Coonridge Digest: One2Believe – Holy Heroes!

Greetings from the Ridge.

I’m not sure where it all started. Maybe it was the old folk song that goes, "Well, I don’t care if it rains or freezes, Long as I have my plastic Jesus riding on the dashboard of my car, I could go a hundred miles an hour, Long as I got the Almighty Power glued up there with my pair of fuzzy dice."

One2Believe, a manufacturing firm from Valencia, Calif., has made a deal with the nation’s largest retail store chain to peddle Biblical Action Figures in 425 of the store’s outlets and Supercenters.

The toys are based on biblical stories. For example, there’s a set of 3-inch figures based on Daniel in the lion’s den for about $7. A 12-inch talking Jesus doll is about $15. And 14-inch Samson or Goliath action figures are around $20. For some reason the Old Testament seems to run about five bucks higher. Maybe it’s the cost of translation.

The company’s founder, David Socha, said, "I’ve got a four and six-year-old and I don’t know what to do with them any more. If you go in a toy aisle you will see toys and dolls that promote and glorify evil, destruction, lying and cheating… you see dolls that are promoting promiscuity to very young girls. Dolls will have very revealing clothes on, G-string underwear."

So? Goliath, Samson, Daniel and his big cats, and Jesus Christ will soon be available at your local toy department. Holy heroes.

Socha says, "It’s a battle for the toy box."

I’ve seen pictures of the Bible Action Figures. Samson and Goliath are both dutifully buff and dangerous-looking, while the Jesus figure is slightly cross-eyed. Maybe that’s meant to be symbolic of his fate.

What bothers me is the way I’ve seen little boys play with their action figures, slamming them around their sandbox and play areas. "My Sampson can beat up your Daniel!" then whammo!… the two figures clash on the lunchroom floor in a tangle of plastic arms and milk cartons.

Of course if the little tykes are true to their religious upbringing, poor Goliath has had it. He’s the only bad guy in the One2Believe lineup. I can envision Jesus, Daniel, and Samson all taking Cecil B. DeMile-type leaps off bunk beds onto the chest of the poor plastic Philistine. It’s not noted whether Samson has a removable head.

Perhaps I’m too cynical. Maybe making big bucks off God is part of His plan for blessing the pockets of the giant retail chain. Since the chain’s salary scale puts its average employees at the poverty level in most states, it might be a sort of inspirational to handle a Jesus action figure once a day. And because 70% of the large retailers products are made in China in sometimes-less-than humane factories, perhaps making two million plastic copies of the Savior of Mankind might provide a healing effect to the overworked Chinese hands.

Blessed are the poor for they shall inherit longer hours to keep up with the demand.

Or I can foresee a movie deal in the offing? It’s late a night in the store, the Jesus figure straightens out his crossed left eye, he looks around at the aisles still crammed with shoppers, reaches over and grabs the tail of one of Daniel’s tigers and roars to life, driving the money changers out of the temple followed by Samson ripping apart the display shelves with his biblical buff biceps while Goliath scrambles toward the checkout counter in search of his head.

Or maybe not.

And by the way, so far there are no plans for Sodom and Gomorra live action figures.

Dear Lord, I do wonder about the little boy in Pakistan or Baghdad, sitting in front of his hut and wondering if there’s any truth to what the radical leaders in his village have told him about the "cruel Satan’s from the West whose only goal is to stuff their pockets with the riches of the world." I hope he doesn’t see a picture of Samson with movable parts. I hope he doesn’t see Daniel with the swivel head.

I hope he doesn’t see the plastic Jesus.

You ever in Coonridge, stop by. We may not answer the door, but you’ll enjoy the trip.