[lbo-talk] AFP: Macho man look is out of style

andie nachgeborenen andie_nachgeborenen at yahoo.com
Thu Jun 9 07:46:12 PDT 2005



> B. wrote:
>
> >[But how can this be squared away with the popular
> >preference for political leaders like Arnold
> >Schwarzenegger, Jesse "the Body" Ventura, "gruff"
> guys
> >like Cheney and Rumsfeld, and Flight Suit/ranch
> hand
> >Dubya?]
>
> Because it's some sort of collective fantasy denial
> of what's really
> happening? Lots of the "macho" guys you list are
> cartoon versions of
> Real Men.
>
> Doug

Right. We're not talking Humphrey Bogart, Marlon Brando, Robert Mitchum, Lee Marvin, James Cockburn -- manly men with style and grace who could be mean and really cool at the same time. Arnie and Ventura are practically cartoon characters --

btw anyone see Predator I, a horror/sci-sci adventure flick (not bad, actually), starring both Arnie and Jesse? There's another muscleman in here, Native-American, forgot his name, but he's obviously fated to be governor of something too. The flick incidentally involves an illegal special ops attack on a base of Central American revolutionies, for which the Predator makes a cruel retribution for its own purposes.)

And for Cheney, Rummy, and W, fuggadaboudit, they're just Ivy League MBA-type locker-room bullies and assholes.

Their appeal goes along with the deterioration of the movie macho man from Bogie or Mitchum to Mel Gibson. Bruce Willis (a slightly higher form of life), or Harrison Ford (not bad but no Bogie).

Even machismo ain't what it used to be.

jks

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