I finally got a response from David and Elizabeth Lawson, the Utah couple selling Barack Obama Sock Monkeys.
Dear Joseph,
Thank you for your email and your forthright feedback. No, this is not a joke, and our intention is not to offend.
Our objective is three fold:
1} Provide a cuddly toy for the millions of Obama fans to take a little piece of their favorite candidate home with them.
2} Have a means for children to become a part of the political process with a cuddly plush toy all their own.
3| Contribute a pivotal article of presidential election memoribilia.After test marketing our product, we found a majority of our customer base finds our plush toy fun and loveable.
By virtue of our plush toy now temporarily out of stock, we’ve had to expedite a new order of inventory to meet the needs of our customers who want TheSockObama.
Joseph, again we thank you and appreciate your interest in the TheSockObama.
Regards,
Dave & Ellee
www.thesockobama.com
The thing that really struck me here was #3. A pivotal article of presidential election memoribilia?
I’ll have to agree with them here. People will be talking about this cuddly, racist toy for years to come.
Maybe they’ll even put it in a museum along side toys like this big-lipped african native halloween mask from the 50s and this oh-so-cute sambo-eating-a-watermellon bank.
By any standard, representing America’s soon-to-be first black president as a floppy eared, big-lipped monkey in a suit IS racist.
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Another racist fuck emerges. This one from Homosassa, Florida. Say cheese: hplinkpl@yahoo.com
You people look to call everything racist because you’re bored with your lives. Get out and do something. And what’s wrong with being proud of your race? Im white and proud of being a more advanced race, and I have science to back that statement up with facts. Nigger lovers.
I’m an educated, professional white woman, and I am appalled and afraid to see there are so many racists STILL out there. It is truly disappointing. Plundercrew – I think y’all should delete their bullshit comments! Their ignorance is disgusting. And I have to say, they’ve really got it coming to them, because KARMA is a BITCH.
I understand as a black woman that the doll could be considered racially offensive. But not all caucasian people realize that something like that would be. I think Jaclyn makes a good point “If the creators are being truthful and meant no harm then I think it is sad that not one of the creators was intelligent enough to realize that this doll could be seen as offensive and was probably not appropriate to create”. Remember the old white lady in The Color Purple, Miss Milly, who told Oprah’s character “your children are so clean, would you like to work for me and be my maid?” I really couldn’t be mad at her because she was just expressing what she thought – which I like, knowing just who I’m dealing with, not the undercover racist who only says the N word behind your back – I think many people are that way. blind to those types of things, because they don’t have the same frame of reference as we as black people have. Speilberg really captures that type of ignorance in that small scene. I think it’s time we stop getting all angry when someone does something that APPEARS to be racially motivated and just explain how it makes us feel, when its not blatant and in your face to try and help this country heal from its past. Dont get me wrong, I know racism still is alive and well, I am not ignorant to that, but for our children’s sake, Lets move on.
re #114: I’d like to think that’s the case here, but it’s not.
If these racist Utah folks realized their mistake and apologized after we exposed them for their monkey doll then I would have forgiven them.
But, unfortunately, they continue to sell their racist product online (I will not link to their website again) and probably sell more of this racist trash because of the link I provided in my original post.
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