Abstract
This article uses archival material from the South African reality television show “I blew it” to explore the notion of happiness and consumption as it relates to township masculinities in the South African context. The program follows the lives of people who inherited fortunes from their deceased parents, got compensated by government for being involved in a road accident, or played lottery and won millions of Rand. Most of the beneficiaries blew their money becoming poor again. The experiences of these people are usually framed within the framework of conspicuous consumption born out of the need to announce one’s newly found status as the big man signified by, in most instances, having a lot of money, dating different women, and participating in rituals such as “ostentatious consumption.”
Introduction
Popular culture has a way of speaking to a society’s conceptualization of happiness. South African rapper, Big Zulu,
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released a song, Imali Eningi (translated from IsiZulu: A lot of Money) expressing his wishes for having a lot of money to be happy. In the song, he intimates that money must be spent, so that “we would go and work for more.” His longing for a lot of money is meant for his wallet to bulge, drive him crazy, and to afford to eat a lot of meat and forget about his daily and boring poor man’s food. He also dreams of buying an expensive car, drive into the hostel where girls would want to touch him—because he is rich—and get selfies with him and he would take them away from their boyfriends. Further the song goes: Ok let’s do it like this . . . I need money trees and summer breeze Lot of cheese, Louis V’s and double G’s Overseas with Thuli P’s and Nancy B’s Black cards with credit limits that’s guaranteed . . . I think a lot of my brothers is all I need (Is all I need) Let’s throw a party my brothers it’s all on me (It’s all on me) Follow me (Follow me) It’s all on me (It’s all on me) ’Cause Ferraris and Lambos is all I see Combinations just landed from Italy Cotton eaters Bhincas and VIP It’s all on me, it’s all on me
This song captures the core of this research project: how the poor get windfalls, pursue happiness, and lose it all in the process. Although framed within aspirational consumption, Big Zulu’s song captures fundamental themes, such as masculine identities, neoliberal capitalism, and issues of powerlessness, which are central to this article. Through the interaction between micro (modes of consumption tied to how people form relationships with money) and the macro (the context of neoliberal capitalism that has centered life around money), the song highlights issues of aspirational consumption that are connected to hip-hop and rap music in the United States and South Africa. Like many entertainment spaces which partly influence how ordinary people develop various patterns of consumption through reality shows and advertising, the music industry notoriously constructs modes of conspicuous consumption as central ways of relating to money and people. In this context, consumption is emphasized by how rappers and musicians, mostly who have come from poverty and rose to success, acquired their windfalls through their music while having to navigate through regimes of consumption. In the article, we use archival material from the television reality program, I blew It, to explore the experiences and meanings of conspicuous consumption as it pertains to people who came onto the show to share their experiences.
Furthermore, we use expert commentary from a Social Worker, Siphosenkosi Ndlovu, who has counseled a number of windfall beneficiaries who went on to blow it and a Financial Advisor, Bright Phahle, to cast light on the psychology of money especially in the hands of the poor. The old adage “money can’t buy you happiness” may be true in the sense that happiness in itself is not a commodity that can be bought. An attempt at an absolute definition of what happiness is would undoubtedly be too cumbersome given the complexity of the concept. The term has in the latter part of the 20th century going into the 21st century attracted a lot of attention from psychologists, philosophers, and economic scholars alike. For our purpose, happiness is an emotional experience characterized by a sense of joy and fulfillment. It is generally a positive emotion and feeling of satisfaction. We contend here that the answer to Sara Ahmed’s (2010: 2) questions of “what does happiness do?” and how does happiness do? is that it consumes.
Much of the research on the economics of happiness has focused on it as being a function of income. The myriad of studies conducted in this area have focused on income and happiness (Ballas and Dorling, 2015; Clark et al., 2008; Dynan and Ravina, 2007; Meyer and Sullivan, 2003; Weinzierl, 2005) mainly concluding that the relationship is either weak or statistically insignificant. Using the “China Puzzle” as an example of a country that has seen a significant increase in income since the 1980s, Wang et al. (2019) observe how happiness has not risen thus going back to the inability of money to buy happiness. The reasons for this range from the need to work longer hours in order to earn the income to health-related concerns. Furthermore, the Easterlin paradox offers another rationale for this. According to the Easterlin paradox, while higher income may initially result in higher happiness, over time the correlation eventually diminishes (Stanca and Veenhoven, 2015). The question that remains unanswered, though, is how then is it that people with money seem happier? Our focus is therefore compelled to shift from money to consumption and happiness.
Stanca and Veenhoven (2015) observe that very little is known about the relationship between consumption and happiness. The relationship between consumption and happiness is of interest to us, given the fact that the case study that we are using predominantly deals with consumption-induced happiness that does not result from income but rather windfalls. This case study presents a unique opportunity to look at consumption and happiness without the element of income. Although the literature remains scant, there are scholars who concur that there is a positive correlation between consumption and happiness (Stanca and Veenhoven, 2015). This happiness is consistent with a signaling effect. The suggestion here is that consumption has the potential to increase social cohesion and by extension resulting in heightened happiness levels (Wang et al., 2019). Sticking with the notion of the signaling effect that is linked to consumption and happiness, we turn to the theory of consumer behavior espoused by James Duesenberry (1949). The theory of consumer behavior holds that the consumption of certain conspicuous goods and services may increase happiness by increasing one’s social status within a defined reference group (Wang et al., 2019). The desire to signal one’s social standing through consumption occurs to become respected and honored triggering happiness for some people.
