Merchant of Cool

This documentary ties back to Foucault's idea of popular culture. Popular culture influence people's thinking and identity. In the documentary, popular culture reinforces the status quo of patriarchy and objectification of women. It influences people to conform to the status quo in order to "fit in" and "be cool", which ties back to the idea of hegemony. American popular culture capitalizes on youth, appealing to teenagers who have the most indisposable income. It runs on capitalism, influencing people to buy more to adapt to the ever changing popular culture in order to be "cool". However, it causes many teenagers to have self esteem issue as they can't keep up with popular culture's demands. Popular culture also capitalizes on that, making people buy things in order to assimilate and be "cool".