The 8 Most Shameless Attempts to Cash in on 9/11
The anniversary of 9/11 was a time for reflection, memorial and staggered disbelief at the ways some people tried to make money from it. We've already seen retarded references to 9/11, and the most retarded reference to 9/11, but here are the worst insults to America and capitalism not videotaped in a cave. We're not saying these cash-grabbers are despicable bottom-feeders, but they are parasitic worms that enter the human body through the anus (unless that anus belongs to these people).
#8.
The 9/11 Quilt
Kevin Held raised almost three quarters of a million dollars to construct a vast 9/11 memorial quilt capable of covering 25 football fields, possibly as an early TSA test to see if shouting "terrorism" really could let you get away with anything. Even if it wasn't a scam, it was the worst charity of all time: His plan was to raise money to make blankets that were no use to the people who might need them. If charities get tax breaks, he should have had to pay the government extra.
Matt Rourke / AP file via MSNBC
Left: The real heroes. Right: The opposite.
He raised $713,000 to make a quilt, then moved into a $660,000 house and didn't make a quilt. Then he moved out of the house when the Associated Press noticed. He claimed the quilt hadn't been completed due to "tough economic times," which included charging the charity $37,000 rent on office space in the house he had bought, paying himself $175,000 and his own family $74,000 and spending $170,000 on travel expenses. This guy's "tough economic times" sound an awful lot like anyone else's "winning the lottery." Bedding hasn't been so horrifically misused since smallpox.
#7.
9/11 Wine for $9.11
Lieb Cellars are selling "September Mission" wine for $9.11 a bottle, because a novelty drink price point is the most tasteful place to commemorate tragedy, and a "9/11 Memorial" wine for $19.11 a bottle, because even getting the date right is less important to them than making an extra 10 dollars. Either that or this doubles as a tribute to the Italo-Turkish War.
Lieb cellars
We shall never forget Tripolitania, Fezzan or Cyrenaica!
The problem is that no one orders wine to commemorate mass murder outside of a hollowed-out volcano lair. In fact, if someone does gaze across the romantic candlelight to toast you with terrorist-attack wine, well done on dating the baroness, but you've already been poisoned. The New York Fire Department and Emergency Medical Services found out this was being sold in restaurants and called Anthony Bourdain to do something about it. These people responded to 9/11 itself, but this wine was such a travesty that they needed external help. The way 6 to 10 percent of sales go to charity only reminded people that about 92 percent doesn't, and that shouting "charity!" doesn't actually undo disrespect. Bourdain responded in his trademark calm and reasonable manner:
@NoReservations
He went on to inquire, "Holy F***! What kind of piece of shit would create such a product?" describing it as "exploitative" and "vomit-inducing." When Anthony Bourdain is calling you the asshole, and he's right, you've invented more new kinds of assholery than Sodom's first proctologist.
#6.
$9 + $11 Silver Coin Certificate
The $20 silver coin certificate was released in 2008 and is made up of a $9 and an $11 certificate. That's more disrespectful to victims and capitalism than the "$9.11 for Rudy" campaign and couldn't be more anti-American if it killed Apollo Creed. The National Collector's Mint combined tackiness and numerology into a solid anti-respect -- if you rub these certificates on royalty, they become commoners.
Asseenontv.com
This travesty has less chance of being worth $20 than a $10 bill, and not just because they sell it for profit at $19.95. The National Collector's Mint has already been censured for deceptive business practices in 2004 with their Freedom Tower Silver Dollar Coin, and again in 2011 for the 10th Anniversary Dollar, so if you think they dabbled in legality in between, well done on picking the one thing they probably aren't guilty of.
As before (and after), it comes with a certificate of authenticity confirming that it's non-circulating currency in Liberia. You couldn't push dollar bills into uselessness faster with a lighter (although at least that way you'd gain some warmth for your money).
#5.
Hand-Held Game
9/11 was an incredible challenge to Americans: Should we give up basic human rights to fight attacks that were already very illegal under the laws we had? This was a challenge airports would fail, but not as hard as hand-held LCD game makers (who are by definition exempt from, and unaware of, anything after the release of the Game Boy).
