red onion

Fetishism: (Merriam-Webster's Collegiate Dictionary):

Extravagant, irrational devotion and/or the pathological displacement of erotic interest and satisfaction to a fetish.

The truth is, I should have posted this days ago, as the changing of the fetish has already occured in the media, and they are on to other obsessions, that may become fetishes. But, here it is anyway:

I like to surf cable, for the delicious tidbits of trash tv and viewpoint of the right-wing media. There is no liberal media, dog; that's been obvious for some time now.

But this media's obsession with Dean's speech in Iowa, has approached a territory in which obsession takes on the characteristics of that which is being condemned, in a kind of devotional, irrational, fetishistic quality.

I've always viewed fetishes as an empty vessel that takes form by the emotions shunted aside and taking residence there.

Surfing in the span of five minutes, and all three major cable news channels are airing video of Dean's so-called meltdown speech, and then appropriate commentary on how he's done himself with his "manic" performance. Hints of mental illness imbue their commentary with a self-satisfied "thank-God I'm not Howard Dean" smugness.

I go to my computer, two hours later, to write to a friend about this issue, and in the other room I hear yet another replay, I think on CNN, of the speech, and yet more commentary on Dean done himself in.

The speech was angry, it was raging, it bordered on an out-of-control lunacy. All the while what has become truly frightening is the media's seeming obsession to take him down. What was a speech to rally his troops in Iowa, has become a sign of Dean's mental illness. This says so much more about our media than about Dean himself, doesn't it?

Dean's defiance in the face of defeat, his anger and passion, have been fetishized by the obviously starved media...starving for what, well, I have my theories...

Anger in particular is considered such a "negative" emotion, that it is often shunted aside. Because of the value judgement placed upon it, it is treated like an ugly stepchild...abused, ignored, and commiting acts of treason in front of our faces.

The emotion ignored is the emotion that must find expression. And the emotion most ignored is the one channelled into fetish.

Dean is the man to rape right now. You want rape boy, I'll give you rape. Turn around and bend over, and I know you like it hard, and you like it angry, and ohhh...this feels good...Dean you bad boy, bad boy, bad boy.

We have news men and news women rubbing their crotches against the shoes of Dean's anger, under the table, while their mouths move and their heads wag in front of the camera, much sound and fury signifying a nothingness in which the shoes of Dean's anger take up residence.

The shoes of Dean's anger sit on a slowly revolving pedastal, spit-polished, shoes lovingly buffed to a high resolution. From every angle, they twinkle in the eye of the news man or woman who sits on a stool, gazing at the revolving shoes, longing to hold them, to touch them, to drop tears into them, to squeeze tears out of, to flag into submission, to flagellate oneself with the shoes of Dean's anger and delight in the large, black and blue heel marks left beneath the clothes.

Yes sir, I've got what it takes to be a newsman and newswoman, they say to self in the mirror each morning as they pack the shoes of Dean's anger in their briefcases and begin their daily commute to work.