Why do people like things?

Question:

Why do people like things?

is it because of familiarity? like music. if i hated a song and it was played over and over on the radio, i learn to like it. have i just been brainwashed? do i actually like it?

Best Answer - Chosen by Asker: Ha, you just asked a pertinent question about something few notice, seemingly!

Yes, repetition of a message works, and it applies to ideas and words as to music for a majority of us. This phenomenon is largely used in advertising, of course, but also in politics all around the world. It has been, and still is one of the favorites principles of Communists who hold that overwhellming a person with the same message repeated in different forms (statement, staged events, songs, movies, etc) will win over his mind and will.

It is not brainwashing, but it is part of brainwashing. For, the goals of brainwashing extends far beyond the case you brought upon since it aims at radically changing the whole set of principles and ideas of a given person according to a multiple steps process.

The subject you brought upon is more relevant to persuasion and to memetics. Would you finally accept this song the way you do if everybody around you said it doesn't? Probably not, because our mind needs this general consensus--an effect known as "bandwagon-effect"--to accept and agree with a given message. In other words, we tend to like what others like, and the oposite is true.

That's why many people do the same things and submit to the same practices such as dressing the same way, rejecting certain dressing code, loving the same music at the same time, getting tatooed and pierced now but certainly not 10 years ago, etc.

The subject is vast and calls for longer and better explaination than this answer. You'll find further information in perusing generalist books and works on psychology and mass psychology. One of the best books ever describing this process and how it affects different categories of persons is The True Believer, by Eric Hoffer. The True Believer is not really a book about psychology, but about "crowd behavior," aka "mass-behavior."

This book is not that thick and its reading is enthralling and intellectually accessible to majority of us. It's reading will fully answer your question since brainwashing is a method fit for one person and not for a crowd. People like things because the culture we have grown up in revolves around materialism. Having things is thought to make one happy, unfortunetly. The truth is that it isn't the case at all, they are used to fill gaps.
I wouldn't say you are brainwashed. It probably is most likely the cause of repetition of the song. We've all had it happen I'm sure. Or it could also be that you have just now noticed something different about the song, such as what the lyrics really mean.
Only you can say if you really like it. Some people call brainwashing educating. Do you like it ? Only you know. You could have been in a bad mood the first time you heard the song. The next time you were having one of the best days of your life. I suspect you might react differently under 2 drastically different conditions.

People usually like things for one basic reason. It makes them feel good. Unless they were masochists, in which case it would make them feel bad and they would like it for that reason. People`s mind is like the butterfly. It keeps moving from point to point , event to event, hoping for some happiness . In anticipation of happiness we tend to like that thing. We do, initially but , soon , we are weary of this transient happiness and seek yet another . We hope this new one will have a lasting happiness.
But it is a mirage.
Like the butterfly, if it cannot find another flower it will keep coming back , again and again , to the same flower . Not because it likes it but it hopes that it will get something out of it.

We do the same thing. If we have nothing else to go to we keep going to the same one. I envy you, if I hate a song and they play it to death on the radio, I want to shoot the radio, and then myself.

I CANNOT learn to like it.......my revulsion grows!

I cant hit the button fast enough!
Consider yourself lucky. Ecclesiastes 1:14 - I have seen all the works that are done under the sun; and, behold, all is vanity and vexation of spirit.

Matthew 7:2 - For with what judgment ye judge, ye shall be judged: and with what measure ye mete, it shall be measured to you again.

Yes, you could be brainwashed.
If you believe you now actually like it, then, regardless of being brainwashed or not you now actually like it. You are not brainwashed. People often give free rein to their inner avarice. Whether the desire is inborn or not is not clear but it normally makes its appearance early in life.People who claim they have no interest in things often have the sharpest feelers for things. Eventually, it appears that the lack of interest claim is simply a cover for human being's irrepressible greed: innate desire to have, to hold, to possess but rarely to evaluate.