Blissful Unawareness?  – Materialism in the Eastern Bloc, Part 2

I believe the biggest problem when it comes to materialism in the Eastern Bloc is that we all were able to watch West German TV and advertisements. Except for “the valley of the clueless“, Dresden and the northeast, where not even the best antennas could receive West German public TV signals.

It might be a hard comparison, but thinking about it now, it’s just like seeing all the things we don’t need but are told to purchase by prettier, smarter, and more successful influencers. It’s friends creating mirages online of their ideal lives by posting their best picture of the week on social media. 

Now, Imagine all of this gone! It’s difficult, I know. But humor me. First, imagine a world without the Internet. Almost impossible, isn’t it? Then imagine all billboards gone. Reduce all advertisements in magazines by 98%. Take away all colorful storefronts, and window decorations. In fact, take away all the bright colors, and colors that diverge too far from prime colors, like pink and turquoise. That’s what it was like in East Germany during the 80s and 90s.

I remember my mom telling me when I was a kid that there used to be advertisements on East German TV. But since the products then weren’t always available they resorted to advertising for cabbage and lentils until they finally stopped in 1976, a few years before I was born.

Now, envision watching vibrant West German public TV with advertisements amidst this East German economic desert. They were not Fata Morganas, because we all knew that a country existed, where you could walk right into a store at any day and time, and buy what you have seen on the telly a moment ago.

For us watching the commercial breaks on TV was as popular as the shows and movies themselves. We knew all the slogans, and jingles by heart. The „Second German Television“, ZDF, even had the Mainzelmännchen, little funny cartoon characters, appear between ads.

Begging my mother to watch a little more TV before going to bed, I would say: „Nur noch die kurzen Bunten.“, „Just the short colorful ones.“

I know how my mental health and wallet benefit from cutting social media. Would materialism in East Germany have taken a different turn, if nicely bottled water hadn’t been dangled in front of our noses in a commercial wasteland all the time?