This Baccarat Buddha--now being featured in Bloomingdale's holiday ads--can be yours for $600, a price designed to help devotees achieve un-attachment to money.
Recently in Holidays Category
The Illinois Lottery has received a fair amount of attention in recent years, from its connections to disgraced former governor Rod Blagojevich to the state's controversial plan to sell the lottery to private investors. Now, for the holiday season the Illinois Lottery has launched a new ad campaign using the Christian hymn "Joy to the World" to flog its scratch-off games, a move that has led at least one Christian to complain to the Chicago Sun Times:
In Monday’s paper, columnist Lewis Lazare notes that Energy BBDO has created a series of holiday television commercials using the song “Joy to the World” to sell—of all things—lottery tickets! The new lyrics and retro music may be captivating and clever, but are the people at BBDO familiar with the original words to this Christmas hymn? Or do they care?
“Joy to the world, the Lord is come!”
Or is Linus the only one who still understands what Christmas is all about?
Dan McGuire, Bensenville
It's a paradigmatic case of cultural appropriation, with one community's traditions used to promote ostensibly contradictory values. And as MultiCultClassics observes, the campaign doesn't stop there--"It’s gone from blasphemy to Black clichés."
There's a lot more Bronner's Christmas wack goodness on Jezebel.
Via the New York Post:
A human skull that may have been used in a bizarre ritual was found on a Bronx beach flanked by multicolored necklaces and with a jar of mercury embedded inside it, The Post has learned.
Knowledgeable sources say the skull was likely stolen from a grave and used in a Palo Mayombe ritual, which was developed by Central African slaves in Cuba and spread to the United States in the 19th century.
At the center of worship is a cauldron filled with human and animal remains, herbs, spices, cemetery soil and branches, considered sacred because it is believed the gods reside in them.
Freedom of religion--ya gotta love it! Happy Independence Day!
An American Red Cross volunteer in 1919. No Caption Needed has more photos on this theme--and be sure to scroll down for the punchline.
From Judith Morgan's Dr. Seuss and Mr. Geisel:
Joanna Sugden has the scoop, complete with this social-enterprisey analysis from a moderate Muslim blog:
Newspapers are featuring ads for flowers and articles on various Muslims worldwide with their panties in a bunch about any holiday not explicitly mentioned in Sahih Bukhari. But in all the conspicuous consumption and harrumphing, the ones that Muslims should really be focused on get lost in the shuffle as usual. Many of the trappings of Valentine’s Day have ugly and sometimes bloody pasts that no amount of red satin can hide. The items we exchange as gifts are often produced by workers who are paid little or nothing, live in wretched conditions, and face cruelty and danger in their work. Yet in the denouncing of this holiday, even the holier than thou forgot the poor and the oppressed.
No, really:
An advent calendar comprises 25 condoms each held behind a respective door for selective removal. Information is contained behind each door and a special condom is available on Christmas eve.
Roses in Riyadh will soon be rare, now that the Commission for the Promotion of Virtue and Prevention of Vice has banned items with a scarlet hue from floral and gift shops.
