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Menino to Nike: Drop dope
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1st Amendment? Outrageous!
Boy I bet the brothers at the Hempest are keeping real quiet right now, hoping hizzoner doesn't figure out what hemp is used for...
I have seen these shirts and
I have seen these shirts and my initial response to them was that they were simply about the "runners high" you hear so often about, which I and many of my friends can attest to experiencing. This said, it does push the boundaries to their absolute limit, if not beyond. Nike shouldn't stop selling them, but perhaps reconsider their window displays. One of my friends is a visual merchandiser at this Niketown. I'll try to ask her what's going on.
More making news for the wrong reasons
If the Mayor's people were smart, they would have made it clear that Menino was speaking in his capacity as an individual, because the quotes from the letter sure make it sound like he was using his position to engage in an unlawful exercise of governmental authority. He would have gotten the same response without setting off the 1st Amendment alarm bells.
More importatantly, of course is the question as to whether the people of the city who have been affected by illegal drug use would rather the Mayor spend time/make hay over T-shirts in a store or in lobbying for more funds for treatment, etc. I imagine lots of people read the quote beginning with "What we don't need is" and requoted that with lots of other endings such as "...is politicians who spend more time...."
And Nike
is getting free advertising for their cheezy T-shirts to boot (no pun intended).
LOL
Because if I see or wear a shirt like this, I'm just going to have to do drugs, right? This reminds me of Ron Paul's little bit on cocaine at the South Carolina GOP debate. Seriously, mayor, get a grip. Did the shirts make you want to do drugs or something?
Well, what else can he do?
He does have a bit of time on his hands, with the hole in downtown NOT being filled, and crime in that area escalating. If he wants to complain, because that's what he's really good at, then let him people.
Maybe Bostonians should also write letters to the mayor and ask him to do something about that hole in the ground and just get it filled in for goodness sake. We all could use the parking at least!
Don't ever suggest more
Don't ever suggest more parking to city officials. They have a long history of obliterating parts of the city in favor of turning Boston into a suburban office park or mall.
piss poor attempt by Nike to try to seem edgy?
The t-shirts are idiotic... perhaps funny in a Beavis and Butthead sort of way, but nonetheless harmless. Reminds me of the kind of tacky items you'd find at Spencer's in the mall in the 80's.
who snitched on Nike?
that's the real question...
didn't Mr. Mayor learn his lesson that being anti t-shirt makes you seem ineffectual.
by the way, it is damn hard to run and smoke a joint at the same time. Mutually exclusive, or so I have heard
ILL DUCE
Remember the firefighters' bumperstickers from a few years ago? Ill Duce? That's what it is - sick authoritarianism, typo or not.
Menino was actually pretty successful in intimidating businesses from selling the "Stop Snitching" t-shirts, in a thug-like way.
The guy's basically a fascist, and like all fascists will hang on to power for life. Unfortunately, his regime has all of the corruption of other authoritarian governments, and is choking off the city. Time to go, Menino.
Term Limits
Perhaps it is time for an initiative petition on the statewide ballot limiting mayors to, say, eight to ten years maximum?
He's only mad because...
It's the only thing in town that doesn't have his name on it yet.
I take that back...
That was unfair. Sorry.
One of them does say "dope" on it. My bad.
What a dope
I've seen the shirt too.
To me, it is an ANTI-DRUG message. Even better than the "why do you think they call it 'dope?"'" campaign. It says that the wearer's choice of high is healthy, outdoor activity, not pills.
It is so obvious that the intended use of the word "dope" is as a current synonym for "cool."Do we condemn the use of a word because it has another unrelated and unintended meaning that some people choose to apply to it? That's just stupid, liberal authoritarianism.
Henceforth, no feline shall be called a pussy! No rooster a cock! Let the thought police tell US what words mean and which definitions must be erased from the dictionary!
Lunacy.
Endorphins
They're dope.
Too bad Menino is so very unfamiliar with them.
He should go home and listen to his John Denver records until he feels better. Rocky mountain high ....
Some at large candidates agree
Connolly, Flaherty and Murphy all raised their hands at a Back Bay candidates forum tonight when asked if they agree with the mayor in the shirts. Arroyo, Dorcena and Ryan did not. Pressley did not attend
Just maybe...
Maybe, just maybe, instead of trying to empty a storefront on Newbury, they should try filling one in Downtown Crossing.
Maybe, just maybe, absolutely nobody's life is affected by these shirts in any single way but drugs and crime are getting people killed in plenty of ways that affect lives every day in Dorchester.
Maybe, just maybe, we could demand the focus be turned on the real problems in this city. We don't have a broken window problem...we have a broken BLOCK problem in some areas. Fuck the sensationalistic bullshit about a bunch of stupid t-shirts that only make half-sense anyways. The drug war is over anyways. Didn't City Hall get the memo? We lost. It's time to start dealing with the reasons that people turn to drugs in the first place...and it isn't because a bunch of boldtype t-shirts in a Nike store suggested it was cool. Besides, we're talking about a store that shares the street with The Hempest...a head shop where you can buy "tobacco" bongs! And suddenly it's a t-shirt that says "get high" on it that is corrupting our youth??
Damn, these politicians need to pull their heads out of their rectums and quickly.
Nike T-Shirts
People are going to believe what they are lead to believe. This is the American way. The manufacturing of fame has become the single most important component of too many American's lives. If I write a poem about killing someone for their Air Jordans which is filled with imagery and irony I would not expect a reader or listener to use the poem as "cliff notes" or a blueprint to murder. But the powers at be see fit anything which upsets their personal way of life. Nike says, 'get wet" which could be taken as smoking angel dust, or "ride pipe" which could mean sex for profit or dope as in weed, meth, oxycodine, lsd, heroin or fly, hip, cool, slick, out of sight, hype, phat as in fly not obese and on and on to the break of dawn. Everyone has that cop mindset when it come to their own personal beliefs. We are all Nazis at some point in our existence. We all want things to mean what we wnt them to mean according to our backgrounds, values, education ans sexual preference. It's a damn T-Shirt which costs far more than it is worth probably made in some sweat shop by some thirteen year old who will spend her life in poverty and squalor and we don't care about het but start crying about some slogan or word on the T-Shirt which gates her two bucks a day for a bowl of rice while the mayor of Boston rides in his town car eats at his fancy residents and can't do anything about unemployment in Roxbury. He should wear the Dope T-Shirt because that is what he has made himself out to be.
TOOK OFF FAST DIDN'T GET FAR
I FIRED HE FELL BETWEEN TWO PARKED CARS
HE WAS COUGIN' CRYIN' BLOOD DRIPPED ON THE STREET
AS I SNATCHED THEM AIR JORDANS OFF OF HIS FEET
from PLEASE DON'T TAKE MY AIR JORDANS by reg e gaines