That time Bristol Palin was right...Starbucks and seeing red

So look I pride my self on giving people credit when they are right, even if, generally speaking those same people are idiots. So in that spirit, let me just say that I actually agree with Bristol Palin's most recent public comments over the Starbucks Red Cup "controversy".

Ok so for those of you not familiar with it, every year in December Starbucks releases a special holiday red cup. This year however, the Relgious Right has their collective panties in a bunch over the cup

This is the 2015 version thats got everyone so pissed off:

Now at this point, if your, you know NORMAL, your probably asking yourself, what the fuck is the big deal? there is literally nothing, offensive on the cup.

Well see that's offensive....they took off all the christian iconography that is all over the cups usually and thats insulting to Christians.

Seriously, do a comparison yourself. Here's a picture of the unchristian 2015 cup and prochristian cups from the previous 3 years:

Can't you just see the Jesus exuding from those other 3 cups?

No? Ok well you can see the manger scene right? the virigin Mary? a cross? an Angel? no?

Well congratulations your fucking normal. Starbucks has NEVER put any religions iconography on their holidays cups, instead preferring secular symbols like snow flakes, santa, snowmen, and ornaments

Now, as to the headline of this piece: Enter Bristol Palin who decided to weigh in on this controversy in a blog post:

"Over the past few years, Starbucks has rolled out their “red cups” right after Halloween to signal the start of the holiday season. Usually adorned with snowflakes and reindeers, this year the cups were given a makeover in a more sleek all red ombre look.

And somewhere, somehow someone took offense to the change, claiming it was part of the war on Christmas.

And the media RAN with it. They used one small group’s opinion about the cups and began attributing it to the greater Christian community. The mainstream media and the Left love their outrage machine where they claim the world is ending because any number of tiny people have expressed hurt feelings on social media. So now, they’re taking a tiny fraction of people’s response and attributing it to all conservative Christians.

Do not buy in to the media hype surrounding this story!! It is just another attempt by the LEFT to make Christians look stupid."

Now believe it or not, Bristols one word away from being 100% correct... And her implied point, that the majority of christians dont give a shit, and dont find Starbuck's cups any less (or more) religious then they ever are, it totally accurate and spot on.

Now the one word Bristols off on, highlights actually the major problem a particular group of people in this country. That one word being LEFT.

This is not a controversy fueled by the Left wing....its actually being run by the right.

Or more specifically its being run by those on the right who prey on the ignorance of others on the right, in this specific instance Breitbart.com (although a facebook post made by a guy who read their article seems to get most of the credit from some outlets)

They ran an article about how suddenly and without warning starbucks apparently took the christ out of coffee. Thing is, they didnt even try to hide how weak their story was....mostly because they know they dont have to, given the number of morons who generally read them.

For example some excerpts:

"To the right is the 2009 offering. You can see distinct elements of Christmas, even if that means Christmas in a modern sense.

They lean heavily on stars (you know, like in the Nativity Story) and the background resembles the branches of a Christmas tree. All in all, a pretty good and acceptable design for something that self-defines as a Christmas-orientated product.

But 2009 was a long time ago, and since then the company has slowly, but definitely, moved away from Christmas, and Christian iconography." 

Now to be fair I guess I see how, if we assign pretend meanings to things like stars, and pretend christmas trees have fuckall to do with Jesus, you might have gotten you head lodged far enough up your ass you think you have a point.

But look how fast it goes down hill even if Im enough of a contortionist to wedge my head up my ass the way it needs to be to accept his premise.


"To the left here, you’ll see the 2010 offering. Snowy, seasonal, at least it resembles something mildly festive and Western.

The same applies to the 2011 red cups, which have a dog sledging down a hill on the back of a snowman, snowflakes falling around them. It’s cute, really.

They stuck with snowmen for 2012 [lower right, second picture in this blog], with a big one winking at you with a star in the background that year, and a sort of upmarket stars and baubles motif on their 2013 cups.[lower left, second picture]"

 
Actually, I wouldnt say the 2010 cups looks all that festive.....just looks like people going for a walk in the snow....and they dont even see a indentation that looks like Jesus in it.

"And then it all went south. Or east, maybe.

"2014’s cups [upper right, in that second picture] looked like a child scrawled on them with a marker pen. And not in a cute way. It was a distinct shift away from looking “Christmassy”  before the monstrosity they’ve released this year."

