PERAN KELUARGA DI ERA BUDAYA KONSUMEN

Abstract

The development of consumer culture that increasingly strengthened creates very significant cultural implications in society. Shift in the meaning of the commodity-value products in order to be a symbolic value, impact on changes in consumption practices that originally was based on making the benefits of the exchange of goods became a symbol of space and social identity. Commodities in turn are consumed to obtain all the identities, symbols, images and signs attached to it. This in turn creates a culture where performance immanence (the things that are surface) occupies a higher position than anything substantial. Consequently, people are trapped in the banality of morality and spirituality, which considers moral and spiritual issues as being trivial. Cultural impact is of course very crucial to be addressed so that people are not getting mired in a cycle of low moral and spiritual culture that would degrade the quality of humanity itself. In this case, the role of all levels of society needs to be revitalized, and one of them is family. Family as the basic unit of society has many functions that are essential to be developed to address the strengthening of consumer culture. Various functions, such as religious function, social cultural function, charity function, the function of protecting, reproductive function, the function of socialization and education, including the economic and environmental development function, can make an important contribution to the construction of individual personality and social action. Internalizing the values of religion, social, cultural and other social capital will be affecting the actions and social practices. In relation to the negative impacts of consumer culture, education for religious values which is related to the dimension of the divine becomes the counterculture to overcome the culture of immanence in the consumer culture. Reliance transcendental becomes an important mechanism to sensitize the public on the need for transcendence to improve the quality of our humanity. In addition, efficient internalization of culture or modest consumption (moderate) as confirmed in faith should be done to limit the desire for being consumptive. This value needs to be emphasized because it has a positive impact for the future protection of family and community in both the short and long term.