The Big “O”
At first, Rick Husong was stunned by the overwhelming wave of negative and sometimes crude reactions to his bid revealed in Whispers last week to build a pro-Sen. Barack Obama movement around a hand salute dubbed the Big-O. Among the hundreds of comments posted on the Whispers site were those comparing it to a gang gesture, a Nazi salute, or worse. “This is how Sieg Heil got started. And, no I’m not saying Obama is Hitler. I just think people should be careful about slipping into a personality cult for a charismatic leader,” wrote Jake of Tennessee. Husong tells me that he was pretty depressed by the reaction to his idea and free design offered on the website of Loyalty Inc., his California creative company. That is until he heard of a fan walking on Venice Beach wearing a T-shirt displaying the artwork. In fact, despite the tsunami of criticism, the artwork has been downloaded 7,700 times and his site has been hit 214,000 times since the first Whisper went live. “I would call that a raving success,” he says, adding that he plans to make his Big-O the “peace sign of our generation.”
He also E-mailed me last night to say that the hits on the artwork have inspired him to push even harder to build a movement around the hand signal.
Well, we know what it inspired on my part.
But the actual image in question is this one:
Here’s the take of the one outspoken Obama supporter in my office:
I have to say I am a little frightened by this. My first thoughts as I saw this were, “Great, all we need is an elephant to stroke and we are set!” Then I remembered that the GOP is represented by the elephant… talk about the irony.
You don’t say.
As Glenn Reynolds noted, Mr. Husong has forgotten the First Rule of Holes.
UPDATE: Robb weighs in with a “hand salute” suggestion of his own.