An economics think tank argues parasocial relationships are just imaginary friends for adults
AEI, on Farrah Fawcett posters in 1976. It is the least sympathetic framing of the week and the most useful one.
American Enterprise InstituteRead →
The economist says we worship idols in sport, politics, cinema and business
And refuses the special pleading that it is only a pop thing.
The useful move here is refusing the special pleading. We say it is idols, and then it turns out the same wiring runs in football, a party leader, and a bank. Six hundred years before any of it, Margery Kempe put on white clothes in a world where widows wore black. Binding is public. The stage is much bigger than we admit and we are all standing on it.
Notice, name, choose. That's the whole method.
The clerk's shelf - how this got here first
ESSAY
The Binding of Margery Kempe ↗Medieval binding as performance of self. EGSA 2011. Free to read.Sources
Psychology says people who worship their idols in sport, politics, cinema or business aren't just fans ↗
The Economic Times, via MSN · 5 SEP 2026
Where this sits in the encyclopedia
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Taylor Swift's re-recordings are a parasocial business model
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