Why do we love assholes so much? Do you realize how many trillions and trillions of gigs of space are soaked up in the comment forums on TMZ-type sites with Springer wannabes arguing about the merits of loving/hating Paris, Britney (both chubbins and post-surgery versions), Loh-jam, Brange-fuckball, etc. Log into AOL instant messenger (come on, you know you want to) and actually look at the crap on the desktop application. Pick a link with an exciting new photo of one of these media darlings in a potentially compromising situation and spend some time reading the comments at the bottom. There will be dozens of “she’s a skank” comments along with “why don’t the evil paps leave these poor misguided celebrities alone” and a couple “I’m praying for you and your baby (or babies) because Jesus loves you and knows you are a good person and he is just waiting for you to step into his warm embrace and…” blah blah blah.

We love assholes. We love talking about assholes. We love arguing about whether or not they are assholes, or what quality of assholes they might be. And, some of us love complaining about the fact that we are alwasy talking about assholes. Yeah, I know I’m not helping the situation much right now.

But here’s the thing…in my commercial hating mode I have noticed several campaigns that celebrate asshole behavior. I mentioned the reflection phone ad in my last commercials post, but I forgot one of the worst offenders. There’s this awful Dell commercial focusing on digital cameras and bad Photoshop-for-dummies-esque software. This horse faced ass clown takes a bunch of rad self portraits with his chick. Then, they apparently break up and he starts taking bad shots of himself with his new chick. In between lady-friends he does some cropping of the old girlfriend from his terrific digital shots.

What is the message here? Technology will help you be a shallow prick. I mean, it’s not like he just painted a classic portrait only to find out she was banging his brush salesman, so he scribbles on a confusing smirk and changes the name of the painting from “Jenny Juggies” to “Mona Lisa” just to piss her off. This dude is taking self-portraits with a hundred dollar camera at a carnival. Just scrub the card and call it a day.

Why do we find this entertaining? Why do we celebrate people treating other people like assholes? Do you think he cropped her face out of the naked pics he got her to pose for after the carnival when she was all hopped up on fried Oreos and $15 beers? No, I bet he was emailing those to all his buds. He probably sent a couple shots to that dude with the mirror phone. No wonder that dude’s girlfriend looks so miffed.