The program, I blew It, follows the lives of those people who inherited some fortune from their deceased parents, got compensated by government for being involved in a road accident, or played lottery and won millions of Rand, the South African currency. In an attempt to announce their arrival and assert their newly found power and fame, most of the beneficiaries blew their fortune, becoming poor again. This was as a result of conspicuous consumption borne out of the need to announce one’s newly found status as the big man signified by, in most instances, having a lot of money, dating different women and participating in rituals such as “ostentatious consumption”. This consumption is shown through buying takeaways, expensive alcohol, cars, taking friends for holiday, dating many women, or engaging the services of commercial sex workers and on rare occasions, investing the money. In line with the emergence of a fierce phallocentrism, this consumption contributes to a shift from emphasis on patriarchal status (determined by one’s capacity to assert power over others in a number of spheres based on maleness) to a phallocentric model, where what the male does with his penis becomes a greater and certainly a more accessible way to assert masculine status. (hooks, 2015: 94)
The shift may broadly then become the basis for the socio-economic and political destruction of masculine identities which serve the interests of capitalism which deprive Black men of their rights by deflecting away from a patriarchal power based on ruling others to emphasize “a masculine status that would depend solely on the penis” (hooks, 2015). As a consequence, the consumption, and the shift it drives, translates into a transition, especially for a poor man, to acquire means to participate in conspicuous consumption. That assumption that comes with a new identity is that of a big man. This is used to assert and concretize the previously small and now big man’s patriarchal position, where his masculinity is asserted through consumption, conquering women and disposing of women, that is, changing sexual partners at will. Newly found wealth allows for these men to perform their aspirations.
When Thorstein Veblen came up with the concept of conspicuous consumption, his main objective was to speak to socio-economic inequalities that characterized different social classes in industrial societies (Orock, 2019: 135). Veblen explored how the elite differentiated themselves from the common masses “through a combination of structural, material and ideational means” (Orock, 2019: 135). This conceptualization is relevant to this article as shall be demonstrated later. This article explores the theme of conspicuous consumption and how this is done in pursuit of happiness and how people who get these windfalls end up blowing it. The following questions guide this study: What are the meanings of the windfalls to the people featured in the show I blew It? How does conspicuous consumption link with happiness and identity? How can we make sense of the consumption patterns of the poor people in the show? The next section explores literature on consumption, windfalls, and identities.
Background and context of the article
I blew it is a South African reality show that is aired weekly on Mzansi Magic which is a channel on DSTV—a Sub-Saharan paid satellite service provider. The show follows the lives of people who received large sums of money from various sources including winning the lottery, inheritance money, pension funds, sportsman payouts, or payouts from the Road Accident Fund (RAF). Most of the people who came on to the show received amounts well over a million Rand and blew it within 24 months. The participants in the show are all Black and predominantly male from different townships of South Africa. All the participants in the show report that they went from rags to riches and after a short-lived happiness went back to rags.
I blew it is set in the natural environments of the participants and therefore the shoots take place countrywide. The show premiered in 2018 and has to date aired a total of 3 seasons with 13 episodes in each season. The popularity of the show in South Africa is attested to by a viewership of over 500,000 coupled with the regular shut down of the social media streets being blown away by the stories of the participants culminating in memes of all kinds being shared. Of all the 39 episodes aired in the 3 seasons of the show, only 4 participants are females with the rest of the 35 being males. Being a reality show, the program arrived at a fertile ground where there is a growing demand for reality television in South Africa.
The desire to learn about the world in general and the lives of other people are two of the reasons why the reality television genre has seen a rise in viewership in South Africa. According to a 2019 survey conducted by FutureFact, 4 out of 10 adults prefer reality television shows behind South African soap operas and music programs. The survey notes that when it comes to the segmentation of reality television shows, the fourth most popular types are ones that focus on the real lives of ordinary people of which I blew it is one. The 30-minute-long episodes are divided into four segments. The first segment shows snapshots of what to expect on the episode. On the second segment, the one who “blew it” introduces himself or herself sitting down telling the viewers who they are, where they come from, and how their life was before money came. During this time, snippets of those who witnessed the arrival of money also comment in different frames about how they know the blower. Usually, they narrate the story of how broke they used to be and how they received the large windfalls. In the third segment, the music changes in the background to a gqom song—a popular South African house genre that originates from Durban which is a coastal city of Kwa-Zulu Natal—to match the ambiance of the money being spent and the blower tells of how they received the money and how they felt when it came. During this segment, reenactments of how the blower spent the money are showed. In the final segment, the blower and those around them share how they realized that their money had been blown and how they are now back in rags.
The program deliberately follows the unfortunate cases, and these are mostly Black men in South Africa. Such television programming has been labeled trash television by citizens on social media as it paints a negative picture of Black South Africans. Successful cases are not seen as attractive enough it would seem. What makes the show of particular interest to us is the context within which it takes place. Post-apartheid South Africa has a booming Black middle class, often framed through the stereotype of consumerism (Krige, 2012). Paradoxically, the growing middle class is coupled with deepening levels of economic inequality making South Africa the most unequal country in the world. The implications of inequality are too many to consider here but include unemployment, abject poverty with disparaging consequences for selfhood amid rampant consumerism and its public display. Essentially, what is clear to us is that the South African consumer culture scene is very complex and can be divided into four broad categories. First, those who appear to engage in conspicuous consumption and have a legitimate racial right to do so, that is, the wealthy minority White and its unknown middle class that no one ever really considers in depth. The consumption behavior of this group is often considered in oblivion. The second category is the minority Black class that can consume conspicuously due to having wealth, whose consumption unlike their White counterparts undoubtedly rates news worthy; then we have the fast growing headlining Black middle-class consumer; and finally the socially prohibited poor Black consumer who raises eyebrows and drops jaws every time they engage in what seems like conspicuous consumption. What we need now is to contribute to the theorizing of Black consumption particularly in the context of poverty much more so at least in the context of this article, the type of consumption from poverty to wealth and back to poverty again and how the notion of happiness is made sense of.
Conspicuous consumption, windfalls, and identities
There is an expanse body of research demonstrating that we live in a world where identities’ fluidity, informed by different fantasies and realities change, is magnified. Windfalls and wild lumpsums of monies acquired through insurance benefits and lottery winnings have a potential to influence the identities of the beneficiaries in different ways (Bauman, 2000, 2007; Binde, 2008; Kuhn et al., 2011). According to Arjun Appadurai (1996), consumption is like breathing, “a self-effacing habit that becomes noticeable only when contextually ostentatious. But it is only in ostentation that we often take notice of consumption . . . ” (p. 66). For instance, food consumption is habitual and repetitive but is rarely noticeable because this is necessary for the body and rarely a matter of imitation of social superiors as argued by Veblen (1994 [1899]). Veblen (1899) originated the concept of conspicuous consumption in his book The theory of the leisure class. At the core of the theory is that wealthy people in society consumed highly conspicuous and high-quality goods and services so as to show off their wealth “thereby achieving greater social status” (Bagwell and Bernheim, 1996: 349). For Veblen (1899), “in order to gain and to hold the esteem of men, wealth must be put in evidence, for esteem is awarded only on evidence” (p. 24). This evidence, in contemporary society and even then, consisted of such articles that fell into “accredited cannons of conspicuous consumption, the effect of which is to hold the consumer up to a standard of expensiveness and wastefulness in his consumption of goods and his employment of time and effort” (Veblen, 1899: 71).
