A Pandemic of ARSES

Yet again the two-headed beast that is

has postponed its appointment with obscurity, and yet again I despair of the creeping sickness infecting the population at an alarming rate.

Oh, I don't mean the Jedward 'phenomenon':

 n.(pl. phenomena) — a fact or situation that is observed
 to exist or happen, especially
 one whose cause is in question. 

Voting for talentless never-will-bes is a national pastime, like wearing polyester and saying "at the end of the day I was on a rollercoaster of emotions".  

No, I'm talking about our growing inability to lose badly, when circumstance demands.

The British have always had a reputation for good sportsmanship, fair play and losing gracefully.  If we're good at anything, it's losing; if we're top of a premier league — yup, it's in failure; if we're hoisting a cup bedecked with ribbons high over our heads, then it's for our expertise and ferocious commitment to coming last. 

We lose properly.  We sigh, give a wry smile, manfully shake our competitor's hand, and give credit where credit is due.  After all, we know that when push came to shove, we were probably just a little bit crap.  On the day the best person won.

But this sporting response is inextricably coupled with fair play.  You can't have one without the other.  If fair play is missing, then it's absolutely fine to express disappointment, dismay and anger — a stamped foot here, a few swear words there — before moving on.

However, the latest import from America — besides True Blood, the compensation culture, and the nutritionally deficient convenience of Pop Tarts — threatens this national notion of sportsmanship.  In the face of unfairness and injustice, Phase I of the retroviral ARSES (Auto-Repressed and Stunted Expression Syndrome) presents as a tight, rictus grin accompanied with a glassy-eyed stare; during Phase II, the victim will vomit large gobbets of  meaningless platitudes.  The third and final stage manifests as a suppression of all naturally arising emotions, the victim's formerly colourful inner-landscape now carefully blocked in with beige, taupe and, terminally, fawn.

That ARSES is highly contagious, a pandemic only a matter of time, is obvious.   Some folk are more vulnerable than others, namely social workers, politicians, and those in the media.  The elderly, under-fives and those with underlying health problems remain largely unaffected, and scientists speculate this is due to them not giving a stuff about their self-image. 

Competitors on The X Factor who have lost out to Jedward have clearly contracted ARSES.  That tight, polite smile, the blank-eyed stare?  Phase I, for sure. 

A healthy person would have responded with a tantrum.  Losing to Jedward should have ignited a flame of indignation, quickly spreading and growing into a conflagration of incandescent rage at the inequity of it all.  Dreams lie in tatters, careers collapse, all because two smurfs with a hair gel habit large enough to rival that of Gary Rhodes in his heyday have managed the impossible and alchemized loose stools into polished turds.

If I had lost to Jedward I would have seized a mic stand and beaten them over the head with it until they could dance in time, all the while screaming,

"You want fame?  Well, fame costs and this is where you start payin!"

I would have held them under the dry ice until they stopped moving.  I might even have used them as human javelins, hurling them at each other until they became impaled on the points of their own Shockwaves Ultra Strong.

Every fibre of my being would have strained against the injustice, the lack of fair play.  I would be looking for bunnies to boil.

And that would be okay.  Because anger, frustration, disappointment, sadness — these are all human emotions, and to deny them is to become essentially automative.  Beige. Taupe.  Yes, even fawn. 

Since when has identity-management become more important than identity itself?

Though seemingly a recent occurrence, I suspect it all began years back, when the ARSES virus first stowed away on imports of 'The Waltons'.