Saturday, October 14, 2006

Old News: Sex Sells, 'Specially the JrH Kind

[Posted by reader_iam]

'Cause, in the end, we're all just stuck back in that most unlovely of lifecycle phases.

Or--as bad? worse? (in my worst moments, when I read stuff like this, I have to think that maybe it's true, maybe it really is a very close call and open to debate; indeed, maybe I at heart even believe it, 'cause what else can I do?)--we the people are, in fact, complete suckers, idiots, and shallow puddles:
Politicians today, said Sigelman, strive for "the personality and looks of talk show hosts." The goal is to be "well turned out."

Are you--insulted? offended? what? By that article? This post?

Ptooey.

Tell me why the assumptions underpinning this article don't hold water. Tell me why we avert our eyes from the sexual saturation of, well, everything, not least including our politics, in a whole array of ways, yet--wherever we are on the spectrum--claim the higher ground in our own special ways? Why, collectively, we utterly embrace the anti-ideals that enable this shabby, dishonest state of reality?

Tell me why, as I approach whatever upcoming elections, and in whatever short- or long-term timeframe, that I shouldn't just pick candidates who best evoke the "hott-ness" factor to which I was in thrall in my middle-school days.

I mean: What the *--well, you know. Isn't that what it's all about?

(While you're at it: Remind me, again, why it is that I'm supposed to take the political world, even elections, seriously. 'Cause I'm at a lowpoint on that one, just now.)