The idea of "Mass Culture" and "Popular Culture" as expressed by the Fiske piece intrigues me. The round and round circle that the two are working in, to keep up and distance oneself from each other, says a lot about the choice that people are given.
Mass culture and the production and distribution of commodities that are seen as "wanted" by people, is a capitalistic industry that constantly takes advantage of peoples needs.
Popular culture is combined of so many ideas that are all in excess and not even apart of the norm or what people want.
For myself these two industries are extremely hard to escape and therefore I kind of ignore the role that they play in my life, which is such a huge one. Today I kind of watched and paid closer attention to the images, products and ideas that I am always bombarded with. I caught myself saying "I want" in my head so much... "I want that shirt, coffee, jewellery..." All of these wants are definitely not needs and I don't even know why I feel the urge to get them... because of popular culture and what I constantly see around me, I want to fit in. It's like I am in grade two again and I want to be friends with the cool kids. It is a hard circle that we all keep running around in, you want to be unique, different and individual, so mass culture caterers to that and you end up running after popular culture like you have been left behind.