Yes, that's my take. I'm of the opinion we should outlaw advertising. If your product is good, word will spread via word-of-mouth.

But then, I don't exist to do business. Acquiring profit isn't my goal. Acquiring status, rank, or advantage over my fellows isn't my goal. Its the goal of those we let run roughshod over the rest of us justified by phrases like "well its just human nature to be greedy; nothing to be done!" or "If I don't do it someone else will!"

This is how low we've sunk: lying is so normalized that we can't envison a world without it.

I think if we strengthened fraud provision we eliminate many societal problems, including marketing. If marketers were required to be completely honest and transparent, a lot of this goes away.

Because a megacorporation hires psychologists (in the form of marketers) to gin up scenarios where class mobility is implied as a subtext in the acquisition of their goods? I mean, who doesn't want to have the fun/get the girls/get the money because they bought {insert product here}?

How is one to defend one's self against the constant onslaught of bullshit meant to part fools with their money? How is an individual supposed to have any defenses against that? When they're raised in an endless din of lying noise?

Yours is the classic _abusers take_. "If only you were a better person you could stand up for yourself"

Because you are a generally honest and trusting person and so you believe them when they lie to you.

What? What does it mean for a comment on the internet to be non-zero accountability?

no,thats true and honest marketing. If the iPod stopped working after a year (low quality), or was easily hackable (low effort) - and they didn't include that in the marketing - then it would be lying (Windows).