A chorus of boos for Hallmark carol revision

[unhappycamper]

http://www.kansascity.com/2013/10/31/4588538/hallmark-takes-the-gay-outof.html



A new Keepsake Christmas ornament from the Kansas City-based company looks like your favorite tacky-but-festive holiday sweater, only this one is decorated with the words “Don we now our FUN apparel!”

A chorus of boos for Hallmark carol revision
October 31
By TIM ENGLE
The Kansas City Star

Too bad Hallmark doesn’t make an apology card for this occasion.

A new Keepsake Christmas ornament from Hallmark looks like your favorite tacky-but-festive holiday sweater, only this one is decorated with the words “Don we now our FUN apparel!” That, of course, is not quite the line you remember from the carol “Deck the Halls,” which dates to the 16th century.

That, of course, is not quite the line you remember from the carol “Deck the Halls,” which dates to the 16th century.

Hallmark had defended its word switcheroo on the 2013 holiday sweater ornament, saying “gay” is “open to misinterpretation.” But Thursday afternoon, after a day of hullabaloo, the company apologized.



unhappycamper comment: Gimmeafuckinbreak. I find it hard to believe that most of corporate America this stupid. But it appears to be.

[marble falls]

1. Most? Almost all.

[unhappycamper]

2. Corporate bigotry and racism resonates loudly.

Hopefully, people will vote with their dollars. I do.

[marble falls]

3. I do too. And I let them know with a letter, e-mail and/or phone call. I believe it works.

[unhappycamper]

4. I have just been voting with my $$. Your suggestion to let the assholes know what you think makes a

ton of sense.

Thank you.

[dipsydoodle]

5. Saying there could possibly be any misinterpretation of those lyrics

would be as absurd as saying there could be any possible misinterpretation of the original words for Sunday's Child - "Bonny and blithe and good and gay".

'less of course they were changed to Bonnie and Clyde...................

[nightscanner59]

6. Hallmark's achilles heel in this is also the product description on their site:

"When it comes to Christmas sweaters, gaudy can be good! Hang up this flashy sweater to make your tree's outfit complete. With its catchy phrase, Don we now our FUN apparel! everyone will be in on the joke."
"everyone in on the joke" is a little exclusive of certain of those... ahem... "funny" family members now isn't it?
Here's the irony. Hallmark cards company scores a 90 percent on HRC's equality scale, so they are pretty good with their LGBT employees, and for that reason alone, I will continue to purchase from them.
However, I am placing product feedback as follows right on the page:

Hallmark please edit your product description!

"Everyone in on the joke" is a bit exclusive of one of those... Ahem... "funny" family members now isn't it? I'm a consumer of your products and am proudly gay, and also glad your company rates high on HRC's equality scale. But this is clearly insensitive and politically incorrect.

I encourage other LGBT to do similar feedback. Let's let them know their "joke" is a little off color directly. Here's the link:

http://www.hallmark.com/products/general/keepsake-ornaments/holiday-sweater-1295QXG1585_DK/

[Tien1985]

7. This doesn't

Bother me.

I don't see this as trying to avoid all things gay--they do treat their LGBT employees well and their HRC score is pretty good.

"Gay" just doesn't mean what it used to anymore, and eventually people are going to start adapting traditions or creating new ones to reflect the way language has changed. "Don we now our gay apparel" means something completely different to young people growing up now--not that we can't explain the old definition, but it'll probably never really replace the first definition in their minds--as someone born in '85 and well aware of the alternate definition of gay, I have NEVER used the word that way EXCEPT when singing deck the halls.

And I'm grateful for that. We live in a time where people are openly LGBT to the extent that non-derogatory words are designated for us.

[Lex]

8. Hallmark sucks anyway, so this is just another reason to avoid their dreck. nt

[Zorra]

9. Don we now our fun apparel? Really?

Fa la la, la la la, la la la...