The modern society demonstrates the materialistic values that serve as a distraction to the population, and are held by so many in an attempt to deflect from his or her fears. Jack Gladney is the direct representation of a materialistic and “fake” being. He spends a great deal of what he views as his “short” life on crafting a certain persona for himself on the university campus. For this reason, he wears "glasses with black heavy frames and dark lenses" and calls himself J.A.K. Gladney to sound smooth and professional (22). But as he admits, he is “the false character that follows the name around" (22). The phony values pressed upon people in society force someone to try and become another to overcome their fear of rejection. Jack realizes this and often regrets it, but plays along…show more content… “The simple truth is hard to fathom. But once we stop denying death, we can proceed calmly to die and then go on to experience rebirth” (35). Murray serves as a kind of wakeup call for Jack in and amongst the hum of modern culture, offering only hard truth. Consumerism is used as a way to evade ones fears, specifically of leaving this world. To offer and elusive promise of comfort, products such as Dylar are manufactured. Dylar represents the ultimate form of consumer product as it is thought to eliminate the fear of death itself. Even though the promise is impossible, desperate people are willing to take it as a last effort to feel security in the modern society. In the same way, Jack believes Dylar will help because it is “the power of suggestion [that can] be more important than side effects” (251). Jack is “eager to be humored, to be fooled” (251) by this drug and its false promises. DeLillo indicates that the people are so hopeless that they are eager to be fooled. Multiple aspects of society are engineered by the people to distract them from their own terrors. The population, cowering in fear, is ready to believe anything and indulge themselves in the drug that is
