Contradictions of New Towelism

It's a well enough known phenomenon that an idea first debated by a very small number of people can begin to take hold and spread far and wide. Who would have thought, however, that my innocent discussion of towels, and then the email it produced in response, could have led to this? Lorenz Gude writes:

As I huddle in the leafy suburb of West Palm Beach, I can hear the pulsing roar of the mob as yet another Bed, Bath and Beyond succumbs to its fury. Through the smoke one can glimpse the emaciated figures of South Beach dieting supermodels waving tattered bath sheets triumphantly aloft. The clear distinction between bath towel and bath sheet has, here in South Florida, raised the consciousness of the bourgeoisie - demonstrating, once again, how the intelligentsia, when it is not identical to it, is always in advance of the bourgeoisie.

But alas, co-conspirator Geras, the revolution is not going well. The inherent contradictions within New Towelism have created a schism. The Orthodox Towelists have ousted the bath sheet users for what they see as 'excesses'. And the bath sheet users have proudly adopted the name Full Sheet Bathists and begun referring to the Orthodox as Half-Bathed Towelettes.

You will be pleased to hear that I have set up an emergency trauma counseling station in the back garden for the traumatized Guatemalan gardeners who are wandering the streets, slack-jawed at their masters' exertions, repeating 'muy loco, muy loco', over and over again. When I can get any sense out of them at all, they cry piteously, 'But we have no towels'. There are so many of them and I am only one. I do what I can before falling exhausted into my bed barely able to suppress the uncharacteristically cruel thought, 'Let them shake themselves dry like they always do'.