“On Wednesday morning, the public got their first glimpse of disgraced CBC radio host Jian Ghomeshi– who is charged with five criminal offences including sexual assault and choking–as he appeared at a downtown Toronto courthouse.

What are sex criminals wearing this season?

Well, foregoing his signature, I’m-old-but-a-downtown-scenester-who-likes-beating-women-rock-guy style, Ghomeshi went with a black suit, crisp white shirt and subtly pattered dark tie. Standing beside his fearless and brilliant lawyer, Marie Henin, who was smartly turned-out in black with a lurid splash of lipstick across her face, the pair looked evil and powerful, like they had mastered the dark arts and were taking the charges very seriously.

Ghomeshi, who typically sports a youthful, mop of dyed hair that suggested the gentle innocence of a Muppet to his victims, had trimmed it, a clear attempt to convey to the court that he was a serious man, a full grown predator and that these women would have understood that, via his hair, and thus implicitly consented to being attacked by him. His signature five-o’clock-shadow, a reminder of his love and violent fantasies surrounding the sleazy 1980’s TV show Miami Vice, was gone, once again suggesting that he was a powerful, business-savvy man of violent and criminal action. “Think Christian Grey, not Ted Bundy, “ Mr. Ghomeshi’s stubble-free face declares.

By not wearing a bloodstained white shirt, Ghomeshi and his legal team are sending a clear message to the courts that he is not always beating women for his own twisted sexual gratification,  but is often taking time to try to plot some form of consent from his victims, usually while setting up his video camera and arranging his other props. The tie, dark and respectful, but with a subtle pattern, is a clear indicator of the BDSM interior of Ghomeshi, a bold statement of his violent intentions that not even the most drugged, intoxicated or star-struck woman could possibly have misunderstood.

In court we see that Ghomeshi has decided to eschew the tie and go for a more casual, you’re-relaxed-and-in-my-lair-and-I’m-showing-you-my-record-collection vibe. He’s showing the court that he’s their friend, the voice that they allowed into their home, bedroom, kitchen and bathroom for so many years, and that their relationship is now so intimate that the obvious next step is to introduce a startling, brutally violent, dangerous and one-sided sexual component into their life together.

With Ghomeshi, the safe word is always “style.” “

What follows is Rob Ford’s response:

“The pandas? What do I think of the pandas? I think I goddamn love pandas!! (Takes reporter and places him in genial headlock while giving him a Noogie.) Ah, just fudging around, look, to be serious with ya for a second though, I got to say that I’ve always related to the panda. They’re big, strong and fiercely committed to their people, just like football players.

And you know, they’ve always got the eye black on, so you just know that they’re ready to go into battle. I’d be proud to go into battle with an army of pandas, and Jesus, if I had a team of football playing pandas we’d be as undefeatable as the free market! Just think about it. We wouldn’t lose a single game. Not. A. Single. Fucking. One.

Anyway, I have to give props to our communist Chinese friends for loaning us these pandas and letting them live in freedom for a few years. Hopefully, once the pandas get a taste for the independent, small government, big city dynamo that is Toronto– it’ll really get them turned-on. Guns ‘N’ Roses turned-on. Toronto is like an awesome guitar solo, you know?  Toronto will make the pandas hot, really hot, feeling all sexy like they’re watching a yoga class!  Does it to me everyday. The city girl make me hot, man, hot, sweaty hot. But Geez, it’s hard to imagine that pandas don’t like sex, but it’s a fact of science. Weird, that. So it’s my hope that Er Shawn is like the Jennifer Aniston of pandas and Dammy can’t keep his paws off of her. It’ll be Panda Time all the time, and we’ll become an industry leader in panda breeding. That means more jobs. More jobs for people who never even dreamed that they might one day get to see panda sex. (High-five)

Toronto is the city, stinkin’ rich in Asian culture and with a great Chinatown full of real cheap eats (and a spitting problem that I will take care of) where dreams can come true.  We’ll be known as panda city and we’ll have those little warrior bears all over the place! It’ll be so cute it’ll make you barf, and listen, I bet you my bottom dollar, that when my fucking downtown fucking casino opens, that the whores will be two for one and that all those baby pandas will clean up the raccoon problem that has plagued this city for years! If I, or any of my constituents have raccoon shit in their eaves troughs again, the whole frigging species is going get it. Raccoons, consider yourself on watch because Rob Ford and the pandas have a plan, and you aren’t in that plan.

And you know, this might sound all freaky or something, but I’ve had a lot of funny dreams involving pandas. Can’t quite explain it. I once wore a panda mask on Chat Roulette, didn’t even know why. Saw the video after the fact. Anyway, seems like fate that my city is going to be the city of panda sex–wild, eh? ”