Woman Triggered by Hobby Lobby Cotton Decoration, Demands it be Removed
Cotton is the single-most oppressive plant on the planet, apparently
Cotton. Cotton is now, apparently, a racist symbol that triggers people perusing craft stores. Or it did Daniell Rider.
Rider was shopping at the local Hobby Lobby in Killeen, Texas when she passed a cotton decoration. But Rider did not continue on her merry hot gluing way, no, no. Rider decided to take a stand against this vile symbol of oppression. She snapped a picture of the Racist™ faux cotton stem, tapped on her Facebook app, and demanded the retailer remove the decorative stems from their store.
“This decor is WRONG on SO many levels,” Rider typed feverishly, “there is nothing decorative about raw cotton…a commodity which was gained at the expense of African-American slaves. A little sensitivity goes a long way. PLEASE REMOVE this “decor””, Rider demanded.
You know what else goes a long way? Not making everything in the entire world about slavery. I’d suggest trying that on for size, but the metaphorical shirt is probably made of cotton and thus oppressive in its own right.
Not everything in life is symbolic. More often than not, things are exactly what they are. Cotton is a plant. It cannot be and is not evil nor oppressive. It holds no responsibility for the sins of the past. Cotton plant likenesses, shocking as this may be, do not possess the ability to jump off a craft store shelf and oppress anyone.
The compulsion to view inanimate objects as morally and personally threatening is not a delusion I will ever be able to fully understand. But I digress…
Rider’s Facebook post:
The Killeen Daily Herald caught up with Rider after her Facebook post went viral:
Rider posted a picture of Hobby Lobby cotton decoration on Hobby Lobby’s Facebook page Sept. 14 saying, “This decor is WRONG on SO many levels,” and requested the ”décor” be removed from the store.
Rider, 38, said she shops at Hobby Lobby because she loves crafting, but had never seen the raw cotton displayed as a decoration.
“It shocked me,” she said Wednesday. “I was just taken aback by it because I had never seen it before.”
Rider said she at first posted the picture of the cotton on her personal Facebook page.
“Then, the more I thought about it, I thought, well I’m a consumer and it’s a décor that I don’t agree with,” Rider said about her decision to also put the post on Hobby Lobby’s Facebook page, where it went viral.
By Thursday, it had about 295,000 comments, 106,000 reactions such as likes, and more than 22,000 shares.
On Friday, she started getting rude posts on her Facebook page and her messenger inbox exploded with comments.
“I started to try to respond to a few of them, but then I realized that people weren’t wanting to have a conversation about it; they were just wanting to tell me how they feel, as mean as possible,” Rider said.
Rider said she has received death threats from people on social media, and many called her a racial slur. Rider said she has read and re-read her post to see where she offended a specific person or race and did not find anything.
“I didn’t attack anyone, I sent a message as a consumer to a retailer,” she said.
Rider, a mother of two with a bachelor’s degree in psychology, said some things can evoke a negative feeling in one person and a positive one in another.
I mean, that last sentence though…
Is Rider similarly triggered by cigarettes, sugar, rice, or hemp? What about watching others cook, clean, do dishes, and laundry? Nannies. What her thoughts on nannies? AMERICA DEMANDS ANSWERS! How else can we purge ourselves of wrong-thinking and uncomfortable history?
What a garbage time to be alive.
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Comments
Dear Ms. Rider,
At this juncture it would behoove you to stop and reflect. Not on oppression, but on how you are so free and unoppressed that the only thing you can find to complain about is an inobtrusive decorative plant.
Sincerely,
Normal People.
I wonder how many cotton products she was wearing when she wrote that post. And here’s a news flash for her: African-American slaves haven’t picked any cotton in well over a century. Maybe she could find something a little more current for her next outrage . . . .
I know ONE cotton product she’s wearing, but it doesn’t look like it’s big enough.
When I was young, I remember seeing Lester Maddox, George Wallace, and other Democrat politicians on TV spewing irrational racism and leading violence against all blacks.
Whenever I see he word “Democrat,” I see it as a “vile symbol of oppression” and I am stunned by the insensitivity with which the word is routinely displayed today. I demand that the word “Democrat” be banned as their political power was “gained at the expense of African-American slaves.”
Everything is bigger in Texas! We have some of the biggest morons on the planet. No, it didn’t stop with LBJ.
