For myself, I think advertising as it currently exists is a massive negative for society, and I think capitalism is a net win (perhaps marginal). So I insist t

For myself, I think advertising as it currently exists is a massive negative for society, and I think capitalism is a net win (perhaps marginal). So I insist that "marketing is bad" is NOT a shadow argument for "capitalism is bad". You do a fine job of describing what I think is wrong with ads (that most ads consist primarily of false information, often conveyed via subtle signals that the consumer processes non-consciously). I also absolutely agree that making the consuming public aware of the options open to them in the market is beneficial to society. I agree that there's a tension here: if you want to absolutely ban all of the downside of the former, you also lose the upside of the latter. Thank god my disgusting bathwater is gone, but where's my baby? However, it's completely preposterous to say that the only alternatives are completely unrestrained advertising on the one hand, and a government-sponsored consumer-reports on the other. The latter sounds like an experiment I'd like to see run, actually, but not enough to endorse it in my own economy, so I guess that shows how much faith I have in it. But we already live in a compromise: manufacturers of known social ills like tobacco, alcohol, and gambling, have restrictions placed on how they can advertise. We already have laws on false advertising, especially around food and drugs, and also laws on clarity in packaging (which is a form of advertising). I think that if there were public will to do so, we could iteratively, gradually, over years and years, successively tighten the requirements for truth in advertising. I think it's plausible and practical that this might get us to a societal state where the standard for advertising is informative, useful, and much much less manipulative. Or maybe it wouldn't get us there, because getting legislation right is a bitch (especially in the US, apparently). But I see no support for your out-of-hand dismissal of the existence of practical, plausible alternatives to laissez faire.