Special Report: Pig Logo Exposé 8

We have dropped any number of bombshells with our series of pig logo exposés. We've ruffled the feathers of the suicidefood establishment. Stepped on some toes. Sure. Obviously. It comes with the territory.

If you've been following our exposés, you might suppose you've already seen the most prevalent pig mascots. Perhaps you're thinking of Lumpy, with at least 17 tokens. Or maybe Pig Out, with at least 18. But they are as nothing compared to this, our latest and greatest installment! Feast your eyes on this cornucopia of suicidefoodist cloning!


















































































































































(From left to right, by row: KKC Barbeque Company, Cape BBQ Fest, Up in Smoke BBQ; Bixby BBQ n' Blues Festival, Bullock's Bar-B-Cue, Dillon County Chamber of Commerce BBQ Contest; Kennesaw's Pigs & Peaches BBQ Contest, Butt Lovers BBQ, JD's Barbecue; New Jersey State Barbecue Championship, Speak E-Z's, Biffle's Smoke House; Bub-Ba-Q, Stone Mountain BBQ Cook-off, Hog Heaven; Winelands Pork, Carolina Q Cup, Gourmet Pig Roast; Hansen Meat Service, Nugget Rib Cook-off, "Just Ask George" [thanks to Dr. shidoshi for the referral and photo]; The Giggly Pig, Pig Roast and Shore Lunch, Georgia Bar B Cue Association; Henry's Hog Roast [thanks to Dr. BJ for the referral and photo], Restaurant 28 Catering, Masterpiece Bar-B-Que; 10th Annual BBQ Cookoff, Uncle Redd's [thanks to Dr. Deepfriedkudzu for the photo]; TNT Southern Bar-BQ, Longcross Arks, McFrankenboo BBQ.)

Now, we know what you're thinking. The breadth, the scope, the numbing repetition! It's overwhelming! Well, prepare to be overwhelmeder!

Because this is only the beginning. Something has been nagging at us for a good long time about this pig—we'll call him Ubi, short for ubiquitous. We couldn't get over the feeling that, even though we have uncovered example after example of him, in varying degrees of customization, there was more to the story.

And then it hit us like a plate of pork. (Barf.)

Exposé 3, starring Ta-Da! At the time of this writing, we have unearthed 17 specimens. Here, take a look at a couple.

Don't you see?

Ta-Da! is Ubi. Ubi is Ta-Da! They are one. We are looking at the mightiest confluence of clip-art, folk art, and barbecue meme the world has ever known! It's almost like the Unified Field Theory, drawing together every strand of the Suicidefoodist Movement!

And it happened in our lifetime.
















Addendum: Opinion at headquarters is divided, but doesn't there appear to be some Ubi influence in this, as well? (The image, by the way, is for a dogpark.)












Addendum 2 (10/18/09): The 50th example of Ubi/Ta-Da!















Addendum 3 (10/25/09): Two from the German-speaking world, coming in at #51 and #52. One advertises a Metzgerei (butcher's shop), and the other a "suckling pig paradise!"













Addendum 4 (10/26/09): This thing's gone global!












Addendum 5 (11/21/09): For number 54, Ubi lounges on an airplane so that he might be delivered—fresh!—directly to your mouth.









Addendum 6 (2/19/10): Fifty-five. Okay, we get the point.










Addendum 7 (4/25/10): We're calling it. Number 56. It's iffy, but the general shape of the snout and ears, not to mention the sparse head hairs, sealed the deal for us.











Addendum 8 (10/06/10): #57.






Addendum 8 (10/16/10): For number 58, we go back south of the border.








Addendum 9: With appearances 59–63, Ubi cements his reputation as the hardest-working pig in the dying business!

Have Pig Will Travel

No indignity is too small! No affront too minor! Heap on the abuse—the pig can take it all and come back for seconds! Pigs are old hands at this, after all, the greedy acceptance of ill will and pain.

Leave it to the wishy-washy "food" animals to participate merely by bringing the barbecue to you. Yes, it makes their destruction that much more assured, but where is the extra portion of humiliation? The utter debasement? Sure, it's embarrassing to haul the grill around with you, but it's not floridly embarrassing.

Which is where the Have Pig Will Travel pig comes in. He consents to be ridden to the barbecue that will claim his life, smiling. And don't spare the spurs! If he's not burning with shame, it's hardly worth his while.

Pigs and Cars, a retrospective

Oh, those motoring, pleasure-seeking pigs!












Let us pause to consider the newly documented complex known as DPS (Driving Pig Syndrome).












Capable of operating a motor vehicle, of obtaining their own freedom by means of the internal combustion engine, still they remain tethered to the industry that enslaves them. They appreciate their fine retro and/or muscle cars more than life itself.