Most importantly to this research article, Veblen distinguishes between two drivers of conspicuous consumption and these are “invidious comparison and pecuniary emulation.” The former refers to the consumption rituals of the wealthy so as to “distinguish himself from members of a lower class” (Bagwell and Bernheim, 1996: 350). The latter is the opposite, it refers to a member of the lower class who consumes goods and services conspicuously, not because he naturally can afford, but “so that he will be thought of as a member of the higher class” (Bagwell and Bernheim, 1996: 350).
There have been studies that have demonstrated different effects of sudden wealth to insurance beneficiaries and lottery winners. Kuhn et al.’s (2011) study of Dutch lottery winners suggests that these windfalls affect winners, neighbors, and distant neighbors differently. In addition, there is a suggestion that existing income and educational status play a role in the deployment of wealth and rituals of conspicuous consumption. For example, “low education households spend more of their lottery winnings on cars, and less on vacations than higher-education households” (Kuhn et al., 2011: 2243). These researchers also found that the immediate neighbors of some of the lotto winners also increased their consumption patterns especially in relation to spending on cars. But there is no conclusive evidence of neighbors competing with their newly wealthy ones in terms of consumption as in some cases “social spillovers in car consumption could be driven by winning households selling their used car to neighbors; or by households passing money to immediate neighbors, who might be family members” (Kuhn et al., 2011: 2245). However, Higher-income households in our data are significantly happier than other households, but lottery winnings do not make households happier, nor do they make neighboring households less happy. The latter two results, based on genuinely exogenous shocks to own and neighbors’ incomes, would seem to present challenges for both relative income-based and for “habituation” models of happiness. (Kuhn et al., 2011)
In some cases, those with wealth or winnings have had the power to select one’s identity and to hold to it as long as desired, that becomes the royal road to the fulfilment of identity fantasies. Having the ability, one is free to make and unmake identities at will. Or so it seems. (Bauman, 2000: 83)
Conspicuous consumption has been much more conspicuous in the global south where there is an imbalance in terms of wealth distribution. The disparities between the wealthy and the poor are alarming (Sulla and Zikhali, 2018). South Africa, which is the focus of this article, is one of the world’s most unequal societies where vulgar wealth co-exists with desperate levels of poverty (Cheru, 2001). The evidence of conspicuous consumption by the wealthy, hip-hop stars and television actors is splashed in different media platforms for the consumption of mostly the poor.
Former President of South Africa, Thabo Mbeki, once decried the culture of conspicuous consumption arguing that “the new order, born out of the victory in 1994, inherited a well-entrenched value system that placed individual acquisition of wealth at the very center of the value system of our society as a whole” (Mbeki, 2006). According to Mbeki, the White minority which was and still remains “the dominant force in our country . . . entrenched in our society as a whole, including among the oppressed, the deep-seated understanding that personal wealth constituted the only true measure of individual and social success” (Mbeki, 2006). However, according to Bond (2006: 11), Mbeki merely compounded matters “with his tendency to talk in a radical manner, while he acted to preserve the overall premises of capitalist globalisation.” It is curious to note that, while it is true that White people control the largest chunk of the country’s economy, cases of conspicuous consumption within this community, especially in television and other media platforms such as Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram, are very minimal. Given the pervasiveness of the media in contemporary society, media define and legitimize certain identities and ways of being and living over others (Malinga and Ratele, 2016). This includes forms of manhood and masculinities. As Viljoen (2008) notes, the media produce and reproduce hegemonic discourses of masculinity that are largely centered on middle-class consumerist ideals, thus excluding those who do not fit into those ideals or are unable to live up to them. These media representations have immense implications for the consumption patterns of izikhothane, 2 for example, and their idealized sense of self.
But as Mbeki further claims, Blacks learnt this culture from Whites as is perfectly obvious that many in our society, having absorbed the value system of the capitalist market, have come to the conclusion that for them, personal success and fulfilment meant personal enrichment at all costs, and the most theatrical and striking public display of wealth. (Mbeki, 2006)
The issue is not only common to South Africa and Mbeki’s words correspond with the transitions and transformations of patriarchal masculinity. Documenting the influence of White supremacy and capitalism on Black masculinities in the United States, bell hooks (2015) indicates that the conservatization of sixties [black] radicals began with their embracing an ethos of greed, one in which having enough money to be self-sufficient is not what matters, but having money to waste, having excess. Like their white counterparts, an ethos of greed began to permeate the psyches of black folks. (p. 17)
For some, money became synonymous with life itself and to quote hooks once more: Once money, and not the realization of a work ethic based on integrity and ethical values, became the sole measure of the man, more black men could enter the game . . . By the late sixties and early seventies most black men had made the choice to identify their well-being, their manhood with making money by any means necessary.
Despite these similarities, South Africa has created a social context of its own, corrupted by the politics of materialist greed that forestalls the emergence of alternative masculinity rooted in dignity and selfhood. Through the policy of Black economic empowerment (BEE) that produced Black bourgeoisie that promotes western imperialist greed, freedom and liberation from apartheid have been reduced to “the freedom and liberty of the narrowly defined neoliberal ‘self’ that competes in the world market” (Gibson, 2005: 64). BEE, described as the “ideology of reparation” (Mbeki, 2006: 72) and “the ‘structure of feeling’” (Williams, 1947) of reparations [that] “encourages the idea that socio-economic elevation is a lottery that is available to all South Africans,” the self-as-commodity “is presented not only as the ideology of the rising elite but also as the only possible way for the poor to raise themselves out of poverty” (Gibson, 2005: 64).
