ABSTRACT
Humans are best adapted to living in small units within an ordered structure, whose ethics and moral standards are accepted and followed by everyone. It was not so long ago that people in villages, or in largely self-contained communities in towns, would never feel the need to lock their cars or their doors when they went out. Nowadays people live in an age of increasing pressure; pressure from information cascading in via television, radio, and the Internet; peer group pressure, both on themselves and their children; pressure from advertising, from junk mail and from “phishing”; pressure to be politically correct, and from current obsessions over health and safety. Advertising, particularly on television, pursues a relentless goal of “happiness”, portraying a picture of a world in which everyone can expect to be fulfilled by benefiting from the products and services being promoted. It is hardly surprising that sometimes this onslaught creates tensions that are tough to handle.