I suspect she was looking for a reason to get offended. If she hadn’t stumbled onto this dumb idea, she’d have been annoyed when the cahsier told her to have a nice day.
Slowly, ever so slowly, the young clerk reached for the 3 foot length of 2 inch dowel rod. The section of dowel had been purposed for a project she was doing in night school – but Halloween had come early, or so it seemed. Rearing back with the stout rod, she whacked the crazy lady hard against the shoulders. Omph! The air was expelled as the crazy lady fell to her knees. Just one more good whack and it would be light-out…
Should we watch for Colin Kaepernick at this year’s Goodyear Cotton Bowl Classic?
“A commodity which was gained at the expense of African-American slaves.”
Technically, slaves weren’t American, Daniell.
Ugh. Ban T-shirts, pants and our textiles.
If that plant was picked by slaves, it’s I’m amazing shape for how old it must be and should be in a museum.
Stop the insanity. Nothing wrong with a cotton plant.
Sorry the rant is over. People are just so crazy sometimes.
Next she’ll be offended by sheets at a department store.
What a cotton pickin’ a-hole.
The obama legacy.
but would she be offended by Egyptian cotton?
No… Muslim muslin.
Well, now she’s having her day in the sun and is famous and well known as a respected SJW.
Nuff Said!
I expect that Ellen and Oprah will be contacting her soon.
I hope she’s never traveling through an area where they actually grow cotton.
I can’t imagine the psychological distress she would face.
I bet she won’t be shopping at CVS anytime soon. I hear they have an offensive display of cotton balls. The horror. The horror. The horror.
Well, she’d better not watch any GOPe rinos on tv, or she’ll be inundated with cotton balls.
My local grocery store here in RI has watermelon on display, OUT IN THE OPEN!!
I haven’t written my protest letter yet but, as soon as I’m done with this fried chicken, I’m going to. Danged racists.
It’s only racist when they display quarter wedges.
The old Irish curse rings true today: May you live in “interesting” times…
Thought that was supposedly Chinese…
https://www.phrases.org.uk/meanings/may-you-live-in-interesting-times.html
She probably believes that babies are delivered by stork at the time of viability (i.e. denying lives deemed unworthy, inconvenient, or profitable), too. Also, that there are transsexual humans, that homosexuals and bisexuals are not transgendered, that modeling from extrapolation of characterization in isolation to a real frame of reference is a scientifically sound practice, that political congruence or “=” is not bigoted (i.e. sanctimonious hypocrisy), and that judging people by the “color of their skin” a.k.a. “diversity” is not a progressive form of racism and sexism.
Looking for $$$
–>with a bachelor’s degree in psychology,<–
she needs to continue her studies on a psychiatrist couch.
“Then, the more I thought about it, I thought, well I’m a consumer and it’s a décor that I don’t agree with,”
The standard she implicitly proposes for acceptable displays appears to be wholly subjective: if it bothers ME (or perhaps even if I think it might bother someone) then it must go.
What matters is not what is objectively there, the thing everyone can see for themselves. What matters is the internal, subjective emotional state supposedly created by the display.
I don’t doubt she’s fully “woke,” yet I’d question whether she’s aware that adopting this makes-me-feel-bad standard must mean living in a world with no decorative displays, for how could anyone building any decorative display possibly anticipate every possible internal, emotional state the work might trigger in someone?
Has she considered the digust her narcissistic, practically solopsistic display of intolerance-to-everything pique may be inducing in those who view her risibly me-centric complaint- one not made on the basis of what it is, does or represents, but on the basis of how it makes her feel?
(And yes, there may be some cognitive dissonanse in the PC crowd as to whether cotton is bad because of its history, or whether it’s good because better those plant-based fibers than those nasty petrochemical-derived synthetics. Perhaps the moral is, whatever you do, you’re wrong! and let me tell you how to fix it.)
Like most snowflakes, she confuses being offended with being right, and giving offense with being wrong.
She needs an eye test like the one one at an optometrist. Which is better, one, or two, whee one is an oil derrick and two is a cotton plant.
If I had a hissy fit over every bit of “decor” that I don’t like I would have time to do nothing else.
This woman had a serious mental condition. It’s called “all about me” and it is an epidemic in this country.
She’s an insecure putz who found her way into a cult that fills that void in her life. The cult lauds her self esteem by finding things like cotton.
Trained like dog, and half as useful.
