mixedmedia

Don't Let the Car Fool You, My Treasure Is In Heaven

I saw this bumper sticker on the back of a brand spanking new Hummer this morning. I actually had a little gagging feeling at the back of my throat when I saw it. The nauseating implications of this statement are legion.

Just wanted to share/vent.

Anybody else seen or heard something today that took a little chunk of flesh out of your faith in mankind?

It's okay, baby, let it all out. I'll even hold you hair back for you.

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Most people go through life dreading they'll have a traumatic experience. Freaks were born with their trauma. They've already passed their test in life. They're aristocrats. - Diane Arbus
PESSIMISM, n. A philosophy forced upon the convictions of the observer by the disheartening prevalence of the optimist with his scarecrow hope and his unsightly smile. - Ambrose Bierce

pig

paging jess, paging jess. we have a hummer and some hypocracy over in the "outrage thread." need some cleanup, stat.

me personally, i don't get mad. i'm just too doggone sweet and loving. some might say cherubic, angelic, just the cuddly part of everyone's soul personified.

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You don't love me, you just love my piggy style

mixedmedia

oh, doggone, man...your sweetness is melting away all my hostility, see...

help us, we're melting, oh the humanity...all my beautiful outrage

But sure 'nuff it will be back.

__________________
Most people go through life dreading they'll have a traumatic experience. Freaks were born with their trauma. They've already passed their test in life. They're aristocrats. - Diane Arbus
PESSIMISM, n. A philosophy forced upon the convictions of the observer by the disheartening prevalence of the optimist with his scarecrow hope and his unsightly smile. - Ambrose Bierce

sapiens

I'm not religious, but I suppose that I am culturally Catholic. I've seen the bumper sticker before and it doesn't upset me.

I will say that I don't understand the notion of "knowing that you are going to heaven" implied in the bumper sticker. It's foreign to me. From my upbringing, no one can know whether or not they are headed to heaven. Believers must try to live a good life and "carry the cross" themselves. Only God knows.

(I'm not saying that the bumper sticker is wrong. I just don't understand it).

maleficent

my treasure will probably be in heaven, however Sister Ann in elementary school told m I was going to go to hell -- so yet again - No treasure for me - that really blows

you have a brilliant future ahead of you as a used car/ bridge salesman..

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pig

well, you know m2, one thing about that bumper sticker - its kind of nice to see a return to the "divine right" brand of christianity. really, so many christians these days try to pull of the lovin and healin jesus figure - its kind of nice to see a little old fashined 'fuck y'all - i've got money on this side and power on the other' attitude. breath of fresh air. so i say inject that anger back in - that's the spirit we need more of.

mal: i take it you suspect i'm full of shit. i'm aghast at such a notion. but, of course not mad. just sort of soft and mushy and taken aback in a slow-eyed tender sort of way. of course.

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You don't love me, you just love my piggy style

maleficent

i thought you were thoroughly charming and never once thought you were full of shit- though are your eyes brown? that might give us a clue as to what you are full of

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mixedmedia

Okay...so you're saying I should've pulled up next to them and yelled "Fuck you, you asshole!"?

Well, brother, I don't understand it, either. And being culturally Catholic perhaps you didn't get the memo, now you can buy your tickets to heaven in advance through Ticketmaster.

__________________
Most people go through life dreading they'll have a traumatic experience. Freaks were born with their trauma. They've already passed their test in life. They're aristocrats. - Diane Arbus
PESSIMISM, n. A philosophy forced upon the convictions of the observer by the disheartening prevalence of the optimist with his scarecrow hope and his unsightly smile. - Ambrose Bierce

pig

you couldn't just challenge them to a duel or something?

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You don't love me, you just love my piggy style

JustJess

Ahem:
FUCKING HUMMER DRIVERS OUGHT TO BE WHIPPED!!


Does that work?
I completely and totally agree. I wish you were closer for some of that cuddling!

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My heart knows me better than I know myself, so I'm gonna let it do all the talkin'.

magictoy

Yeah, there was a car I saw yesterday with a Kerry/Edwards bumper sticker.

ngdawg

Actually, the fact that the owner of that monstrosity thinks his car is any kind of 'treasure' shows just how delusional he is....."yea, I can afford to total ruin this ugly piece of $60,000 crap with a $2.50 bumper sticker"....

