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Yesterday, in my “Five People That Had A Worse Weekend Than You” column, I tossed in an item about how group of evangelical Christians were saying that Starbucks had “declared war on Christmas” by removing the images from their traditional holiday cups and simply going with a red cup to be more inclusive. If you read that column weekly, you know that the people, organizations, and things included are often there because of the sheer ridiculousness of their story. Which is exactly what I thought that particular item was when I saw it — ridiculous.
But yet, apparently, this is actually a legitimate thing. People actually believe that Starbucks is anti-Christmas, are angry about it, and are creating a growing online movement. Like, seriously?
To be honest, though, I can’t say I’m surprised. The Internet is essentially a portal for contagious outrage. One person gets pissed about something, rants about on YouTube for three minutes and all of a sudden, it’s an actual “thing.” It’s almost as if the entire online universe would shrivel up and die if we didn’t have anything to be virtually offended by. And so, every day, we get riled up about something, from lions we didn’t care about until they were killed to celebrities wearing politically incorrect Halloween costumes, and our timelines explode with monologues and reposts about the issue, until the next thing for people to be outraged by comes along.
But let’s have a reality check here. I’m pretty sure Starbucks actually loves Christmas since they sell like a billion gift cards during the holiday season, if the amount I wind up with on December 26th is a fair indication. Also, I went to twelve years of Catholic school and a Jesuit university, and I can say with a fair amount of confidence that Jesus doesn’t really care that Starbucks took the Christmas clipart off their cups. He’s probably got bigger things to worry about. As should you. And in case you need some help, let me give you some ideas:
According to Rock The Vote , “Millennials have the potential to be the largest voting bloc in our country but are voting at a fraction of their size, with an estimated 30 million young people staying home in 2012.” And yet, they are the first ones to Tweet politically charged idioms at the drop of a hat.
Greg Hardy beat the crap out of a woman, has shown absolutely no remorse, and not only gets to continue playing football, but gets referred to as a “leader” and likely makes way more money than you.
According to Feeding America, “15.3 million children under 18 in the United States live in households where they are unable to consistently access enough nutritious food necessary for a healthy life.” Children are innocent, and every single one should have enough food to eat.
Twitter still doesn’t have an edit button, and therefore there is no way to correct when you use there/their/they’re inappropriately. Obviously the technology exists, so why won’t they give us the damn edit button? Are they laughing at our constant misspelling of ‘definitely’ behind our backs? #Conspiracytheory
A September 2015 Veterans Administration Inspector General report found that “307,000 vets died before applications [for care] processed.” These people fight for our freedom and yet can’t get the basic care they were promised in return.
Don’t like people but love animals? Well, according to the ASPCA , “Each year, approximately 2.7 million animals are euthanized (1.2 million dogs and 1.4 million cats)” in shelters.
You want to be outraged about something today? There you go. Pick an issue, educate yourself and do something about it that doesn’t involve you tweeting your outrage. But if you got up this morning and decided that the thing you were going to take a stand on was the holiday Starbucks cups…I’m going to need to ask that you sit your ass down, because there are some real problems out there that we should be concerned about, and ain’t no one got time for your foolishness. I’m too busy waiting in line for skinny peppermint mocha. .
Image via Shutterstock
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Jenna Crowley
Jenna used to be known as 2NOTBrokeGirls, but then one of the girls actually went broke, so she's struck out on her own. Jenna spends her free time saving the world, one sorority girl at a time (usually while wearing yoga pants), questioning why she decided to get a doctorate, documenting her love of all things cheese related, and hosting the new PGP podcast Don't Take It From Us. You can ask her anything you want about football, using your boobs to get what you want, and pizza at @JennaLCrowley on Twitter or via email at JennaLCrowley@gmail.com.
@JennaLCrowley
@donttakeitfromus
I’m outraged people aren’t outraged at the outrageous amount of stuff we could be outraged about.
Yeah an edit button on Twitter sure would be nice. Right PGP?
If a plain red cup has any effect on Christmas for you, you don’t get Christmas…
This plain red cup has probably ruined plenty of Christmases
If plain red cups offend you then you probably had a bad time in college.
That’ll happen when you French fry when you should have pizza’d
Whenever there’s a new social media “outrage” I always imagine a handful of idiots, maybe even just 1 or 2 internet trolls, who are actually upset. The vast majority doesn’t give a shit, people are just bored with their first world life and are trying to grasp at straws for a news story.
‘Merica.
This didn’t even need to be said. 99% of people don’t give a shit what Starbucks does with their coffee cups. Just another example of the media trying to stir the pot.
I’m convinced Starbucks started it for free viral advertising and I’m not mad at them.
“I’ll have them write Merry Christmas as my name! That’ll stick it to those Seattle fat cats!”
The fact that you’re insulting my outrages that are based on what’s trending is absolutely outrageous to me. How dare you. I’m even more outraged that you posted this without checking your privilege first.
I couldn’t give two shits about Starbucks or what their cups look like, but they took the Christmas stuff off their cups so they didn’t offend people that hate and/or don’t celebrate Christmas. So outrage was going to come one way or the other. America.
For all of these people who are upset about “Christ” being removed from Christmas, or I don’t know snow men off of Starbucks cups. Be upset that ever kid won’t have a Chrostmas. In that they won’t have a present and they won’t have a meal that day or really any other day. If these groups put their energy into making sure these kids had a warm meal and 1 present then so many children would have a nicer holiday.