"We are certainly influenced by role models, and if we are surrounded by images of beautiful rich people, we will start to think that to be beautiful and rich is very important - just as in the Middle Ages, people were surrounded by images of religious piety"
About this Quote
De Botton is smuggling a moral critique into a calm, almost anthropological observation: what we call “personal values” are often just the wallpaper. The line works because it refuses the self-flattering story that we freely choose what matters. Instead, it treats desire as a social technology. Put enough curated faces, luxury interiors, and effortless lives in your field of vision and your brain starts treating wealth and attractiveness less like optional goals and more like civic duties.
The Middle Ages comparison is doing two jobs at once. First, it punctures our modern superiority complex. We like to imagine medieval people as credulous, hypnotized by icons and stained glass; de Botton’s point is that we’re not less impressionable, we’ve just swapped saints for celebrities and salvation for status. Second, it reframes contemporary glamour as a kind of secular religion: images don’t merely reflect what a culture admires, they train the public in what to revere, what to feel guilty about lacking, what to pursue as proof of worth.
The subtext is sharper than it looks: if the environment manufactures priorities, then “choice” becomes a weak defense. Consumer culture gets to plead neutrality - it’s just entertainment, just advertising - while quietly setting the agenda for anxiety and aspiration. De Botton’s intent isn’t to scold beauty or money; it’s to expose the system that makes them feel spiritually consequential, then acts surprised when people organize their lives around them.
The Middle Ages comparison is doing two jobs at once. First, it punctures our modern superiority complex. We like to imagine medieval people as credulous, hypnotized by icons and stained glass; de Botton’s point is that we’re not less impressionable, we’ve just swapped saints for celebrities and salvation for status. Second, it reframes contemporary glamour as a kind of secular religion: images don’t merely reflect what a culture admires, they train the public in what to revere, what to feel guilty about lacking, what to pursue as proof of worth.
The subtext is sharper than it looks: if the environment manufactures priorities, then “choice” becomes a weak defense. Consumer culture gets to plead neutrality - it’s just entertainment, just advertising - while quietly setting the agenda for anxiety and aspiration. De Botton’s intent isn’t to scold beauty or money; it’s to expose the system that makes them feel spiritually consequential, then acts surprised when people organize their lives around them.
Quote Details
| Topic | Ethics & Morality |
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