See now I understand his problem. When you have a two tone red cup that makes a patter than looks kinda like a pine tree you walk with god. When its snowflakes and other geometric shapes its almost like hugging Jesus. But when those two tones look kinda like wrapping paper.....thats dangerous close to selling your soul to the devil.

But still this is the major plague attacking Christian values in *this* country as the article gets to

"Frankly, the only thing that can redeem them from this whitewashing of Christmas is to print Bible verses on their cups next year.

Not that I’d buy their burnt coffee anyway. And certainly not while they keep spelling my name “Ragih” (right) on their cups.

“But Ragih,” I hear you say. “Why do you care about what Starbucks is doing anyway? It’s crap coffee and none of us buy it.”

Sure, but plenty of people do. And subliminally, they’re being told/reminded that this time of the year is no longer about Christmas. It’s about the colour red, or something. It’s a “holiday season”. Don’t say Merry Christmas. It’s offensive.

And no, I’m not “reading too much into it”. This is happening. And it’s as disgusting as an Eggnog Latte."

Now a couple of points that arnt as obvious from the reading the article. First it's written by a guy named Raheem Kassam. Now if you look into Mr. Kassam's background, you will notice a few things very quickly.

1st) he's British and still lives there.  Kinda important when this story is being used as proof of Unamerican values and seen as a story about the attack on the American way of life.
2nd) Mr. Kassam is an Atheist.
 3rd) He was raised Muslim.

Now I have no problem with that (hell *I* am an atheist) but they suggest a strong likelyhood that Mr. Kassam is not too likely to be genuinely concerned about the alleged waning influence of a religion in which he's never been a member in favor of the "religion" (or belief system) that he IS a member of (if we accept his premise that the red cups are inherently anti christian and prosecular)

And actually to be honest, I only like the 3rd one because it lets me show just how stupid some people are. See the people who prey on the moronic part of the right wing usually like leaving pretty obvious clues they shouldnt be taken that seriously....its probably makes it much funnier when the dumb shits actually freak out.

So the article he wrote includes this line in its introduction. " And today I returned to my old, caffeinated Mecca (and the crowds made it feel like I was on the Hajj, too)." 
Now this is a perfectly fine analogy, and if you love coffee. likely appropriate normally. But its a bit out of place for a guy whose claiming to be a christian standing up for an assault on christian values. I highly doubt most of his target audience has any idea what the Hajj is.

But thats also the point of the analogy. Its a signal to those of us with working brains that this should never be taken seriously. And its a safe signal to drop, because Mr. Kassam knows none of his readers will actually click on the link to see what a Hajj is, and therefore notice the implication that Mr. Kassam may not be christian (and he isnt) and therefore likely doesnt actually believe in the problem he's inventing.

And look in fairness to Mr. Kassam, this isnt something unique to him. One of the things I love about the excentric and insane stories on the right, is that most right wing websites include links to the very things that prove their entire story is a lie.....because they know their target audience will never click them...and if your smart enough to do it, they dont really want you anyways (you might eventually ask a hard question of them like "yea but the math on your tax plan doesnt work")

But that brings up to the broader problem....it turns out that in america we have an entire political party whose base is made up of people of the non link clicking variety.

Dont believe me? Here's that parties front runner:

Guess whos too stupid to know they are being played? ^^^THAT GUY^^^

But their is good news, Many many many many more on the right are pushing back against this story as the stupid fake bullshit that it is.  Like FOX News, in multiple articles. (although as the video in the last link proves, some of FOX is still infested with critical stupid)

Or, my personal favorite ray of hope that maybe, finally, we found the stupid that broke the camels back is this:

"Funny, though, how some grinches on the Left take things too far in attempts to make all us jolly revelers look ridiculous, lumping us in the same box concerning misplaced outrage over a coffee cup's non-controversy.

My daughters spent many summers employed as hardworking baristas; I love their take on faux concern over Starbucks red Christmas cup and why you should enjoy your festive cuppa'joe anyway!"

The author of that quote, in case you couldnt tell from the grammer, is Sarah Palin, once the benchmark for stupid republicans.....even she doesnt buy into the story and knows its bullshit.

So, and I've never said this about anything Sarah Palin has said before.....thats a good sign for our countries future.