TwoTalking

I have to call it a fever, because I can only assume that people would hop aboard such a trend with some seriously impaired thinking. And from wanderings around Europe and even Morocco, it is clear as day that this fever is contagious, not to mention long-lasting. At first it seemed like a fad that might (hopefully) pass quickly, but more and more I worry that it is becoming the equivalent of the Che shirt to this generation.

Do they think that they holding it up for the cause? Or are they aggressively appropriating another people’s symbolisms as if meaning to render them meaningless? Or mindlessly following someone’s idea of edgy, fashion-forward thinking?

However having read this post on the Dunkin Donuts-Rachel Ray-Palestino debacle, I am now starting to think that it might be almost worth it. Really, I had hoped that the fever would spare the States, but the deliciousness of this ridiculous controversy has made me view the whole fashion in a whole other light… an opportunity for provocation, if only of people’s most caricature-esque sentiments. “Mainstreaming terrorism to sell donuts”? “Dunkin Donuts, the venerable old fried dough seller… the latest American firm to casually promote the symbol of Palestinian terrorism and the intifada, the kaffiyeh, via Rachael Ray”? Almost makes me feel like I have left the real world and entered some strange alternate universe… like, the universe of the Onion, the universe of SNL. What is going on?