Osama Death Merch: 6 Disturbing Gift Ideas


Osama bin Laden may be dead, but America’s entrepreneurial spirit lives on. Want a creepy relic to commemorate NOsama Day? Bid on bin Laden’s (alleged) beard! Got $12,000? The domain name BinLadenConspiracy.com could be yours! Below, 6 OBL commemorative options, starting with two Mother’s Day gift ideas:

1) For your pregnant sister-in-law:

Hey, it’s almost Mother’s Day! Why not congratulate the soon-to-be-mom in your life with this lovely “Bye Bye Asshole” T-shirt? As an added bonus, the word “Asshole” will stretch right over that cute baby bump, and Osama’s head will be at pubic level. This isn’t about being sexy. It’s about being right. America!

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

2) For your mom’s car:

Unlike most OBL death merch being sold this week, this bumper sticker is both patriotic and relatively understated!

 

 

 

 

 

 

3) For your hipster roommate:

This T-shirt isn’t overzealous like SOME T-shirts (I’m looking at you, “Bin Laden in Hell” baby onesie). Bonus: it’s made out of 100 percent organic cotton, showing that you can hate terrorists and love the environment at the same time. Everybody wins!

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 4) For your racist, yoga-loving friend:

Sure, there are many yoga mats with anti-Osama sentiments to choose from. But what’s more soothing during your sun salutation than a reminder of your intention to hate Muslims?*

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

5) For your techie coworker:

This iPad case is succinct and subtly ironic, perfect as a coffeeshop conversation-starter. No extra lives for you, Osama.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

6) For your Republican, beer-drinking dad:

As your dad knows, the only sad thing about Osama’s death is that Obama ordered it. Unless Sarah Palin was right, and George W. masterminded the whole takedown ages ago! Either way, he can savor the taste of freedom with this beer stein.

 

 

 

What? These options don’t match your gift-giving needs? Never fear, there are many, many, many more options to choose from on eBay, Etsy.com, and CafePress. Share your faves in comments.

*Please note: Gaiam is only the manufacturer of the mat, CafePress does the printing. There is now an online campaign asking Gaiam to remove the mat, but it would be prudent to forward concerns to CafePress as well. Gaiam is aware of the problem and is working to remove the mats and has said they do not condone the statements on the mat pictured.

Front page image: Abbottabad Baby Onesie/CafePress

WE'LL BE BLUNT

It is astonishingly hard keeping a newsroom afloat these days, and we need to raise $253,000 in online donations quickly, by October 7.

The short of it: Last year, we had to cut $1 million from our budget so we could have any chance of breaking even by the time our fiscal year ended in June. And despite a huge rally from so many of you leading up to the deadline, we still came up a bit short on the whole. We can’t let that happen again. We have no wiggle room to begin with, and now we have a hole to dig out of.

Readers also told us to just give it to you straight when we need to ask for your support, and seeing how matter-of-factly explaining our inner workings, our challenges and finances, can bring more of you in has been a real silver lining. So our online membership lead, Brian, lays it all out for you in his personal, insider account (that literally puts his skin in the game!) of how urgent things are right now.

The upshot: Being able to rally $253,000 in donations over these next few weeks is vitally important simply because it is the number that keeps us right on track, helping make sure we don't end up with a bigger gap than can be filled again, helping us avoid any significant (and knowable) cash-flow crunches for now. We used to be more nonchalant about coming up short this time of year, thinking we can make it by the time June rolls around. Not anymore.

Because the in-depth journalism on underreported beats and unique perspectives on the daily news you turn to Mother Jones for is only possible because readers fund us. Corporations and powerful people with deep pockets will never sustain the type of journalism we exist to do. The only investors who won’t let independent, investigative journalism down are the people who actually care about its future—you.

And we need readers to show up for us big time—again.

Getting just 10 percent of the people who care enough about our work to be reading this blurb to part with a few bucks would be utterly transformative for us, and that's very much what we need to keep charging hard in this financially uncertain, high-stakes year.

If you can right now, please support the journalism you get from Mother Jones with a donation at whatever amount works for you. And please do it now, before you move on to whatever you're about to do next and think maybe you'll get to it later, because every gift matters and we really need to see a strong response if we're going to raise the $253,000 we need in less than three weeks.

payment methods

WE'LL BE BLUNT

It is astonishingly hard keeping a newsroom afloat these days, and we need to raise $253,000 in online donations quickly, by October 7.

The short of it: Last year, we had to cut $1 million from our budget so we could have any chance of breaking even by the time our fiscal year ended in June. And despite a huge rally from so many of you leading up to the deadline, we still came up a bit short on the whole. We can’t let that happen again. We have no wiggle room to begin with, and now we have a hole to dig out of.

Readers also told us to just give it to you straight when we need to ask for your support, and seeing how matter-of-factly explaining our inner workings, our challenges and finances, can bring more of you in has been a real silver lining. So our online membership lead, Brian, lays it all out for you in his personal, insider account (that literally puts his skin in the game!) of how urgent things are right now.

The upshot: Being able to rally $253,000 in donations over these next few weeks is vitally important simply because it is the number that keeps us right on track, helping make sure we don't end up with a bigger gap than can be filled again, helping us avoid any significant (and knowable) cash-flow crunches for now. We used to be more nonchalant about coming up short this time of year, thinking we can make it by the time June rolls around. Not anymore.

Because the in-depth journalism on underreported beats and unique perspectives on the daily news you turn to Mother Jones for is only possible because readers fund us. Corporations and powerful people with deep pockets will never sustain the type of journalism we exist to do. The only investors who won’t let independent, investigative journalism down are the people who actually care about its future—you.

And we need readers to show up for us big time—again.

Getting just 10 percent of the people who care enough about our work to be reading this blurb to part with a few bucks would be utterly transformative for us, and that's very much what we need to keep charging hard in this financially uncertain, high-stakes year.

If you can right now, please support the journalism you get from Mother Jones with a donation at whatever amount works for you. And please do it now, before you move on to whatever you're about to do next and think maybe you'll get to it later, because every gift matters and we really need to see a strong response if we're going to raise the $253,000 we need in less than three weeks.

payment methods

We Recommend

Latest

Sign up for our free newsletter

Subscribe to the Mother Jones Daily to have our top stories delivered directly to your inbox.

Get our award-winning magazine

Save big on a full year of investigations, ideas, and insights.

Subscribe

Support our journalism

Help Mother Jones' reporters dig deep with a tax-deductible donation.

Donate