Mature Capitalism

Capitalism is geared toward giving people what they want. It can also reshape people so that they want what capitalism has to give.

There's a tension between giving kids what they want and disciplining them so that they grow up. American capitalism is sort of a bizarre elaboration of the principle of "giving kids what they want", and something like Pol Pot's regime in Cambodia is a very negative (and more bizarre) example of an elaboration of the principle of "disciplining kids" / "giving kids what they don't want because it's better for them". They were taskmasters who worked people to death in pursuit of a more moral society.

Communists and capitalists might both justify themselves by fear of each other. Illiberal (Communist, traditional Muslim, traditional Orthodox civilization, perhaps other) governments and societies might fear consumerism's spiritual and cultural acid, while liberal (capitalist, democratic, Western) might fear illiberalism's literal or figurative abuse of children, the way they make "children" (or children) unhappy, or unhappy in the extreme. If I wanted to side with the illiberals, I would most easily find common cause with their fear of the worst of liberalism, including capitalist consumerism as it keeps people from maturity. Stifling or underfeeding maturity is dangerous, as much as abuse is.

What if children grow up to become adults in capitalist societies, and with their consumer freedom, make choices based in maturity, which capitalism then eagerly instantiates? Maybe this is the way to avoid the two extremes -- freedom (consumerism), which is being used with maturity (discipline).

How is capitalism bending us? Is it bending us toward maturity, or away from it? What kind of producer would make a product, or what kind of service industry would make a service, that would be best consumed by a mature person and less so by an immature person? That producer or service industry would have a motive to bend and organize consumer psychology in the direction of maturity.

(But it's better not to bend people toward maturity. But what about encouraging maturity, or making space for it?)

If such products or services can't be conceived of, is it possible for mature consumers to push back against capitalism? Is there a way for mature consumers to organize? Companies have their "bottom line" at stake (which is their ability to avoid starvation, or something like that), so they are very motivated to do what they do. Can consumers be as serious as them, even though their consumption patterns aren't life and death to them (aren't as obviously life and death)?

I'm not really sure what spiritually mature consumption looks like, other than maybe giving to charities, or better, to more- or most-effective charities (it's mature to want your money to actually do good). So maybe the industry or group that is pioneering mature (rather than merely "late") capitalism is effective altruism. But perhaps there are other ways to promote spiritually mature consumption that I can't think of right now.