The time is Sunday, November 28th. The writer, after two hours of desperate search, finds themselves Hunger Marketing and Its Destructive Consequences on the Human Mind: A Cautionary Tale stranded on the second floor of a common two-story building containing one establishment of McDonald’s. Canaan. Their original goal was to purchase the new onion-cheese flavored French fries for lunch, but after being told (for the third time today) how they were “sold out” and simply “unavailable”, they are suddenly lost. That afternoon, the writer experienced the five stages of grief while munching on a dry hamburger, a sad replacement for the fries.
 
The writer, at the time, did not realize that they had become victim to a blatant scheme composed by important people who wear McDonald’s suits, own McDonald’s shares, and decide the November marketing strategy for McDonald’s. The scheme itself is nothing new. Some might say it’s the oldest trick in the book. Yet it works every time, making people do absurd things like abandoning the comforts of homemade lunch for a fast-food meal on a weekend.
 
It goes like this. McDonald announces the release of its new product on November 7th, in stores until the 1st of December. Someone on Weibo expresses their liking towards it, McDonald’s official account spots the post in under a minute, forwards it, sponsors multiple commercial accounts who then in turn praise the French fries as genuinely as possible because it’s their job, a Twitter user sees it, immediately asks their friend: Have you seen this? And the two, driven by a newfound spirit of urgency, shall venture down the street to the closest McDonald’s today.
 
Essentially, hunger marketing uses either a limited stock, limited time, limited discount or all three at the same time on a product. Given the unshakeable place of utmost importance social media have in our lives, companies are finding higher interest in advertising its product through these platforms as it brings more exposure. And in the writer’s 15+ years living as a human, they had come to conclusion that humans are a specie who thrive on the act of sharing thoughts and opinions on every minimal aspect of life, such as The New Onion-Cheese Flavored French Fries That Will Only Appear In Stores For Less Than A Month. Therefore, hunger marketing works exceptionally well on people who have large, diverse social circles since they are usually willing to participate in a shared experience when provided the event. Moreover, humans are sensitive to the idea of scarcity, perhaps because we are told numerous times that once a chance is passed, you never get it back; once an opportunity is lost, you live the rest of your life in regret; and life, even life itself, you only get to live it once. Except maybe Hindus.
 
Perhaps a pessimistic conclusion from our previous analysis tells us that as long as one lives in a society, one involuntarily becomes the target of hunger marketing. Perhaps destructive consequences on the human mind, as the title explicitly states, are inevitable for the average societal creature. As the writer signs off with a cynical note, sitting in the hard-seat stools in McDonald’s, they can’t help but wonder if Tarzan has made the right choice.