Cape Codders Get Shark Merchandise Taken Off Store Shelves Because it's Offensive to Shark Attack Victims
Source – The wife of a surfer, Heather Doyle of Wellfleet took offense at a kitchen towel for sale at the Christmas Tree Shops store in Sagamore that depicted the open jaws of a shark under the words, “Nice to Eat You.”
Even more offensive, say surfers, paddleboarders and other members of the nonprofit Cape Cod Ocean Community, was a notepad spotted in the Orleans store showing a shark that says, “Send More Tourists. The Last Ones Were Delicious.”
It’s been less than a year since a doctor from New York was badly injured by the bite of a great white while swimming at a beach off Truro — and even less time since 26-year-old Arthur Medici of Revere died after being attacked while bodyboarding Sept. 15 at Newcomb Hollow Beach in Wellfleet.
“It’s in really poor taste,” Doyle said. “This is a reality we’re living with.”
Members of Cape Cod Ocean Community — of which Doyle is co-chairwoman — complained on their Facebook page and contacted corporate offices of the Christmas Tree Shops, which removed the controversial items from store locations on Cape Cod.
“It is never our intention to offend customers by our merchandise assortment,” Jessica Joyce, a spokeswoman for Bed Bath & Beyond, which owns the Christmas Tree Shops, said in an email to the Times Tuesday. “We appreciate all customer feedback and understand this is a sensitive issue toward which many people have different feelings.” …
“It’s not cute,” said Marc Angelillo, an Orleans surfer and paddleboarder who said he regularly encounters great white sharks in Cape waters.
Never let it be said that a thing can exist that is so innocuous and inoffensive that somebody, somewhere, won’t be offended by it. It has always been the case. It’s just that in 2019, we actually listen to them.
I have no doubt that 40 or so years ago there were people offended by Jaws merchandise. I’m sure the surviving crewmen of the USS Indianapolis and their families probably didn’t love their suffering turned into character development in the first great summer blockbuster. Maybe they objected to Universal Studios doing exactly what the town Amity did after Chrissy Watkins was killed in a boating accident by a Great White, slapping the shark on everything from t-shirts to posters to beach towels to arcade games:
… in a case of life imitating art. But they didn’t demand that the rest of the world bend to their will. Even 10 years ago, if the family of a shark attack wrote an angry email to a store insisting that the t-shirts they sell hurt their feelings, they’d have gotten nothing more than a polite “We are sorry for your lost. However …” in response, and that would be that. But now we’ve got a major area retailer kowtowing to a group of … what exactly? What demographic are they afraid to offend? Shark attackees? Is that some huge, powerful lobbying group we all have to bend the knee to now?
Look, I have sympathy for what they’re going through. I really do. And I make it my policy to never blame the victim. But how many Shark Weeks do we have to sit through before we realize the victims of shark attack deserve a share of the blame? When you choose to float on the surface of the habitat of a perfectly evolved, prehistoric, carnivorous, death submarine and know that from underneath you look like a seal, which is essentially a Hot Pocket with whiskers to these creatures … yeah, you are partly culpable. The waters off the Cape have been their home court for eons. You climb in, you takes your chances. And if you lose, that’s awful. Tragic. But don’t come crying to the people who just want to buy a novelty t-shirt.
Because where does this end? Dozens of people die in car accidents on the Cape every year. Are their families supposed demand a ban on all Hot Wheels and Lightning McQueen toys? If someone gets swallowed by a whale does Vineyard Vines have to change their logo? Hell, no one sells more gear on the islands than The Black Dog. I’m sure the hundreds of victims of dog attacks in this country will be contacting their lawyers. And God forbid if the San Jose Sharks come to Boston for the Stanley Cup Final. The thousands of Massachusetts shark attack survivors will be rioting outside the Garden, demanding they change their name like a racist mascot.
We are currently living in the early stages of the Tyranny of the One. And if we don’t start saying “no” to people, even people who lost loved ones to marine predators who are perfect eating machines, we’re not going to survive as a culture. So stand up to the oppression and buy a One Bite Tee here. For freedom.