In South Africa, consumer culture drives most television programs as these are deemed attractive even to the poor who cannot afford but can only aspire lifestyles shown in the media. Such aspirations lead to buying imitation or replica products from China Malls and other shops at a very small percentage. Shows such as, Top Billing, which exposes the lives of plush homes and dining lived by business people and celebrities, and Top Shayela, which showcases the lives of celebrities and many others, have large viewership statistics demonstrating the popularity of what is colloquially called soft life in South African social media. Soft life is basically a life of luxury characterized by the conspicuous consumption of experiential and material goods and services. There are more reality television shows in South Africa that are modeled along American ones such as MTV Cribs, Lifestyles of the Rich and Famous, Keeping up with the Kardashians, Secret Lives of the Rich, The Real Housewives, Selling Sunset, My Super Sweet Sixteen and these are Rich Kids, The Real Housewives of Johannesburg, Being Bonang, KwaMaMkhize, Living the Dream with Somizi, and many others. Thus, “television and movies spread images of the lifestyles of the upper class . . . diffuse lessons about consumption as a value” (Kent, 2011). In some cases, those celebrities and business people who do not have access to mainstream media where they can flaunt their wealth use social media platforms such as Twitter, Facebook, Instagram, and others (Caitlin, 2016; Dantas and Abreu, 2020; Ferraro et al., 2013; Taylor and Strutton, 2015).
There are three broad categories affecting consumer behavior in any given society and these are demographic, psychological, and socio-cultural. These partly influence whether people would consume experientially and or materially. According to Van Boven and Gilovich (2003) and Bronner and de Hoog (2018), experiential consumption relates to the purchases that can be seen but not handled, observable, fleeting, and not long-lasting goods and/or services such as a ticket to watch an opera or attending a dinner which disappear after the performance of consumption. Material consumption relates to the buying of tangible things that last for some time.
Consumption is largely an identity formation process. Rondal Doane (2007) notes studies of masculinity used to focus on the male figure as a “laboring provider.” Earlier studies on fashion theory such as Geaorge Simmel’s (1957) considered men not to be concerned about how they looked as such concerns were associated with femininity. The same idea was espoused by Veblen (1899) arguing that men’s fashion was more constrained and reserved, though costly. Conversely, their wives wore conspicuously elaborate dresses with high heels, often said to demonstrate an identity outside of work because it would have been impossible to do any work in such clothes. What was interesting about this though is that the extravagant and elaborately fashionable the wife was, the higher the husband’s social status became because this spoke of his ability to provide as the man. Masculine identities are shaped and enhanced through consumption of goods, services, and women as suggested in the evidence from the show and interviews below. Much of the research that has been published in recent years that examines the relationship between masculinities and consumption has been from the fields of consumer behavior, marketing, and advertising (see Ourahmoune, 2016).
In the context of consumption, the notion of masculinities has been explored from various angles, including masculinities in crisis, intimacy, culinary decisions, use of cosmetics, the retail environment, and consumption enhanced physical appearance. The link between masculinities and consumption is predominantly related to the gendered sense of self, which is constituted by the acquisition of goods and services that are associated with being a “man.” Sociocultural norms about manhood, however they may be defined, are changing and this is evident in the consumption behaviors of men (Corrigall, 2015; Kimmel and Issier-Desborde, 2000; Magubane, 2004; Ourahmoune, 2016). There are also scholars who have taken a cultural and media studies approach, occasionally delving into fashion and sartorial studies, to the analysis of the link between masculinity and consumption (see Farber, 2015; Mohamed, 2011; Narunsky-Laden, 2008; Richards, 2015). Quite often, these scholars situate the relationship between consumption and masculinities in the political and historical context that has impacted on race, class, and gender relations, which are assumed to culminate in consumption choices. Anthropological studies have examined the relationship between masculinities and consumption from the perspective of Darwinian evolution, to speak about the idea of masculinities that are enforced through impressing others (Al-Shawaf and Lewis, 2017; Zahavi, 1975). All of these perspectives, however different they may be, are useful in helping us understand the relationship between masculinities as identity and consumption.
The apartheid regime defined not only what it meant to be Black but also what could be consumed by Black people. The democratic dispensation brought a number of reforms, particularly in the area of economics and class relations, culminating in an unprecedented rise of a Black middle class that can now afford opulent lifestyles characterized by expensive clothes and houses in suburbs or new township property developments, send their children to private schools, and drive expensive cars. Much of this success was made possible by the introduction of policies such as BEE, which sought to make business opportunities available to Black people (Leopeng and Langa, 2018). Bandile Leopeng and Malose Langa (2018) observe that these advances have led to the perpetuation of hegemonic masculinities, since mainly men have benefited economically from them, further entrenching the notion that economic success is the marker of manhood. Leopeng and Langa (2018: 58) argue that the masculine identity of Black men portrayed in the magazine “reveals the cultural values of the norms of the target audience” and thus mirrors contemporary society. This assertion suggests that the representations of Black middle-class masculinities in the media are representative of the hegemonic masculine ideals.
This view is not without shortcomings. Stella Viljoen (2012) argues that mass media have an inherent homogenizing influence, something that requires critical problematization and “denaturalising.” However, Viljoen (2012: 163) acknowledges that the fact that masculinity is in flux in South Africa may mean that men are more susceptible to the homogenising influence of men’s lifestyle magazines, but it also means that the role that these magazines play in articulating vernacular identities is amplified.
Leopeng and Langa (2018: 60) note that post-apartheid Black middle-class masculinity is based on hegemonic neoliberal capitalism, which is characterized by “attainment, and accumulation, access to material resources and wealth, and the ability to provide for one’s family.” This type of masculine identity enjoys a hegemonic status in urban areas of post-apartheid South Africa and South African men also pursuing it in townships. The desire for these makers of manhood characterizes much of the behavior of izikhothane. In a 2015 article on izikhothane Richards, (2015) and Mnisi (2015) observe that having money and the ability to provide for one’s family, and or girlfriends at the taverns or clubs is one of the markers of manhood desired by the participants in the subculture.