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Don't blame me. I didn't vote for either of'em.

mixedmedia

Oh, da horror...maybe it was my old minivan.

I still have some of those bumper stickers if you'd like one.

Which also reminds me...one of my neighbors in my apartment complex has a bumper sticker that says "Bush Is Real." Get it...Bush Is-Real...Bush Isreal. It's so witty you don't even have to spell it right.

__________________
Most people go through life dreading they'll have a traumatic experience. Freaks were born with their trauma. They've already passed their test in life. They're aristocrats. - Diane Arbus
PESSIMISM, n. A philosophy forced upon the convictions of the observer by the disheartening prevalence of the optimist with his scarecrow hope and his unsightly smile. - Ambrose Bierce

Halx

How can you ruin a piece of crap?

Anyways, my philosophy is to not show outrage, just pity. Life's too important to be taken seriously.

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[Don't Feed The Animals]

mixedmedia

Well being that his windows are about 5 feet higher than mine I think I'd have a little difficulty slapping him on the face with my white kid glove.

__________________
Most people go through life dreading they'll have a traumatic experience. Freaks were born with their trauma. They've already passed their test in life. They're aristocrats. - Diane Arbus
PESSIMISM, n. A philosophy forced upon the convictions of the observer by the disheartening prevalence of the optimist with his scarecrow hope and his unsightly smile. - Ambrose Bierce

roachboy

it seems to me that a sticker that indicates qualities like poor taste, a lack of judgment and the ability to live in denial on a hummer is redundant, in the same way the phrases "mass genocide" or "mass exodus" are.

this would entail that the driver is probably immune to insults: he or she would probably find a way to mishear them, imagining that what you were shouting was made up of heartfelt compliments directed at the fine driving machine which has the added advantage (relative to most hummers) of holding a particularly elegant bumper sticker off the ground.

there is nothing to be done with these folk.
it is good they keep themselves sealed up in huge metal boxes, dont you think?

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a gramophone its corrugated trumpet silver handle
spinning dog. such faithfulness it hear

it make you sick.

-kamau brathwaite

Bill O'Rights

Never underestimate the power of the good ol' fashioned "point and laugh". It's the surest way, that I know of, to guage just how seriously an asshole takes himself.

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"I distrust those people who know so well what God wants them to do because I notice it always coincides with their own desires." - Susan B. Anthony

"Hedonism with rules isn't hedonism at all, it's the Republican party." - JumpinJesus

It is indisputable that true beauty lies within...but a nice rack sure doesn't hurt.

Carno

I really see nothing to be "outraged" about. Why work yourself up over nothing?

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Crack

I know some starving kids are out there somewhere that could have used the $50k or whatever that hummer costs for food and medicine.

But no. the apocalypse might come soon, and they will need that 4 wheel drive and the 8 miles to the gallon.

Like $4000 rims on a rusty 82 Buick LeSabre, thus ends the glory of mankind.

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Crack, you and I are long overdue for a vicious bout of mansex.

~Halx

mixedmedia

Well, it was meant to be light-hearted. My intent was to open up a venue for people vent things that particularly annoyed them during the course of their day. Perhaps I should have named the thread Annoyance of the Day but it just didn't have the same ring to it.

Although, I do find the sentiment expressed in this bumper sticker to be especially adverse to my own personal values. Yet they are expressing their values and I am expressing mine by objection. That's all. No harm.

__________________
Most people go through life dreading they'll have a traumatic experience. Freaks were born with their trauma. They've already passed their test in life. They're aristocrats. - Diane Arbus
PESSIMISM, n. A philosophy forced upon the convictions of the observer by the disheartening prevalence of the optimist with his scarecrow hope and his unsightly smile. - Ambrose Bierce

pig

Hell.
yes.
that's,
what.
i'm.
talking.
about.


m2, i actually get a little bit viscerally annoyed anytime i see a car with a bunch of political/theological/whatever-al bumper stickers on it. to me, its just super fucking tacky. yes, i realize many of our dear posters have stickers all over their mini-vans and vw's, but i just can't help it. while i'm being a dick, i also can't stand catchy-ass personalized license tags. every time i see someone with a bunch of bumper stickers on their car, i can't help but to think that its kind of sad that people need to use that medium for self-expression...because the people behind you aren't thinking "shit, your boss was a jewish carpenter???? goddamn it, i never thought of it that way. i'm going back to church!!!!" you know?

