Smug, smug parents

Madge’s PTA is inviting people to an event, and I think I might have to go just to see.
And maybe rile up some people, depending on how much coffee I will have had.
The event is by “an investigative journalist, broadcaster, and … parent” and is called, “Buy, Buy Baby: How Consumer Culture Manipulates Parents and Harms Young Minds.” It’s based, of course, on material from her new book.
Why isn’t it entitled, “Fret, Fret Parent: How the Media Attacks Itself to Sell Itself” or some such.
In other words, how is this talk/topic/discussion different from what it purportedly “exposes”?
Sure, who doesn’t hate the endless “I want, I want” from their kids? But isn’t that part of growing up? And, more to the point, we happen to live in a consumer culture. If kids don’t understand how it works, how are they going to fend for themselves when their time comes – which is sooner than any of us would like to acknowledge?
How can anyone claim that consumer culture is harmful and still justify living in NYC?
I have yet to hear someone say they moved to NYC to get away from it all.

In other words, I’ll be going in order to see how many people I can alienate before noon.