Legacy media and social media play a very crucial role in influencing processes of identity enactment, behavior, attitudes, values, and perceptions (Allen, 2007). Malinga and Ratele (2016: 101) note that the media contribute toward the construction of social and psychological meanings. Extending this view to print media, Narunsky-Laden (2008: 131) comments that “consumer magazines for black South Africans function seminally as ‘cultural tools’ that perform the task of cultural (re)ordering by codifying, disseminating, and legitimising specific urban middle-class repertoires for black South Africans.” Viljoen (2008, 2012) notes that magazines like FHM, GQ, Destiny Men, Blink, and Men’s Health tend to produce and reproduce hegemonic discourses of masculinity that are largely centered on middle-class consumerist ideals. This marginalizes those who do not fit into these ideals and can give rise to resistant masculinities (Malinga and Ratele 2016: 103). Although resistant masculinities differ across contexts, they are often characterized by “rampant materialism, fatalistic attitudes, physical strength, and the acquisition of respect through violence” (Henry, 2002: 116). The result of too much exposure to the hegemonic masculine identities that are portrayed in the media is that they become naturalized. Living up to naturalized ideals of masculinities may often come at a cost both financially and emotionally, especially for those men who live in impoverished conditions.
To re-imagine and refashion their class identities and thus disarticulate race and class in post-apartheid South Africa, young men drew extensively on hegemonic fantasies that were found in magazines such as GQ and Men’s Health (Mohamed, 2011: 105). Being a fluid, relational, and multiple concept, which is often influenced by power and class relations (Connell, 1995), notions of hegemonic masculinity often overlap with and contradict each other (Morrell et al., 2012). In this sense, Mohamed notes that the young men in her study negotiated the upper-class masculinities from the magazines with Black township masculinities to strategically resignify their class aspirations. Through their modes of dress, the young men sought to contest and refuse the identification with the perceived violent, lower-class Black masculinities often associated with the Cape Flats (Du Toit, 2014). The students in the study wore branded denim jeans, tracksuit pants, t-shirts, jackets, and shoes. Their dress sense was geared toward the performance of their imagined masculinity. The students used what Mohamed (2011) labels the performative possibilities of clothing, speech, and other markers that served to locate them within the referential discourses that define middle-class masculinity. The motivation of these students was to move away from their habitual class dispositions (Mohamed, 2011: 106). The upper-class masculinities that were represented in their magazines of choice suggested a fashion sense that was current. In this sense, Mohamed (2011) notes that clothing enables self-representation and individual differentiation as well as symbolic inclusion into a social identity. The idea of using clothes to communicate class membership or at least a certain social identity conjures up notions of sartorial expression.
The corpus: I Blew It
“Meet the people who’ve received large amounts of money and spent it unwisely. This show takes a closer look at the sudden changes wealth has made to their lives and relationships.” This is the tag-line the producers use to describe the show I blew it. Here, we summarize the episodes (1, 2, 3, 6, 11, and 13) that we chose for the purposes of this research. We may hasten to say that there are more men than women who got windfalls and after wasting their fortune came to tell their stories on television. As discussed later, women and men manage money differently, which explains the demographics of the show.
Episode 1 features Nonhlanhla who was involved in a car accident in 2013 and was given 1 million rand by the RAF. The money was spent on alcohol, cosmetics, hair, food, shopping and gifting relatives, friends, and house renovations. She also met a boyfriend on whom she spent a considerable amount. Her mother advised her to buy a Microbus worth R160,000 for business purposes. Nonhlanhla twice took her eight friends to the holiday resort city, Durban, “to have fun.” She told a friend, Tebogo, to resign from work and promised to give her a monthly Friendship Allowance which was more than her salary at work. She invested some of the money in a flexible account which she would sometimes use with her friends and on parties. Nonhlanhla feels it was ghost money as it ran out too quickly. She also regrets dating Simphiwe and spending money on expensive alcohol. However, she does not regret taking her friends to Durban. She learned from her mistake and claims not to be wild anymore.
Episode 2 features Thabo who was raised by a single mother. At one point, Thabo had to financially support his siblings and children. He was a regular lotto player. In August 2008, he won R1,800,000 from the lottery and summoned his family for a meeting where he informed them. His mother was in the process of building a house which Thabo completed and furnished at a cost of R750,000. He bought a pair of shoes that cost R14,500 and a suit for his engagement for R42,000 and a number of cars. He went to Durban for holiday thrice in 1 month where he spent more than R50,000. He quit his job because he felt that it is a fruitless exercise. Thabo was introduced to drugs by his new friends and spent most of his money on them. As a result, his family distanced themselves from him. He does not regret his past and mischievous acts. He realized that he ran out of money when he was left with about R200,000 in January 2011. He sold all his cars and then bought a small one which he thought he could maintain. Thabo is currently job hunting and wishes to run a company someday.
In Episode 3, Gwaja claims to have been a mischievous child who failed numerous grades throughout his schooling. He lost his father and was emotionally affected. In June 2012, he received R200,000 from his father’s insurance policy and blew it in 2 months. Gwaja quit his job and bought a car. He spent most of his money on women, parties, and alcohol. He realized that the money was running out when his bank card was declined at a clothing store in August 2012. Gwaja’s family and friends realized that his money ran out the day they were unveiling his father’s tombstone, when he received R5 coins that amounted R20,000 from someone who wanted to buy his car. His sisters continue to emotionally and financially support him after this ordeal. Gwaja went to his former employer to ask for his job back. He regrets how he spent his money and wishes he had invested it for his child’s education.
Episode 6 features Harold who claims to have been a religious and moral person. Harold’s mother was a nurse. The mother passed away in 2012 and he received a policy payout of R107,000 which covered funeral costs. He also received R1,050,000 from his mothers’ funeral and pension policies. He used some of the money to build his family home, renovate his grandmother’s house, and pay bills. He spent considerable amounts on jewelry, alcohol, friends, parties, expensive clothing, and his girlfriend. After a few months, Harold bought a secondhand car for R38,000 and remodeled for R20,000. He withdrew R15,000 regularly to spend on the parties that he hosted at his home. He would make grand entrances at local taverns where he filled tables with alcohol for people to drink. He always had R4000 in his wallet to spend daily. His friends say they felt like they were entitled to his money because they would let him know when they needed it. Harold bought takeaways on a daily basis. After a couple of months, Harold felt that his sister was jealous of him because he was rich thus he chased her out of their family house. His girlfriend moved in with him and he gave her one of the two bank-cards linked to the same account. The girlfriend would withdraw money weekly for personal reasons. Harold realized that he ran out of money when his account had a balance of R12,000. He then applied for his retirement and annuity fund and used it to pay debts. In April 2015, he decided to sell his car, clothes, furniture, and the family house. Harold regrets spending his money recklessly.
