This bumper sticker isn’t strictly progressive, but I can’t help but include it anyway, because it’s just so extremely, inaccurately, tickling.
It’s the Pug of Doom bumper sticker.
Anyone who’s ever known a pug understands the delicious absurdity of this sticker. Pugs are weird, affectionate, snorting, cute, completely harmless, silly, disturbingly snotty, dogs. There isn’t a whiff of doom about them.
In my mind, this Pug of Doom idea takes the idea of the pug personality and turns it on its head, almost as if the pug could be posing as a dangerous dog, when in reality, it’s just a friendly little odd animal that needs special care and attention.
Hm… Wait a minute. Is this bumper sticker perhaps a commentary on teenagers from supportive, comfortable families who pose as if they’ve got edge? Could it be a statement about affluent, safe Americans who like to pretend that they’re under constant danger from terrorists?
Well, maybe it is a progressive bumper sticker, then, in a way, with this message: Let’s all stop taking on this pose that we’re on some kind of dark and dangerous path. Let’s drop the security obsession. Let’s recognize people who are truly in need, and help them, instead of wallowing in an entertainment world of pretend problems.
Let’s not be pugs of doom.
(Also available as a t-shirt)
