Theodor Adorno

I conducted some research on Theodor Adorno and his beliefs into capitalism. Adorno believed that capitalism 'fed people with the product of a 'culture industry'' in turn falsely keeping them satisfied and politically apathetic.

Adorno saw that the economic system, capitalism, had no become more unstable or was not close to collapse, as Marx had predicted. Adorno instead believed that it had become more well established. Where Marx had focused on the economics side of things, Adorno was more focused on the role of culture in securing the status quo. Adorno suggested that 'culture industries' such as film, radio magazines etc. churn out a corrupt mass of unsophisticated, sentimental products, which have replaced the more advanced, 'difficult' and critical art forms which he said might lead people to actually question life.
FALSE NEEDS are cultivated by people in the culture industries- enlightenment of mass deception. These false needs are ones which can be both created and satisfied by the capitalist system. These replace peoples 'true needs', freedom, full expression of human potential and creativity and genuine creative happiness.
COMMODITY FETISHISM- denotes the mystification of human relations said to arise out of the growth of market trade promoted by marketing, advertising and media industry. This term means that social relations and cultural experiences are objectified in terms of money ( we are delighted by something because of how much it costs.)
Popular media and music products are characterized by standardization- the process of developing and implementing technical standards ( they are formulaic and similar) and pseudo individualization- “endowing cultural mass production with the halo of free choice or open market on the basis of standardization itself. It keeps consumers in line by making them forget that what they listen to is already listened to for them, or ‘pre-digested,’”
Products of the culture industry may be emotional or apparently moving, Adorno sees this as cathartic- emotional cleansing- we might seek some comfort in a sad film or song, have a bit of a cry and then feel restored again. 
Applied to the most obvious modern day application, the argument would be that television leads people away from talking to each other or questioning the oppression in their lives. Instead they get up to go to work, come home switch on the TV, absorb the TV's nonsense till bed time, and then the daily cycle starts again.