Wikipedia
Laden vs USA was made in China and can at best be considered financial judo, with China using America's capitalism against us. At worst, it's battery-powered hatred. Someone had clearly been stuck with a warehouse of hand-held electronic parts since 1989, and the most appalling terrorist attack on American soil was when they thought "NOW I REVENGE MYSELF AGAINST CAPITALISM!" It was converted so quickly the instructions still describe it as a boxing game, and being repeatedly punched in the head is still better than playing it. The makers only had enough time to Photoshop news footage of actual 9/11 wreckage on the box and only had enough brain cells to think that it was a good idea.
If you actually beat a level, it plays "Deck the Halls," because if you play this game for an entire level you deserve to have every kind of happiness poisoned by the memory.
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ReplySeriously people, stop saying how "People are cashing in on WWII with video games". Thing is, in those WWII games, you're a soldier fighting other soldiers, not a Nazi executing people in concentration camps or a soldier slaughtering civilians. When you start cashing in on crimes against humanity, then there's a problem.
ReplyKILLING OTHER HUMAN BEINGS regardless of their occupation isn't a crime against humanity? Wtf are you still doing on this planet?
SeanYamazaki, did you have a family member that died in 9-11? If not, you have no right to say what you just said.
ReplyNope, he's right. As sad as 9-11 was, as a nation, America is not moving on. Of course, it was a sickening tragedy and it needs to be remembered, but every year the media starts all this fanfare and it is on the news for about a week. It's like picking at a wound instead of letting it heal.
It's just easier for many people to have an all-encompassing explanation for terrible events. Doesn't make the Truthists or other poop any more justified in their thinking, but it explains a lot.
ReplyAlso, I know we're all suppose to be sad and s**t about 9/11, but it was ten years ago. Move on.
9/11 was ten years ago. Time to move on...
Reply"A Ronald Reagan who could double as Krang."
ReplyThe animation! It burns!
Laden vs USA? Where you can defend USA or attack USA? If it wasn't about 9/11, that'd be an awesome game.
ReplyOr command and conquer generals, the only video game I know where you can play as the terrorists fighting the americans. It's such an awesome game.
Barf on America.
ReplyYeah, I'm not very proud of our country all the time, either.
This isn't the worst part about that coloring book, but "Islamic Muslim" is redundant. By definition, a Muslim is a follower of Islam, so it's like saying "female woman."
Reply"Islamic fundamentalist" is also redundant.
Let's just get things straight.....
ReplyExploitation and controversy sells!
Unfortunately, that's the way the world works and there's not much we can do about it; after 10 years I think it's time to move on.
Video game companies are always cashing in on WWII, where 45 million died.
Reply Hide All See All 4 RepliesI don't see the problem here then.
If I had to guess it would be the fact that most WWII games display the actual war, usually in a semi-historical fashion of an RTS or FPS. Not the heinous tragic f*****g events of the war as a backdrop to a nearly unrelated game.
For instance, they don't have the Nazi Concentration Camp themed Donkey Kong, or the African American Slavery Backdrop to Pong.
That's not the point.
They're taking a war where millions died and turning it into a game to entertain kids/teens.
Also, comics used WWII in stories about guys who wear spandex.
I’m sorry. But I must ask. Are you an idiot or just trolling me?
WWII =/= 9/11
You’re comparing an entire engagement of warfare fought across over 5 years and fought over a century ago to a single week long occurrence a decade ago that wasn’t even a war.
What type of black and white nonsense arguing is that?
“Derp, all videos games based on wars showing me as a soldier killing soldiers are the same as a game based on f*****g aliens taking a theme from a mass murder.”
That is the same type of a*****e logic that says a soldier is the same as a serial killer.
I refuse to believe you are THAT much of a tard. You’re obviously a troll. Congrats friend. IMMAD! You did it! You have accomplished your daily task of feeding on my anger tears. You will sleep with a belly full of hate water and your mind can be laid to rest knowing you are indeed successful.
Ironically, using 9/11 as a backdrop for games makes a helluva lot more sense, or at least a better connection with humanity.
WW2, once you get past the rhetoric and Time Life version of it, was about bunch of imperialist nations trying to buttfuck each other. Of course, there was some stuff about Jews and genocide that were equally, if not more, important. But good God, you are always some SF or 101st Airborne twerp fighting for GOD QUEEN AND COUNTRY!
