June 30, 2007
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Annals of Theology:
November 2004– 
Controversial
“Desperate Housewives”
ad on “Monday
Night Football”“Desperate Housewives”… ranks No. 5 among all prime-time shows
for ages 12-17. (“Monday Night Football” is No. 18.) This may explain
in part why its current advertisers include products like Fisher-Price
toys, the DVD of “Elf” and the forthcoming Tim Allen holiday vehicle,
“Christmas With the Kranks.”Those who cherish the First
Amendment can only hope that the Traditional Values Coalition,
OneMillionMoms.com, OneMillionDads.com and all the rest send every
e-mail they can to the F.C.C. demanding punitive action against the
stations that broadcast “Desperate Housewives.” A “moral values”
crusade that stands between a TV show this popular and its audience
will quickly learn the limits of its power in a country where
entertainment is god.– “The Great Indecency Hoax,” a New York Times column by Frank Rich quoted in Log24 on Nov. 26, 2004
The entertainment continues. A rabbi’s obituary in today’s New York Times (see previous entry) served as ad-bait for “Joshua,” a Fox Searchlight film opening July 6.
A search for a less sacrilegious memorial to the rabbi yields the following:
The “Project MUSE” link above
works only at
subscribing libraries.It seems that here, too,
the rabbi is being
used as bait.For a perhaps preferable
reference to bait, in the
context of St. Peter as
a “fisher of men,” see
the Christian “mandorla”
or “vesica piscis,”
a figure hidden within
the geometry of Rome’s
St. Peter’s Square–
which, despite its name,
is an oval:
For the geometric
construction of the
Roman oval, see
“ovato tondo” in
Rudolf Arnheim’s
The Power of the Center.For a less theoretical account
of the religious significance
of the mandorla, see
the 2001 film
The Center of the World.