Episode 11 accounts for Bongani’s spending of the RAF payout of R1,350,000. Bongani was a quiet and well-behaved child. He struggled to continue with school due to financial challenges. Bongani has a strained relationship with his family, and he blames his parents for his failures. His lawyer took R50,000 from the payout for legal fees and the money he had spent on Bongani’s medical bills. Bongani paid R100,000 for his traditional ceremony to thank the ancestors for blessing him and spent R30,000 on a fence at his family house. He also bought five secondhand cars and a quad bike within a couple of months. Bongani hired two construction companies to build his house; the workers were paid large amounts on a daily basis. He was romantically involved with a White bank manager and spent a lot of money on her and her children. Most of the money was spent on women, clothes, alcohol, and cars. His plan was to own a lot of cars and later sell them as he ran out of money. When he ran out of money, he started selling his cars, home appliances, and house. Bongani realized that he ran out of money when his bank card declined at a butchery where he was with his friend. His girlfriend, Koketso, is happy that he stopped cheating on her with other women after he ran out of money. Bongani’s biggest regret is that he never listened to Koketso’s advice when he was a millionaire. His current source of income is the government grant that he gets due to injuries he sustained at the accident.
The last episode is the 13th and features Neo who was raised by his mother and grandmother. He worked at his cousin’s bakery after he failed high school exams twice. He was involved in an accident, a bus collided with a taxi he was traveling in at an intersection. In April 2016, he received R1,441,000 from the RAF payout that he blew it in 8 months. Neo was retrenched from the bakery because he was not fit to work after the accident. The first thing he did after receiving the money was to withdraw R20,000 which he spent in a nightclub and bought clothes that cost R9200 for a night out. He spent most of his money on expensive alcohol with friends and different women who lived extravagant lifestyles financed by him. He would settle nightclub bills exceeding R20,000 every weekend with his friends. He loved that people respected him because they knew that he is a big spender. He also spent R170,000 on the family house after being reprimanded by his mother several times. Neo used to have R10,000 on him daily and would have R16,000 available for withdrawal in case he needed it for outings. Overall, he spent about R700,000 on alcohol. He started to notice that he was running out of money with a bank balance of R20,000 in November 2017. He then decided to move back home with his mother. He lent R120,000 to people who are not intending to pay him back. He was suicidal for a while after the money ran out and regrets the way he spent his money.
Method and conceptual framing
This qualitative research relied on data gathered from archival material and interviews with experts on human behavior and finance. The archival data was gathered from Season 1 of the I blew It show. Episodes 1, 2, 3, 6, 11, and 13 are analyzed. Episode 1 was deliberately chosen as it was the only one with a woman who got a windfall out of 13 episodes. The rest of the episodes were randomly chosen. We also interviewed two experts, Sipho Ndlovu, a Counselor, and Bright Phahle, a Financial Advisor. Ndlovu is an expert and experienced in counseling people who wasted their windfalls. Phahle has experience in advising people on financial planning and has taken trends in various behaviors, especially of the poor, toward finance. These interviews marry with the material in the episodes and literature. Besides, no extensive research has been done on the topic we are engaged with here and therefore it is critical that we compare largely Western literature on conspicuous consumption of windfalls with the South African knowledge and interviewees provide us with that aspect.
Critical theorists appeal to the concepts of social structures to think about socioeconomic patterns and circumstances that persist over time. Young (2011) identifies the concept of “objective constraints,” “positions of actors,” and “structures as produced in action” as three main concepts of undertaking a structural analysis. Young (2011) uses the concept of objective constraints to explain how social actors experience institutional rules passively. These constraints occur through the joint action of individuals within social and cultural institutions and given physical conditions as they affect our possibilities. In this context, the notions of masculinity and femininity, as well as how they implicate issues of gender, race, and class, come with possibilities and constraints of aspirations, consumption, social status, and happiness common to certain social contexts. As a consequence, the power of these structures is that they “impose constraints on individuals that are irreducible to these individuals and their properties” (Callinicos, 2004: xxvi), and “structure possibilities for action such that individuals can take them up and take advantage of them” (Young, 2011: 53). In this structural sense, this notion of power “avoids giving a central place to any actor or entity conceived as a ‘powerful’ subject” (Ferguson, 1994: 19). It is “diffused rather than concentrated, embodied and enacted rather than possessed, discursive rather than purely coercive, and constitutes agents rather than being deployed by them” (Gaventa, 2003: 1). The notion of position emphasizes that “structures connect not named individuals but any persons who come to occupy the positions specified by the relation(s) in question. Structures are . . . sets of empty places [and] help to explain why societies persist in time” (Callinicos, 2004: xxi). This follows the understanding of structure as “power-conferring relations” (Callinicos, 2004). By defining their constraints and opportunities suggests the structure of domination as “other powers are, however, structurally determined: that is, they depend on the position that the actor in question occupies in prevailing social structures . . . What social structures do, then, is to give agents powers of a certain kind” (Callinicos, 2004: xx). For these reasons, structures are produced in action and conceive “humans as knowledgeable actors that are both enabled and constrained by the social structures that are at once the consequence and condition of their actions” (Callinicos, 2004: xxi).
Consumption, illusions of arrival, and happiness
Conspicuous consumption by the poor who receive windfalls is used as a ritual to signal arrival of some sort to the aspired lavish soft life that they usually see on television and other media. However, this arrival is characterized by the consumption of fleeting temporary riches, the money that is a visitor and subsequently the grim reality of the elusiveness of happiness if pursued through conspicuous consumption (Deiner and Shigehiro, 2000). Evidence from elsewhere suggests similar patterns of what we observe from the data under scrutiny in this article: poor people do not understand investing and saving for future comfort. As Ndlovu says, Essentially, when one is born in poverty, there are certain things that never come to the mind of such a person although they might have seen them on television or from relatives that are well off. One already has a set view of what their life is. So, when one suddenly gets a windfall, it becomes an issue if he/she was never taught how to spend wisely or exposed to a life of having in abundance. (Ndlovu Interview, 12 January 2021)
Phahle concurs with this view when he says You could give a poor person, middle-class and a rich person the same amount of money but because of their experience of life and what they accustomed to, each individual will use the money differently. In a typical sense, a poor person lived from making ends meet . . . . For instance, if a poor person’s income is R5000 monthly, the minute they get R6000 which is an additional R1000 they are most likely to waste it on purpose or by default. This is because they lack knowledge and lack of psychology to do something with that additional amount of money.