This weird person has a hobby, and it isn’t crafting; it’s whine-making.
Nothing wrong with that. Everybody needs a hobby.
The problem is when anybody else pays any attention.
So, what did Hobby Lobby do in response?
If it caved (like usual nowadays), then that’s the problem.
The way to fight madness is not to just jolly it along.
Rider, a mother of two with a bachelor’s degree in psychology
A BA in Psychology is a default degree. Not long ago the typical college kid who wasn’t motivated to study something relatively specific, like music or electrical engineering or linguistics, tended to end up majoring in either “psychology” or “commercial art”. I don’t know what they major in now; probably something easier to spell than “psychology”.
XYZ “studies” is the new default, I believe.
The very first thing that human beings learn is how to control emotions. We learn not to become enraged without very good reason. We learn how to ignore things which we do not like, unless they present an immediate and gross danger. In other words, adult humans go though much of their daily lives ignoring things.
This woman, however, claims that she was so overcome by the sight of a faux cotton boll that she just had to act. She, a college graduate who it is unlikely spent even one day picking cotton and was never a slave, immediately identified a cotton plant with slavery and identified herself with slaves. And, she was so upset that she could not get through the day without taking action. How do Jews manage to get through the day without being reminded of their heritage as slaves in Egypt? How about all the other people whose heritage includes slavery [historically this includes just about everyone in the world]?
This woman either has a serious psychological condition or she is an activist seeking her 15 minutes of fame. As she called the store out on Facebook, rather than to the store manager directly, i suspect it is the latter. Everybody wants to be a hero, especially one who can bask in public adulation.
I’ve gotta know…when do cotton plants get “outed” as bigoted oppressors and Gildan and Hanes get boycotted for perpetuating the slave trade.
As to the last part of your post, the two possibilities are not mutually exclusive…she appears on the surface to a self-absorbed narcissist with delusions of grandeur and also thinks this should lead to her 15 minutes of fame that she thinks she either deserves or must have.
Another “black hole”?
It’s that time of year when the NAACP and other players in the diversity racket are carrying out baby hunts for democratic leverage and profit.
America to nudist colony in 2018!
I know for a fact that MANY a southern white picked cotton for the whole of their lives. Facts, percentages, statistics, a social justice jedi craves not these things.
Remember that time that the Africans carried over smuggled cotton seeds on their slaver ships and taught us all how to cultivate it? Fake history lives.
“What a garbage time to be alive.”
Oh, no! Just imagine how boring it would be if everyone were normal and was able to think rationally. There’d be no need for Legal Insurrection!
“Sometimes a cigar is just a cigar.”
If she finds cotton so offensive, tell her wear nothing but clothing made from polyester fibers. Then she can have a complete meltdown in the loonie bin when she finds out polyester is made from oil.
She is crazier than the lady (and I use that term loosely, who had a complete meltdown at a car show in CANADA when she saw a replica of the General Lee from Dukes of Hazzard
Cotton balls. McConnell. Ryan. Same thing.
Did everybody get together on this topic? The president of a small college in Nashville had some students over last week and he had the temerity to have this very display as a centerpiece on the dining table. Needless to say the AA contingent from the students took offense to the display. They wanted him drawn and quartered before the meal was over for his lack of sensitivity to the AA population. My response would not have been as spineless seeing as these students are not mature enough to withstand the onslaught of “triggers” and therefore unable to withstand the rigors of higher education. Here’s your tuition back. Now pack your things up and get out.
http://www.wsmv.com/clip/13723379/lipscomb-president-apologizes-to-students-for-offensive-centerpiece
Give that creature (brought up to say “lady,” but not really appropriate here, since “lady” still carries connotations of grace, class, and propriety) her very own rubber room. If the rubber triggers her, tough cookies.
I think dragging a cotton sack for a couple of harvests would help her slim down.
BTW, this is how cotton gets picked in the USA now:
ttps://www.deere.com/en_ASIA/products/equipment/cotton_harvester/cotton_harvester.page
According to her philosophy on things that insult her or that she doesn’t like, think about going into a department store and seeing all the things that you would never wear but they are all on display. Think about all of the black teens wearing their pants down below their a$$ cracks that you don’t like. Or the ones who haven’t figured out that the bill on a ball cap is to shade the sun from your eyes not the back of your head. But hey, we aren’t minorities so things we don’t like or that offends us don’t count.