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You don't love me, you just love my piggy style

ngdawg

The only bumper sticker I've seen that was bumper-worthy was: Hang up the damned phone and DRIVE

(although I did have a couple on my old Beetle: "When I grow up I want to be a Cadillac", later replaced by "don't laugh. it's paid for".)

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Don't blame me. I didn't vote for either of'em.

mixedmedia

Yes, pigglet, I feel the same way. I'm not a big fan of bumper stickers, either. I did have a Kerry/Edwards sticker on my previous car but that was only because I was working the campaign in a little petro-refinery wasteland of a town in Louisiana and it seemed that everywhere I turned there were bumper stickers with Bush/Cheney and mobile farms of yellow ribbons and pictures of fetuses and little decals of Calvin praying in front of a cross. I had an overwhelming need to express myself.

My new car has no bumper stickers.

__________________
Most people go through life dreading they'll have a traumatic experience. Freaks were born with their trauma. They've already passed their test in life. They're aristocrats. - Diane Arbus
PESSIMISM, n. A philosophy forced upon the convictions of the observer by the disheartening prevalence of the optimist with his scarecrow hope and his unsightly smile. - Ambrose Bierce

pig

holy ass, don't get me started on the whackos that hang around outside our football stadium on saturday with the fetus vans. yes, i fully endorse and support their right to be there, no i don't hate them...but a man's getting his tailgate on, and i've got to walk past that crap? no one is being changed by your nasty-ass pictures. they're just making my beer taste like lymph.

i think a bumber sticker here or there's no biggie, and the less catchy they are the better (that's just me dawg - i'm pretty drab guy on the surface). i give free advertising to lee oskar harmonicas on my car. simple sticker, simple purpose, everyone wins according to my narrowly defined asthetic tastes.

because i'm picky like that.

__________________
You don't love me, you just love my piggy style

jorgelito

Um, has it occurred to anyone that the bumper sticker is simply a joke? An ironic twist on a tired medium.

Feel the irony, feel the sarcasm.

Otherwise, it does seem silly to get "outraged" over *gasp* a bumper sticker!!

JustJess

We have a turtle on ours. That's it. I like turtles. It reminds me of Hawaii and I love it there. That's about it!

As for others' bumper stickers... I enjoy reading them and then seeing if the person inside matches my predetermined idea of what they must look like. I'm usually spot on! It's funny, I am REALLY opinionated on almost everything, but I find political stickers to be so distasteful - as if they're just sort of embarassing. Especially stickers for candidates that lost. But those are also funny... Heh. I guess I'm just a jerk.

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My heart knows me better than I know myself, so I'm gonna let it do all the talkin'.

snowy

They really aren't expressing the values of Jesus either, by possessing such a vehicle. Mark 10:25 says: "It is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle than for a rich man to enter the kingdom of God." So I laugh when I see stuff like that. Perhaps, like jorgelito suggested, it was meant to be ironic--because there is a lot of irony to be had in such a situation.

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If I am not better, at least I am different. --Jean-Jacques Rousseau

mixedmedia

Sheesh. I'm highly skeptical that the bumper sticker is a joke. It's not like, "My other car is a Sherman Tank." Now that would be funny.

and

Sheesh. I'm trying to make light of it.

__________________
Most people go through life dreading they'll have a traumatic experience. Freaks were born with their trauma. They've already passed their test in life. They're aristocrats. - Diane Arbus
PESSIMISM, n. A philosophy forced upon the convictions of the observer by the disheartening prevalence of the optimist with his scarecrow hope and his unsightly smile. - Ambrose Bierce

Chamaeleontidae

You mean aside from tv commercials, tv news, talk radio, and just the normal interaction with other people and other people's children? No, not today, but I'll keep you posted...

__________________
"Reality is just a crutch for people who can't cope with drugs."
Robin Williams.

Kaliena

I like bumper stickers, they give me something to read while I'm stuck in traffic.

