Children's birthday parties as Potlatching: cultural evolution in action.Sat 20th Jan.
The subject of the enormous amounts of money frequently being spent on children's birthday parties, especially in terms of "goodie bags" given to all the guests to take home, often with expensive electronic items inside, came up on, I think the today programme, yesterday.It is a prime example of how more and more money is being used as a substitute for loving attention and I've said enough on this site already about what a totally inappropriate substitute it is.But the institution of the goodie bag, which hardly existed when I was a child, is an interesting variation that I relate to the cultural practice of potlatching in use among some North American Indians.To obtain status and high prestige a chief would give away vast amounts of real and symbolic wealth.Clearly the goodie bag practice was instituted by parents originally although now of course children demand it; and I suggest the purpose was buying popularity and status for their child (this would be more or less unconsciously to take the place of the time and attention that was not being given by the parent, no doubt being spent on earning the money to raise the family status and give the child "a better start").A sort of surrogate potlatching which like the original is naturally spiralling out of control.