"Laden VS USA is also an example of the growing political and cultural impact among video games. The game can be compared to other controversial video games such as Grand Theft Auto or Ghost Recon." HAHA
ReplyWhen Anthony Bourdain is calling you the asshole, and he's right, you've invented more new kinds of assholery than Sodom's first proctologist.
ReplyThis is the most brilliant line in a piece of writing, ever.
i remember my first cracked article
All this 9/11 stuff and hating anyone not from the U.S.A. really pisses me off. Every time in your history that you guys are attacked, you act like martyrs. The 9/11 attack caused 3000-5000 deaths. Whoop-di-fuck, the recent earthquake/tsunami combo in Japan killed 3-6 times that much, and you all act with that martyr attitude. Makes me sick. The attack on the WTC would have happened in China or England if it was there. They weren't attacking the U.S., they were going after the WHOLE WORLD with that attack. So U.S.A., please, pull your f*****g head out of your asses.
Reply Hide All See All 5 RepliesAnd you barely give any first responders to the crash site any healthcare for their illnesses contracted at that site, and must first deem them to 'not be terrorists'. Again, sickening.
There are no words that can tell you how incorrect you are, but I will attempt to pen this regardless.
"All this 9/11 stuff and hating anyone not from the U.S.A. really pisses me off. The 9/11 attack caused 3000-5000 deaths." - Try over six thousand.
"Whoop-di-fuck, the recent earthquake/tsunami combo in Japan killed 3-6 times that much, and you all act with that martyr attitude." - So your contention is that terrorists conspired with the Earth to attack Japan? I'm really not understanding where you're attempting to go with this.
""The attack on the WTC would have happened in China or England if it was there. They weren't attacking the U.S., they were going after the WHOLE WORLD with that attack." - Considering Bin Laden himself disagrees with you, I'm pretty much positive that you couldn't be any more incorrect.
Please, point out in the article where there was any "hating anyone not from the U.S.A"? Did you even read the article? I would doubt, vigorously, the idea that you read it before you commented. You came to this article with the express purpose of throwing this garbage out there, and you couldn't even be bothered to fact check or have a cogent opinion on the matter.
There wasn't hating people not from the USA.
There was hating stupid fucks cashing in on a stupid tragedy.
I'm sure if someone made a wii Earthquake in Japan game where you shake the wiimote til the buildings fall, they'd make an equal ton of people mad. Stop being defensive.
Ahaha, look at this one. Stupid and angry make a great combination.
E: "I'm just some teen"
Ah, I see. That explains this entirely.
Ignoramus. You compare this to a natural disaster, but natural disasters are not intentional and are just nature (I am not saying that they are not devastating and horrible). However, 9-11 was a plan thought up by human beings, intending to cause carnage. It killed thousands of people (and was not accidental in the least). If this kind of atrocity happened in any country the reaction would have been the same. Oh yeah, and then you complain that they have a martyr attitude. Um, that is actually called "patriotism" (the devotion to where you come from) , a trait burned into humans before civilization. You obviously are very stupid. The fact that the U.S.A. now is so wary about people from the middle east is reasonable, and although many people are nice from there, not all are. This goes for all races!
I'm not trolling, as a non-American I'm fgenuinely confused and curious.... Movies, games, literature and all such are created about WW2, Vietnam, the Cold War, etc., and absolutely no one has a problem with it - it's perfectly acceptable, and even applauded in some cases (a lot of the mst famous classics are war movies). But someone does the same with 9/11, and there's uproar about disrespect, a lack of patriotism and cashing in on a tragedy. I agree that it can be easily be seen as offensive but why is it only offensive if it's 9/11, and not one of the many other tragic events that have happened throughout history?
Reply Hide All See All 10 RepliesProbably because it happened more recently. Mind you WWII films were being made in the late 40's, but people were better then.
There's a difference between making a game or a movie about WW2, with characters and situations and so forth, and making one about 9/11 with nothing but a crudely-drawn depiction of the towers burning and collapsing.
A game about WW2 that featured, say, the D-Day landings as one of those "defend your castle" type games, with the player acting as the German High Command placing bunkers and towers along a beach-like route a line of mindless American G.I.s walked along, would be almost as idiotic and offensive as any of these blatant 9/11 cash-in attempts.