Also spending to announce one’s status change traps the beneficiaries into perpetual poverty as they do not spend much on education, investment, and savings (Banerjee and Duflo, 2007). The sense of arrival here is concomitant to Veblen’s theorization that individuals compete and measure themselves on economic accumulation and achievements. Thus, most characters featured in the reality show, I blew It, lived a life that they had always aspired for and, in a way, most acquired the big man syndrome as they compared their financial status to those around them. As Bourdieu (1984) suggests, acquisition and consuming announces a transition to “in membership . . . to establish and mark difference by a process of distinction . . . ” (p. 23) and securing a position “of status in the social hierarchy” (Trigg, 2001: 105). Politicians, business people, and others of means are treated as big men in most African societies and they demonstrate their economic standing through consumption of expensive wines, food, clothing labels, and dating multiple women. Ndlovu argues, I realized . . . older men . . . regress where they were almost like teenagers. One client flew to Cape Town with about ten people that he did not know, booked them hotel rooms in different hotels. One client mentioned that he once owned a Durban beach from its South to the North end . . . took two girlfriends with . . . booked himself in the most expensive hotel but did not stay with neither of the ladies throughout their vacation and did not have sexual encounters with them. For men, it is mostly about power . . . he said that he felt he was in control . . . He said spending his money on women makes him feel young and in control as this is what ministers do. (Interview, 12 January 2021)
Women’s consumption differs in that, as Phahle argues, they see the future and are likely to cater for it than the immediate fulfillment: From a stereotypical view, women are better with money than men. The sole difference is development. A guy can earn a lot of money, he will buy what is most important. For example, he could buy a car and get accommodation even if it is a one room as long as he has a car, he is satisfied. A woman makes sure that they take care of others. This takes us back to the idea of wealth, when you take care of somebody you are actually creating another person that can create an additional income in the future to help you and others. So, women think in a development sense, they invest in a child who experiences that investment and at a later stage that investment will come back to take care of the woman. (Interview, 12 January 2021)
From the foregoing in this section, consumption appears as a vehicle that is used to evade the crisis of poverty and to establish a sense of agency against the perceived loss of identity and prowess especially for men (Ourahmoune, 2016). Both genders, it would seem, also announce their arrival through going for holiday, as rich people do. This is consistent with most of the people featured in the show who, further to conspicuous consumption, have added the consumption of immaterial and leisurely things to “signal status and wealth” (Bronner and de Hoog, 2018: 430). Bronner and de Hoog’s (2019: 433) research highlights why this is so, there is a need for the construction and performance of identities and arrival on social media. Most of these holidays are largely meant for the performance of social status where “vacationers are mainly focusing on demonstrating the social status aspects of their holiday: showing that they are successful in life, feeling important, gaining respect from others.”
Consumption, masculinity, and power
The conspicuous consumption exhibited by the men that come to the show is indicative of their pre-wealth aspirations. These aspirations are evident in the clothing brands that they purchase, the alcohol they drink, the cars they buy, and even the multiple women that they date. This consumption behavior generates the symbolic yet temporal social status which would normally be generated by wealth. This pattern is best demonstrated by how four males indulged in this form of consumption:
Thabo bought a pair of shoes that cost R14,500 and a suit for his engagement for R42,000. He went to Durban for holiday thrice in 1 month where he spent more than R50,000. He quit his job because he felt that it is a fruitless exercise.
Gwaja withdrew R22,000 daily that he spent on the same day. He spent most of his money on women, parties, and alcohol. He quit his job and paid an upfront deposit of R36,000 for a secondhand car.
Harold withdrew R15,000 regularly to spend on the parties that he hosted at his home. He would make grand entrances at local taverns where he filled tables with alcohol for people to drink. He always had R4000 in his wallet to spend daily.
Bongani started dating a romantically involved with a White bank manager and spent a lot of money on her and her children. Most of the money was spent on women, clothes, alcohol, and cars. His plan was to own a lot of cars and later sell them as he ran out of money. He states that cars were like an investment to him. His plan was to own a lot of cars and later sell them as he ran out of money. He states that cars were like an investment to him . . . His girlfriend, Koketso, is happy that he stopped cheating on her with other women after he ran out of money.
Inspired by windfalls, the issues of consumption that emerge here are also social and political as much as they individual aspirations and are symptomatic of broader structures of poverty, gender, and class that produce aspirations and preferences among people regardless of their position. For these males, the conspicuous consumption, whether aspirational and status, affirms their maleness that is associated with patriarchal masculinity through spending money on their expensive items, services, and women. This depicts the symbolic presence of wealth that they are part of the privileged class who often define and entrench this materialist greed through rituals of BEE because of healthy forms of achieving this affirmation are not readily available to them because of the constraints that come with their social position. This corresponds with the idea that the acquisition of and display of expensive items functions to project wealth and attract attention to one’s wealth (Veblen, 1899)—among Black communities (the study of “bling lifestyles,” for instance) would refer to status consumption as being intended to communicate the idea that one has “made it” (Gumede, 2011). However, because this is an expression of constraints that come with the position of these people, it is not sustainable and eventually dries up. This relates to how one interviewee, Ndlovu, explains the conditions of some people that get windfalls: When one is born in poverty, there are certain things that never come to the mind of such a person although they might have seen them on television or from relatives that are well off. One already has a set view of what their life is. So, when one suddenly gets a windfall, it becomes an issue if he/she was never taught how to spend wisely or exposed to a life of having in abundance. (Interview 12 January 2021)
Structurally, deprived of a blueprint for healthy Black masculinity because of this position, the notions of conspicuous consumption present themselves as alternative forms of freedom leaving these males more vulnerable due to the constraints of their social positions. Socially and culturally, this corresponds with the notion that even “upwardly mobile educated black males from privileged class backgrounds share with their poor and underclass counterparts an obsession with money as the marker of successful manhood” (hooks, 2015: 23). In addition, the windfall and the resulting conspicuous consumption, as well as the existing constraints facing these males, provide these males with access to phallocentrism where “what the male does with his penis becomes a greater and certainly a more accessible way to assert masculine status” (hooks, 2015: 94) because their social positions do not provide possibilities for patriarchal status (determined by one’s capacity to assert power over others in a number of spheres based on maleness).
