Idol

Idol is the general term covering both directions of transfer, which is why Marsh needs it alongside endo-ideal and exo-ideal. An endogroup acts as a shared animus where the energy of each member is available to all members, and the idol is the point that energy is organized around, either as the idealized self of the group or as its anima bank. Which of the two determines everything that follows. Where the idol takes, the group runs on anima drawn inward and the idol is an endo-ideal tyrant. Where the idol is a prolific channeler of primary anima and the endogroup exists on secondary anima derived from that channelling, the idol is an exo-ideal and the arrangement is martyrdom. The second case is the dangerous one for the idol. Such endogroups risk martyring their idol in their euphoric frenzy, just as tyrants risk the genocide of their prey, and the parallel is exact since both are cases of consuming the source. Marsh describes the progression in the case of celebrity. Reflectors come to believe they have a right to the anima they are draining and devalue the idol as narcissistic, ungrateful or crazy if they resist, leaving their prey as close to empty as they can, after which the idol becomes particularly vulnerable to exploitative reflectors. Like the farmer who killed the goose that laid golden eggs, a group can become convinced that anima will come more quickly through destruction of the source.

Celebrity studies has documented the pattern Marsh describes, from Richard Dyer's work on stars as constructed images to research on parasocial relationships and the build and destroy cycle in tabloid coverage. Weber's charismatic authority describes the leader constituted by followers, and Freud's group psychology has the leader substituted for the ego ideal. Idolatry in theology names worship directed at a made object. Marsh's contribution is to treat the idol as a location in an energy system rather than as a person or an image, which is what allows her to place a celebrity, a religious figure and a corporate founder in the same category and to predict the destruction of the source as a structural outcome rather than a media excess.