There have been movies, games, works of fiction in literature, all sorts of other art in response to or using the 9/11 attacks as a metaphor or subject that are not offensive or disgusting. But some of the most offensive and disgustingly ridiculous bullshit not-art things have been based on 9/11, and some of those appear in this article.
Did you really think the quilt / fraud guy would handle the Vietnam war in a sensitive and useful way?
Uh, Execudork, there IS a game almost exactly like you described.
Go to defenseonlinegames and search for D-Day Defender. You play a German soldier mowing down wave of mindless American G.I.s. And you know what? It was kind of fun. Nothing to get offended over, and offense wasn't even the point of the author.
Also, uh, actually, people have been offended. The Japanese, nowadays, get offended if we do something about WWII and make the Japanese into bad guys (despite actually being the bad guys). But anyway, yes, there are over-reactions, certainly, but the point of this article was about people cashing in on 9/11 without tact. Few people really complained about Oliver Stone's 9/11 movie because it was just "about" the events, not trying to throw 9/11 into/onto something unrelated so you can sell it for way more than it's worth. It's not only offensive to 9/11; try wearing a Hitler t-shirt absolutely anywhere besides a clan rally. It's just that there aren't really opportunities to profit off of Vietnam anymore, except movies or videogames. No one will buy commemorative crap from a war that ended nearly 40 years ago.
There are fps set in Irak, some with completely accurate representations of downtown Irak. Given that that's a current war with over 100 000 civilian casualties, I'm gonna go with the US not particuarly giving a s**t about other people's tragedy. Which is totally human, but they broadcast it across the world, which is mildly irritating.
BWM, the Japanese were the bad guys only to the Allied side of the war. From their point of view, they were the good guys so when game after game depicts them as evil, unthinking enemies, they get offended. If a video game came out, big budgets and all, where you played as a Bomber pilot on the Japanese side bombing Pearl Harbour or playing as a North Vietnamese soldier shooting down US Soldiers and other "Good Guys", how would you feel? Insulted? Outraged? remember that the US and Australian and other "friendly" forces where the invaders, not the other way round.
My point is, don't go calling other countries the "Bad Guys" simply because they were not on your countries side of a war.
I think it's because 9/11 is still so fresh in our minds. Not only that, we're not used to being attacked here at home so it came as a big shock to us and so many Americans, men, women AND CHILDREN died that day... it's still fresh and everytime the wound starts to close up & scab over, something stupid happens. As for Vietnam, WWI, WWII, Korea, etc., the games aren't cheap and disrespectful. ALSO, more time has passed and those wounds aren't as fresh. Although I know for my Uncles and Grandfather, Vietnam was hell and PTSD is hell.
Vietnam, World War 2, and the Cold War were all wars. 9/11 wasn't a war. It may have been the catalyst but the event itself was pretty much just people dying. See, in a war, both sides are fighting each other, but during 9/11 there were no fighters on our side. Just people dying. It's the same reason there's no game based on Pearl Harbor, or the Rape of Nanking, or the worst of the Soviet occupation of Berlin, or even Mai Lai. When you know there are two forces fighting, it's okay to pretend to be one of them, but when it's just one side killing a bunch of people, you show a little respect. Kinda weird, I know, but you can't compare this to a war, because this wasn't a war.
9/11 isn't a war and the US wasn't attacked by Afghanistan, yet we're there. Good times for all in political science. Well, except for me, since most of psychology, polisci, and philosophy texts and arguments are just excuses to keep the lumber industry going.
did i miss your sarcasm? people were better in the 40's? like, for real?
In italy, the TG1 news,(i think it was) the day after the attack, the news started and the first thing they did was boast on how their news cast was the most watched out of all of them and the viewing share they had and all of that, the attitude was amazing about it,it was disgusting, almost as openly saying "wow we made a bunch of money because you all watched us talking about 3000 people dying." How much lower can we sink?
ReplyThere was actually a 9/11 quilt made in Colorado. I don't remember exactly how large it was (At least several football fields). It was later displayed in new your and DC.
ReplyGuys, that's not a coloring book, it's a "Graphic Coloring Novel"! It's got to be important! Also, I found this quote from its back cover really oddly worded: "And bless the American Heroes who have died, and will continue to die, in this war on terror that was brought to our land." It's like, bless our heroes, they're going to die, but we really appreciate the effort!
Reply...where's Darrell Worley and Toby Keith?...
Reply