little poor, so once I had a job and was lucky enough to have some savings, I bought whatever I wanted. It didn't matter if it served a purpose or if there was room for it, I wanted everything cute, fun, and comfortable. Now I've narrowed down what I own and I'm trying my best to only buy things I'll use and/or derive joy from. It's difficult, but if I can make it a habit to be deliberate and slow when I buy things, to treat my possessions more like investments in my life, I think my life will be better for it.

Sorry for the rant. Although I guess that's why you're here. Until next time.

-V 🩵