Volcov 1

Andrei Volcov
Ms. Leah Minor
Grade 9 English Block D
1 December 2016
How Marketing and Corporations can affect People and entire Nations

In his novel, Feed, MT Anderson, presents a utopian world, where everything is perfect,
people have access to internet very fast and the lives are much easier than are in our times. But,
every utopian world comes with its disadvantages, which can affect the society, the relationships
between people, and let corporations rule the world with the help of money, fame and power, and
also, the help of the marketing and consumerism. All those ideas show that marketing and
overusing technology will be more important than having a relationship with a person, or doing
normal things. Marketing has reached high stakes, such as: there are commercials based on the
feed users personal preferences, flooding the users with commercials, making them to buy the
products, just for the companies to make profits out of people.
Marketing products to the American public, is the primary objective of the feed, and we
see this through the ever present commercials. For example, when Titus and his friends arrive on
the moon, their feeds get really busy with ads and Titus says, I was getting bannered so hard
(Anderson 8). Those ads are showing because Titus and his friends are in a very popular and a
touristic area, so, companies can make money out of people while having fun on the moon. Early
in the book, there are multiple commercials for different companies, which try to sell their own
products by promoting intensively, one advertisement stating: months summer styles, and the

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word on the street is squeaky (Anderson 15). Those commercials, although, dont get to the
whole nation, as only 73% of the people have the feed, the rest of the people not having the
necessary money to pay for an expensive gadget like feed, being stated by Violet in a message to
Titus: My fathers family didnt have the money to buy feeds for my dad and my uncle. The
feeds were newer then, and they were the most expensive (Anderson 224). Focusing on the
main character, Titus, because of the grief he was expressing because of the death of Violet, he
has bought a lot of jeans, seen in the commercials. Many commercials are made to comfort the
feed user, by making him / her feeling special. However, at the money that Titus has spent on
those jeans, buying more than 100 pairs, can have a financial impact on the family.
Another big consequence of over-marketing in this book would be that marketing and
indirectly corporations and establishments have taken over the United States federal
government, ruling many government branches, such as Education, Energy and many more. For
example, there arent any federal-run schools, many schools are being School, meaning
trademark, which show us that the school has become a corporation, not a place to learn, Titus
saying: now that School is run by corporations, its pretty brag, because it teaches us how the
world can be used, like mainly how to use our feeds (Anderson 110). Furthermore, corporations
and marketing have an impact on the life quality of people, creating air factories, due to the lack
of forests, subtly trees to create the necessary oxygen and fresh air for the numerous people
living in the United States. Moreover, companies taking over government has left the president
as the leading image of the country, not being fully in charge to run the country.
In addition, marketing has affected peoples lifestyles and personal relationships. In the
book, it is stated that Violet wants to fight the feed, how marketing wants to grasp peoples
thoughts and to turn the people into something they are not. Violet hasnt had the feed for as long

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as Titus had, so, she has known a life without over marketing and commercialism, for example,
Violet saying: theyre also waiting to make you want things. Everything weve grown up with,
the stories on the feed, the games, all of that its all stream-lining our personalities so were
easier to sell to . Then they try and figure out who you are, and to make you conform to one of
their types for easy marketing. Its like a spiral: they keep making everything more basic, so we
get less and less varied, more simple. (Anderson 97).
Having in mind that marketing is at the fingertips of the big corporations, and it always
be, its easily to manipulate people through excessive advertisements, excessive advertisements
which are spread through the feed, make companies richer and famous and reliable in order to
rule a country. Also, marketing has destroyed the man, by creating a simple man, common with
all others, making easier for the countries to create an easy advertisement for all the people.

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Works Cited
Anderson, M. T. Feed. Cambridge, MA: Candlewick, 2002. Print.