One interviewee, Phahle, sees these patterns of consumption as resulting from the psychological impact that comes with money suggesting that because of their experience of life and what they accustomed to, each individual will use the money differently and confirms the notions of aspirational consumption: But when you start having excess funds, once again if you do not know what to do with excess the only thing that you will probably not do is to buy nice things because those are the things that one dreams of. Also, it is human nature to yearn for nice things. (Phahle Interview, 12 January 2021)
While this is connected to the notions of aspirational consumption, it also forms part of the consumption of status generating products and services. It is imperative in the act of suggesting the presence of wealth, as the failure to do so would imply an absence of that wealth resulting in a low social status (Veblen, 1899). The consumption of expensive alcohol and clothes are associated with the practices of status consumption. In realizing their pre-wealth aspirations, these people also engage in status consumption with the intention of showing off wealth to others (Scheetz, n.d.) to draw attention to wealth that is present (see Gumede, 2011; Veblen, 1899). Through this conspicuous consumption, the acquisition of and display of expensive items to suggest wealth and attract attention to one’s wealth (Veblen, 1899)—among Black communities (the study of “bling lifestyles,” for instance)—would refer to status consumption as being intended to communicate the idea that one has “made it” (Gumede, 2011). This is what is captured by Phahle: Making reference to the psychology of a person, people buy expensive things simply because they want to show that they “have arrived.” They want to give themselves a taste of the lifestyle that never lived. In actual fact, most of them will tell you that they have never lived this life and that they only live once thus they end up in positions where they buy expensive things. (Interview, 12 January 2021)
Arrival, in this instance, refers to the achievement of the aspired for life, the life of wealth. Achieving a wealth status and conspicuous consumption is performative, where the performer gains satisfaction from showing off to people around him or her. This is in line with especially the Black Diamonds generation of the wealthy created by the ruling African National Congress (ANC) through the BEE program that sought to redistribute wealth from the previously largely White economy after the end of official apartheid in 1994.
Consumption and happiness
How people consume is subject to their future predictions of what would enable them to experience what they consider to be a happy life. Often these predictions and expectations of a happy life are borne out of aspirations. The said aspirations are considered to be best articulated through consumption. This is particularly the case when looking at a section of the population for whom consumption was historically curtailed by racial segregation and later by an inequitable distribution of wealth. These have had to live as spectators to wealth and forced to consume images of prosperity paraded by the media as happiness (Caitlin, 2016), cementing the notion that to consume is to truly live and be happy. However, consumption outside level 8 of wealth is, according to Phahle, counterproductive. Level 8 wealth means At the very beginning, when you start talking about wealth you talk about having savings, emergency funds which assist when you are in a sudden situation that requires money. [They can work if] they want to, they are not forced to. This person can buy anything they want at any time. They have income that is passive and active and can go on vacation any time they want to. In other words, a wealthy person is someone who is truly able to do whatever they want to do when they want to do it. This person does not have to worry about expenses or anything related to money. They just live life very freely. A wealthy person knows how to make money for generations. (Interview, 12 January 2021)
It is therefore no surprise that as soon as the windfalls make their way into their path, they rapidly embark on the relentless pursuit of the said happiness they have looked on to from outside and longed for. Money buys the access. This is what is evident on I blew it. Although the happiness is supposedly experienced, Stanca and Veenhoven (2015: 95) caution that the “predictions of future happiness are subject to many distortions.” This means that there are other factors that may take away from the anticipated and experienced happiness if not considered. The long-term effect of consumption on happiness is experienced differently by individuals. If the distortions in the predicted happiness are too great, the result may be a significant loss in happiness. To explain this, we borrow Frey and Stutzer’s (2014) expression of mis-predicting utility. The expression contends that the failure to accurately predict the utility of consumption in sustaining happiness in the future will more than likely lead to its loss. Although the expression itself is used in the context of income, it is pertinent here as it relates to the ability to consume. In considering the cases of those that blew it, in the short term consumption brought happiness, however, in the long term the same consumption led to the diminishing of happiness and remorse to which Ndlovu says “The remorse comes from the foolishness of not having spent the money wisely” (Interview, 12 January 2021). With some of the participants in the show claiming that their lives became worse after the windfalls. Considering the long-term effects of blowing it, one may argue that if not handled with care the same consumption induced happiness may be consumed. Hence, this type of happiness that is illusive and elusive in the sense that like the windfall, it is fleeting.
Conclusion
Due to space and focal constraints, the current article has not explored the spending patterns of other “responsible” windfall beneficiaries and this comparison is important for future research to show the other side’s experiences. However, we have demonstrated that notions of conspicuous consumption, whether aspirational or status, are microcosmic expressions of the wider structural issues of poverty, gender, race, and class that cause so many constraints that make the lives of beneficiaries of windfalls so much more insecure and difficult to negotiate. Thus, far from being issues of personal irresponsibility and collective madness, we show that the notions of consumption, highlighted throughout the analysis, express the positional constraints of these people rooted in social structures of patriarchy, race, and class, that explain inequality of opportunity, marginality, and deprivation, as well as how they seek alternative ways of exerting and experiencing masculinities, happiness, selfhood, and social status. As structures are produced in action, these people operate in a social context that is corrupted by the politics of materialist greed and reproductive of historical injustices, their desires, and aspirations, reflected in conspicuous consumption, reproduce their constraints because alternative forms of achieving healthy masculinity, femininity, and selfhood have been foreclosed and constrained by their social positions of marginality and powerlessness.
Footnotes
Funding
The author(s) received no financial support for the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article.
