Sunday, February 15, 2009

Too Dumb To Know Not What They Do

Others have commented on the sheer scale (and tackiness) of the Obama-tchotcke business, but the Barack Obama votive candle may take the cake for its combination of ugliness and cluelessness: 





Now, everyone says this is "all in fun." That might be true if this candle were being sold at CPAC, or at Rush Limbaugh's on-line store. There, the intent would be satirical and mocking. But, the Father Obama  candle is being sold on upper 24th Street. For all of you out-of-towners, upper 24th is a typical upper middle class Prius/latte/"more dogs than kids" progressive SF neighborhood. No one there is making fun of Obama. They love the guy! 

Now, I don't know what lurks inside people's hearts, especially in politics and religion (where it is easy to speak in one way publicly, and act the opposite in private). But, I strongly suspect most of the 700+candles the shopkeepers have sold have gone to homes where Obama is loved and admired, not made a figure of "fun." And, the sight of Obama in clerical robes, surrounded by a saintly glow, is one that I'll bet many of his admirers find inexpressibly moving.

Without knowing it, these people - the buyers and the sellers - are reverting back to a more child-like form of worship and citizenship, and acting out the most basic of heresies; the worship of a mere man as having some aspect of the divine. Yet, these are also the same people who mocked Sarah Palin (and that of anyone else on the Religious Right)'s belief in an Almighty. At least Sarah never looked at John McCain and worshipped him. She knows enough to know that no man is worth that.





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