How is that different than any other global online market place? Even Amazon tries to put additional things in my shopping cart without me ever asking for it
this post was submitted on 05 Jun 2025
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I've never used SHEIN so I can't tell if they are using these practices or how bad they are, but from the article I see they allegedly use fake urgency messaging, which I know has been sanctioned before in the EU (the company I used to work with had to rush removing it from our eCommerce site).
A company can tell you that the item you're looking at happens to be the last one in stock, if it's true. But if they lie about it, so you rush into a decision to buy it before it's gone, then it's a deceptive practice.
Everyone does that all the time though. I can't remember the last time I bought something online that wasn't supposedly either the last one in stock or one of like 5 left. It's obviously bullshit and everyone is doing it.
It's one of those things where periodically someone gets sanctioned and a few others get scared and stop doing it (or tone it down) for a while.
I guess SHEIN are either overdoing it or they crossed the popularity threshold where companies become more scrutinized
I guess I'm just old school and pretty impervious to buying shit I don't need.
No you're not. Advertising, propaganda, and overconsumption impacts everyone.
The "you are not immune to propaganda" meme may also be propaganda depending on who and when it's being used.
It is definitely propaganda against propaganda, everything is propaganda.
There's "good" propaganda and "bad" propaganda, and whether you think any propaganda is "good" or "bad' is propaganda in itself just by sharing such an opinion.
It can also be propaganda against something that obviously true. It can be used to gaslight people into not believing their own eyes. Like being told that Trump isn't leading to a more hateful country and it's only twitter memes that make him look bad.
Absolutely, and being repeatedly reminded to get your COVID or measles shots is "positive" propaganda. Herd immunity is objectively a good thing, but any sort of PSA is propaganda. (please get your shots)
It's like the word "consequence", people always think consequences are always bad, when you could say "I got rich as a consequence of winning the lottery", or, re-worded, "I won the lottery, and consequently, I became rich".
Bref, if you are not immune to positive propaganda, you are also not immune to negative propaganda.
Honestly this would most likely work very well as advertising, and generate a lot of free publicity around the unconventionality of it all.
A marketer's pride would never let them tell the truth.
Yet some people are able to not buy shit just because they see it on a site, so maybe not everyone is like you say
You don't have to have a total lack of self control to be prone to overconsumption. That's a caricature you have in your mind that's main function is to make you feel better about your own habits which keeps many from examining their habits in any detail.
I also run a lot of ad blockers and tracking blockers as well as educate myself on how advertisers use people's insecurities against them. The "How TV Ruined Your Life" series is a pretty comprehensive. Coercion by Douglas Rushkoff is also great for immunizing yourself.
edit: Updated with links. The core of Coercion is still relevant, but it's tech/internet perspective was from the early 2000s.
Dark Patterns is a broad term, but it's also the worst aspect of commercialising "free" software/web services etc.
I hope the term is already part of whatever regulations the EU has there, and I hope this and similar complaints succeed.
I’m hopeful too. We need things like this to start moving in the opposite direction.
The internet and surveillance capitalism have allowed for hyper optimized psychological manipulation. It’s long past time for regulations to catch up.
Trump could solve this but he’s a coward. I got downvoted last time I said this but I’ll repeat it, the tariffs were a good thing as they would absolutely destroy this consumerist culture we live in. The degrowth is a feature not a bug.
But Trump doesnt have the balls to do it and whatever neocon/neoliberal ends up in power next won’t do it either so I guess we’ll just drown in funko pops and cheap slave made clothing.
The problem with these tariffs, implemented in this way, is that the less wealthy has to shoulder the shock and most of the loss of wealth, while the most wealthy solidify their place in society on several levels. The social balance of power further shifts toward the billionaires.
Tarriffs are better applied for protecting existing small and mid-size businesses in danger of being wiped out by huge foreign operations, and protecting industries that have national security roles.
The key here is they would be applied before we lose the capacity - not decades after we already adjusted to the loss.
On this side of the curve it is more productive to subsidize operations that can (re)build the capacity we seek. Biden's work with TSMC was a prime example. This approach is less disruptive. Even then, targeted tarriffs can be productive.
We could have saved our solar industry. We decided to let China sell priduct at a loss until their competition went out of business or left because no profit could be achieved. This is where tariffs make sense.
I don't think you're wrong de facto, and the intentions of the tariffs are certainly different from the results.
Not a Trump supporter btw, just skeptical of each and every neocon/neolib that sets foot near business regulations and PAC money.