Yesterday, while I was out and about, I found a plastic egg that had a business card attached to it.
It’s from a local church. There was a name, a biblical quote, and when the weekend masses begin. Oddly enough, the phone number and address wasn’t there. It said to visit their website, but failed to state what their website is.

The whole card was really colorful with a cross and sunrise, but near impossible to read because of the tiny, tiny, tiny font and font size. Cursive isn’t the best font when it’s point two.

Inside the easter egg was a couple of Jolly Ranchers – which I happily enjoyed — especially the green apple one.
Looking around, I saw several eggs, all with their little business cards, scattered down main street. It’s a high-end part of town that the homeless sometimes visit. Rarely. The police see to that.

The second egg had some Skittles – which I also ate.

At this point, I started to feel a little guilty. When I was there just hours before, there wasn’t any eggs. I’m sure that they where put there for children, not so I could just get a sugar high. (Although the third egg had a bit-sized piece of dark chocolate in it.)

With the current social and political climate, I had to ask myself – is this appropriate?

Resoundingly, no.

I am going to pull apart this seemingly harmless activity.

— First, I’m thinking of the environment.
The cheap plastic egg is made mostly from hard plastic although it’s a little bendable. There isn’t a recycling stamp on it anywhere. From what I read, it could take anywhere between ten to a thousand years (depending on moisture) for plastic to degrade.

The paper card would take two months, is not more. Bonus negative points since the card wasn’t printed on recycled paper and has a piece of clear tape that connected it to the egg.

During the months to thousands of years it takes for these things to degrade, toxins are leaking into the air, water, and whatnot, that would join the millions of other pounds of waste and debree that polite the planet.

Of course, I haven’t forgotten the candy wrappers. The Rancers where in their usual plastic. The chocolate was in some sort of tin foil while the Skittles was in a paper/plastic wrapper. I know it doesn’t seem like much, but there were dozens of these eggs “hidden” at eye level and below for children to find.

It all adds up.

— The candy wasn’t sugar-free.
As my students inform me time-and-time again through boring papers, obesity is a real threat and is harming our children! /sigh.

Sugar is addictive.

Given how the eggs are placed, they where meant to attract children which can be overall harmful and, possibly, against their parent’s wishes. That Rancher could have far-reaching and unknown consequences.

— The card attached is for a religious organization.
They’re obviously promoting their brand when some of society are at their most vulnerable – Easter. Even non-believers who grew up with religious leanings may feel the need to visit church at Easter. Guilt and nostalgia can be a strong combination.

Since the children are targeted, they may ask the adults about the nature of church. Then, others may be invited.

Easter is a way to strengthen their congergation and, over all, attract more donations. That is the goal of any business, regardless of nature. If there are no funds, their best intentions become inoperable.

The church is using a religious holiday to make money and gain popularity by using the insecurities of the passing pedistrians.
I’m not a fully moral person, but that seems wrong.


— Okay.
We got environment, sugar additives, using a religious holiday to promote a church/business.
How about just promoting a religion?

Most Christian holidays tend to be bastardizations of pagan holidays.
In this case, Easter is thought to be stolen from the goddess Eastre, who is the goddess of sex, the dawn, and rebirth. Spring was the time when she rose and the nature started to come back to life — much like Jesus who is thought to defeat death and rises from the grave.

Either way, holidays are symbolic of (argueably) outdated structures that tried to hold society into a structure that benefits certain people.

By reminding and advertising, the church is endorsing pagan holidays or, at the very least, a patriarchical society.
Which, if you believe some people, is the root of 95% of the ills of society and why the world is going into a waste basket.

Well, I suppose religion and parriarchial societies could be seen as different topics, but I’m getting to where I want to do something else.

— Jason brought up child slavery.
I can kind of see that. Free candy is given away to children with a card.
But, the card lacks an address and a phone number. It has a cross with some clouds on it. That doesn’t seem geared for children to me.

But, anything is possible.
There are a number of children that disappear during an equally, if not more so, candy driven holiday – Halloween.

— Oh. One more thing. – Cost Factor.
We have to follow the money. “Eat the rich” is still a thing, right?
For a society to be pure of racism, everyone needs to be perceived equally. That means no handouts – unless it’s from the government.

There are homless shelters and people living under bridges in my little town. I’ve seen them. Talked to them and sometimes waved. On occasion, there’s a guy on the corner of Wal-Mart looking for donations from people who just finished shopping.

So, yes, there is an establised social economic imbalance that is probably related to racism in some way shape or form.

How much money did the church spend to buy non-biodegradable plastic eggs, sugared candy, and multi-colored business cards? I’m sure the people who assembled them where volunteers, but their time is worth some sort of value.

I’m not a math person, but I am a numbers person.
My math is going to be off, but the numbers are in the right area.

Let’s say there where 144 eggs.

If the plastic eggs where bought at the dollar store $1 per 12.
That’s some eight cents a piece. Rounding purposes, let’s say $12.

Two pounds of Hershey’s assorited candy is $20. (Amazon)
360 pieces of Jolly Ranchers is $11 (Wal-Mart)
Fun-sized Easter Skittles is about $10 (Wal-Mart)

Since the business cards were on sturdy paper and in color, they can not be considered basic. They are ‘premium’ which runs about $15 per hundred on Vistaprint.com.
To keep it simple, since we have 144 eggs, let’s just charge for one and a half orders. $15 + $7.50 – $22.50.

For a grand total, not counting shipping, assembly, and the tape used- the church spent:

$75.50.

Churches tend to have tax-exempt status, so we’re not counting sales tax.
This also assumes that they didn’t buy any additional candy.

If I went to Wal-Mart, I could buy five pounds of chuck hamburger for $15.
I could also buy generic hamburger buns for 88 cents.

If each hamburger is half a pound, out of five pounds, I could make ten burgers.
That’s about $1.50 each.

The buns, of course, has to be difficult since there are just eight in a package.
But, for our purposes, let’s just say one package of buns per five pounds of hamburger.

Five packages of five pound hamburger is $75.

So, for just a few dollars more, the church could have made 50 hamburgers with buns for the homeless.

Instead, they’d rather liter downtown with plastic easter eggs that promote religion and are designed to bring in customers.

— So, the lesson is…?
Crud, I don’t know.

I suppose there could be any number of themes here.
But, that’s not for me to think about. Least, not right now. It’s got to simmer in the back of my head for a while.