Fear Itself - A Double Entendre - The Culture of Fear

"The only thing we have to fear is... fear itself." - But, does this not seem on the one hand to be contradictory, but at a more fundamental level an illogical problematic? If the only thing that is to be feared is the very feeling of fear, then fear is fearing itself. Inevitably, one has not rid oneself of fear... it may even be the case that one has, rather, exemplified fear in such a case.
...perhaps even a promotion of fear through a false-exoneration of fear. For, if there are no objects (or subjects) to be feared save for fear itself, this only leaves the trope of reflexive fear... perpetual fear. 
I dare to suggest that the "culture of fear" was born Saturday, March 4, 1933.


TBC...

Intro to my Philosophy of the Macabre & Morbid, II

I'm currently trying to cram in a reading of Steven King's Dans Macabre in which he embarks on a history and description of horror fiction and film. I have quite a ways to go in the book, but thus far he has suggested that many of us may go to horror movies, etc., in order to (psychologically) deal with real-world horrors. In short, I think this, if you'll excuse my language, is B.S. - So, I think perhaps I should attempt to work on an argument for the way in which the affect in the subject of horror and revulsion is precisely one that requires a trope of concentration toward those real-world horrors. To put it in a "catch phrase" of sorts, if we get horrified by representations in print or film why is it we are not as directly and immediately horrified by those real-world horrors? -- One dilemma of course is that our immediate access to the real-world horrors remains in print and visual media....

Introduction to my Philosophy of the Macabre 'and' Morbid

"The Horror!" --

It would seem that at first 'glance' when I inform someone that my research interests are in the subject area that I have termed "the philosophy of the macabre and morbid" (sometimes just "the philosophy of the morbid, or macabre" - the exact word choice is still developmental) that the typical assumption is that my primary concern is in the direction of the "representations" of the macabre, the morbid, horror, terror, etc. However, this is not precisely the case. Although I must indeed find these elements compelling and fascinating, my concern, or at least my attempted philosophical direction, is more fundamentally in the aspect, or experience, of horror, the macabre, morbidity, itself.... Perhaps this too needs its own terminology. I feel safe in describing such a pursuit as "the phenomenology of horror."

This concern spawns from several divergent arche-points, but just to try to shed light on one, take for instance the, perhaps, over-analyzed problem of the subjective and/or culturally encoded responses (and interpretations of those responses) to the various representations of death, horror, suffering, dread, loss, etc. - In short, there are plenty of arguments to suggest the representations in-themselves do little to nothing... i.e. the actual, physical, psychological, and emotional experiences, and responses, of horror rest in the subject. But, that subjects can and do appeal to the parallelism of an experience called "horror," one cannot throw off the experience wholeheartedly, or outright. Something of primary importance remains in the experience, the "phenomenology," of horror itself....