laugh and call him names!

One of the curious facts about the right wing in the US is the tension between its two primary components. It's as if not only one hand doesn't know what the other's doing, but one hand is pointing disapprovingly at "sinners" while the other one is reaching beneath its robes, furiously stroking its grossly engorged johnson. The social and religious conservatives don't seem to realize that all the sin and sleaze they condemn are, for the economic conservatives, pretty much the lifeblood of the economy they celebrate above all else. While "sex sells" is a cliche, the smirking, frat-boy-like version of sexuality mostly on sale is a particularly useful variety for marketing types, dependent as it is on being sexy-as-cool and reliant on a fear of utter rejection if one is adjudged insufficiently sexy. Sure, if you buy that one "body spray" (whatever the hell that is) you will, it is asserted, be up to your ass in ass - but if that guy's getting all the action, that only means none of those lovelies will be coming your way. Better correct that and fast.

We are, of course, currently thrust into the midst of marketers' biggest orgy - Christmas - and the usual whimpering cries of "keeping Christ in Christmas" are emanating from the expected quarters, all while the economists, advertisers, and corporations are well aware that the Christmas sales push is the climactic moment of each fiscal year - and as such is indispensable to our economy. The head reindeer is the almighty buck.

Speaking of reindeer and messages of social control, I was in a restaurant the other day, being besieged by Christmas music, and someone's version of "Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer" came on. For whatever reason I actually paid attention to the lyrics (more, it must be said, than the singer did - who sang every line exactly the same, as if his native language was Finnish and he'd been provided a phonetic translation). Everybody knows them, I suppose, but who listens? "Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer had a very shiny nose / And if you ever saw him, you would even say it glows. / All of the other reindeer used to laugh and call him names. / They never let poor Rudolph join in any reindeer games." Okay, so Rudolph is a misfit, scorned by his peers for his unfortunate deformity. However, the middle eight delivers its plot-twist: "Then one foggy Christmas Eve, Santa came to say / 'Rudolph, with your nose so bright / Won't you guide my sleigh tonight?'" The change is made up North, and the Big Man enjoins a new hand. (Sorry Bruce...) So what goes on back amongst the other reindeer? "Then all the reindeer loved him, as they shouted out with glee, / 'Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer, you'll go down in history!'" The moral of the story, clearly, is that making fun of geeks is fine, until some authority figure shows up and finds value in them. Then, you'd better play along, and praise the ex-geek to the skies. Just remember, kids: that awkward kid that no one likes? His daddy owns General Motors, and someday you'll be kissing his ass. (No surprise, "Rudolph"'s words first appeared in 1939...as part of an advertising campaign for Montgomery Ward.)

All of that reminded me of the way our memories (thankfully) can undercut some of the more blatantly didactic childhood products. One of my favorite books as a kid was about a train named Tootle. In my mind, it was about how Tootle the train had all kinds of fun, not only in the fascinating roundhouse and with all the train cars he got to pull around, but also gamboling about the fields playing with the daisies. At one point several years ago, in fact, I mentioned this to a friend - who said that I had it all wrong: the book was really about how Tootle wasn't supposed to leave the tracks and play in the fields. In fact, he said, the book pretty nearly said that leaving the tracks and playing in the fields was equivalent to communism. Wha-ha? But he was right: I went back and found the book, buried away somewhere in my mother's house, and Tootle is told absolutely no way should he be going off the tracks and fucking up his engines with pointless flowers. The engineers in fact blazon the fields with hundreds of red flags (as a good little train, Tootle knows not to go where there are red flags) to warn Tootle of the dangers of the narcotic poppies and flaming red flowers lazing seductively about in the fields. Tootle must do as he's told, Tootle must do his job, as his superiors tell him to. Damn.