Our media and advertisements tell us we should be growing in economic production, status, strength, and power. If these are our values as a society, what does that say about the way we choose to live? We have moved from a culture of basic needs to one infatuated with luxury items and technological advancements. Essentially, we are being told what to wear, how to spend our free time, and what our homes should look like. Of course we still have our freedom of choice, yet sometimes that seems impossible with the onslaught of advertisements ultimately brainwashing us. “Advertising is the art of arresting the human intelligence just long enough to get money from it”(De Graaf). We are truly living in a pivotal era where the choices of our wasteful lifestyles are having significant effects. Now we must choose to reform our way of thinking and try to salvage what we have destroyed, or continue in our ways and face the numerous irreversible obstructions that lay in our path.