Indeed, they are fully equipped for self-actualization, with their guitars and sunglasses! They are ready to rock, to roll, to hit the stroll! They could blow this jerkwater berg in two seconds flat… if only they had a life force that continued to function.





These two (or, um, this one?) do themselves up with leather jackets and shades and assume as much attitude as a suicidal "food" animal can muster.

Their rides are mere ornaments, outward signs of their inner emptiness. As long as they can glide up to the barbecue in a sweet machine, there to surrender themselves to the eternal freedom of nothingness, they're happy.

We can summarize the personality disorder at the heart of DPS by misquoting Robert Browning: A pig should put the pedal to the metal and race toward death, or what's a heaven for?










Addendum (10/24/09): Another pig behind the wheel and his (human!) companion, who holds aloft the ribs she has torn from his chest. Keep your eyes on the road now.












Addendum 2 (4/25/10): It's spare, but it bespeaks class.












Addendum 3 (10/02/10): Is there any music dearer to suicidefoodists than wheels and squeals harmonizing in a crescendo of awfulness? Hey, this one's a lot like the Cadillac Ranch Bar-B-Q guy!

Hanoi Thit Chó

We have long dreaded this day.

The photograph looks innocent enough: a dusty street near Hanoi, a bicyclist and a pedestrian going about their business. It's a bucolic scene. Tranquil, you might say. Even so, it is a scene fraught with apprehension.

The key is the billboard emblazoned Thit Chó Quay.

Admittedly, our Vietnamese is rusty, but we feel the icy clutch of horror on our heart.












And look! Speaking of rusty, there he is: Rusty, a valiant golden retriever.

Thit chó, you see, is dog meat. That means Rusty is not so much a dog, full of his own emotions and hopes, but a shaggy hunk of meat.

It is not mere sentiment that elevates this into the realm of the obscene. Yes, pigs are every bit as intelligent as dogs. Cows want to live, to nurse their babies, just as any mammal does. Chickens can be companionable creatures. But dogs! How many of us have shared a home—a life—with a dog!

How many of us still cherish memories of a favorite dog from our youth? How many still grieve for a beloved dog who died unable to understand the many shades of our last good-bye? Do you still remember—even now, these many years later—your childhood dog’s funny or charming or endearing ways? We do! Yes, we do!

And we grew up with dogs, we humans. Not just us—you, we, that man there. We humans shared our homes with dogs when our homes were the rudest huts and the dogs still smelled of wolves. Ours is a love that has survived the millennia! We care for them and they care for us: We provide them a surrogate family, and they pledge themselves to that family's protection.

To see a dog’s trust and fidelity—his very birthright!—squandered and corrupted… The soul falters. A symbol of friendship and constancy, now mocked and degraded! That this dog smiles, proud to become thit chó, dog meat in the streets of Hanoi, is beyond the grotesque sideshow of suicidefoodism’s everyday carnival.

(Thanks to Dr. Johnny for the referral and the photo.)







Addendum: The only one of our labels we can assign to this is "3 nooses." That's it. Apart from the putridity of what it conveys, this belongs in a class by itself. It is a map to an undiscovered, tainted land.

The BBQ Grail

When these animals say they're blessed to be barbecued, they are blessed to be barbecued. It's like heaven opened up early and stayed open late to sanctify Suicidefoodism, mankind's foremost grill-and-kill religion. The pigheaded cherubs appear with wings and trumpets to assure you of your righteousness. In front of a lava-orange backdrop of licking flames, they blow their fanfare and hover beatifically.

Okay, okay, so their faith is a little grisly. But many established religions have bloody myths and cruel histories. And Suicidefoodism does appear to borrow heavily from Christianity: the little angels, the grail (here transformed into a barbecue), and, most troubling of all, the Annunciation.

For what is the holy event that has summoned the Heavenly Host? Not a sacred birth! Oh, no! Far from it. It is one of uncounted profane deaths. Sacrifices to nothing so much as appetite and habit. Likewise, the grail, from which only the most pure could drink in Christian lore, is here nothing more than a place to cook dead animals. In other words, this is a religion, as we have long argued, built on a rickety rationale.






Addendum: And what of the motto floating serenely beneath the grail? Volo dulcis puteulanus, as far as we can figure, means "I want a sweet pit." A disappointing motto for a religion of such grand pretension.

Le Roi Rose

Finally, a regal pig with some flair! Leave it to the Europeans to show up America's would-be pig royalty. (Like this pig. Or this one. Or him.)

The Pink King cares for neither wealth nor comfort. Like all good imperial figureheads, he cares only for conquest. Except… not the kind of conquest we usually think of when it comes to the head that wears the crown.

No, the Pink King dreams of his own conquest! The expansion of his empire interests him not at all. His Divine Right is not to rule, but to be ruled.

And so he marches beneath his wheat-blazoned banner, to the fires destined to knock him off his throne.

The Pink King is dead! Long live the Pink King!