Cupcakes, Culture and Capitalism

Where once cakes ruled, cupcakes have conquered. Kids at birthday celebrations nowadays get their own, personalized, individual, puny cupcake. Forget about "Happy Birthday Jennifer" scrawled across the top of a 12-inch cake in unhealthy pink icing; forget about the magic of a clutch of candles illuminating the expectant faces of a crowd of children waiting for the birthday girl to make a wish and blow out the candles. Forget about the subtle lesson of group consciousness and sharing manifested in that gooey confection. The replacement? One's own cupcake. Cupcakes too teach a lesson: We are all separate and alone, not part of a greater whole. What better lesson for the young inheritors of the capitalist behemoth?