However, I do believe that most of the time, you can tell when someone just has one for humor or actually believes the stuff they say: Just look at the sticker in the context of the other sticker.

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~Beware the waffle~

pig

oh.my.god....so it's YOU!!!...

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You don't love me, you just love my piggy style

Carno

Sorry, I didn't mean to rain on your parade.

Anyways, every day that I drive I always have the same outrage: goddamn old people. Booo old people!

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Charlatan

It's funny that some here seem to get annoyed with bumper stickers and yet seem inured to the thousands of other advertisements that we see everyday.

Personally, I wish it would all go away (well some of it).

__________________
"My hands are on fire. Hands are on fire. Ain't got no more time for all you charlatans and liars."
- Old Man Luedecke

abaya

Awesome. That is the funniest thing I've heard all day.

But let's see... I have a USRowing sticker in my rear-window, from my crew-obsessed college days. It's not really a message to convert anyone... hell, I haven't even been rowing in years. But it's like a little secret handshake with fellow rowers out there.

Sometimes I think that's all those bumper stickers are for... to piss Them off, and to have a little wink-wink-nudge-nudge with Us.

Imagine if we had TFP stickers...

__________________
And think not you can direct the course of Love;
for Love, if it finds you worthy, directs your course.
--Khalil Gibran

mixedmedia

Oh this is not true. You should have seen my face everytime that "Chinet means you care" commercial used to come on. I bitch about advertising all the time. Just not here. Lucky for you guys.

Another thing, and maybe we can get this annoyance thing going after all. Tonight, waiting in line at the pharmacy, there was a little girl there, probably 8 or 9, and her jacket read "Buy me things and I'll be nicer." Is that annoying to anyone else?

And just one more thing, I didn't mean this thread to be mean-spirited or to give the impression that I was truly outraged over a bumper sticker, but looking back I can see how I gave off that impression. What's more, I don't think the message of the bumper sticker is mean-spirited. It just conflicts with my own lifestyle. I really didn't mean to turn it into an attack thread or to put down people who have bumper stickers on their car. I hoped it might turn into a simple thread where people could let off a little steam about things they'd seen and heard during their day that irked them.

__________________
Most people go through life dreading they'll have a traumatic experience. Freaks were born with their trauma. They've already passed their test in life. They're aristocrats. - Diane Arbus
PESSIMISM, n. A philosophy forced upon the convictions of the observer by the disheartening prevalence of the optimist with his scarecrow hope and his unsightly smile. - Ambrose Bierce

pig

yes, but nearly as much as walking through the mall a few years ago, and seeing t-shirts for young women/girls that said "barely legal."

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You don't love me, you just love my piggy style

jorgelito

No need for "sheesh", just offering another perspective.

And yes, I do find bumper stickers annoying as well as entertaining. I still think the one in question was a joke, most likely a dig against Christians, something like that.

mixedmedia

Yeah, sorry about that. I guess I was getting a little frustrated because the thread wasn't going in the direction I intended. I'm not much of a thread-leader I'm afraid.

__________________
Most people go through life dreading they'll have a traumatic experience. Freaks were born with their trauma. They've already passed their test in life. They're aristocrats. - Diane Arbus
PESSIMISM, n. A philosophy forced upon the convictions of the observer by the disheartening prevalence of the optimist with his scarecrow hope and his unsightly smile. - Ambrose Bierce

jorgelito

On the contrary, you're doing just fine.

Actually, the t-shirt connection you guys bring up is salient. I have found that the annoying bumper sticker phenomenon has migrated towards t-shirts, only the annoying factor has intensified.

Yes, I absolutely find the "read a t-shirt" fad to be quite annoying. It really is the same as bumper stickers isn't it?

EX:

"Vote for Pedro", "I am a slut", "Jail bait", "porn star" (parents are you monitoring what your kids buy and wear?), "If you can read this then you are too close", etc etc etc.... The list of asinine and inane readables goes on and on and on......

Elphaba

Personally, I hate it when I creep up to another car on the freeway, doing 70 mph, to read a bumper sticker that says:

If you can read this you are too close

Good thread, M2.