This past Tuesday history was made. Barack Obama was sworn in as the first non-Caucasian president of these here United States. As a nation and as a culture we have come so far so fast on the issue of racism. We still have a bit of a journey ahead of us, but another milestone has been reached. Now, most of you who have read me before know I don't like Obama for a host of reasons. His domestic/social philosophy frightens me, I am skeptical of his economic theories, his foreign policy philosophy is too random for me to have confidence in, etc etc....... Having said that, this post is to address US not him.
As a people, we in this culture love our icons. We need and seek a hero. We want to believe in something and we want it to be easy, convenient, recognizable. Advertisers, geniuses that they are, recognize this and do anything they can to Icon-ify there product so that it becomes an easy sell to us. The two biggest and easiest examples of this are the masters who marketed McDonalds and Apple. They are the benchmark for icons. They are so prolific that their monikers have left the industry in which they were born. If your still fuzzy on what icons I am talking about think McNugget, McChicken, and McRib (add a McFlurry and have a McMeal) or i-phone, i-pod, i-Google, i-works, etc. They have morphed into McMansions (ultra large suburban houses), McNasty (sex with an uhm, inexpensive partner), and i-gizmo (latest electronic time waster).
I bring this up as an example because of its relevance to what will happen in the next 4 years and what has already begun to happen over the last year and a half. Mr. President (ouch) Obama has transformed himself from a mere man, into an image, into an expectation, into an icon, and even into an idol. Simply stated he became a rock star with no shortage of groupies, fanatics, and blind followers. Since taking the election he has been desperately trying to spin things back down to lower expectations at least to the level a mortal man has a shot at accomplishing them. He built himself up so mountainously high to gain votes and followers, and believers that he put himself into a position that he either ends world hunger, cures cancer, and regulates the weather to a tepid 72 degrees all over the globe, or he has failed. He knows this and he is now trying to lower himself back down to human. Problem Mr. President, people get stirred up quickly when you play on their passions, they don't come off that cloud of emotion in a good mood typically. I have to give him credit, his campaign was uniquely masterful. If he can lower expectations with angering the masses he will have pulled off a double coup. The people, on the other hand, don't want expectations lowered, they want him to fulfill his promise, they expect 'change' and 'hope' to be brought forth in abundance.
The inauguration brought this idolatry of Obama to a climax. The name Obama and its derivatives are the next big icon. I have already seen a few in news articles such as O-nomics (similar to Reaganomics, but it took him years to gain popular use of that phrase) Another phrase I saw was the O-gasm in referance to the media frenzy around him. I cant wait to see how many new iconic monikers are invented during the next 4 years.
As of Tuesday, we have begun the new era of the Obama Nation (say that out loud a few times if you missed it)
1 comment:
Fear not my friend, the stimulus package will convert us non believers...or so they think. Come on Dawg, just drink the kool-aid.
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