Apples but not bananas? What about pineapples?


Hahahaha this is great – did you know the Apple logo is blasphemous?

Yes well once you’re told of course you can see it. Apple; bite missing. But would you have thought of it if you hadn’t been told? Aha!!1! I thought not. You’re probably blasphemous yourself.

In this case it’s a sect of ultra-Orthodox believers in Russia that are claiming that the Apple logo is indeed blasphemous:

Radical orthodox Christians from Russia remove Apple logotype from the company’s products and put a cross sign instead of them. The orthodox find the half-bitten apple logotype anti-Christian and insulting their belief, something that may potentially cause serious problems for Apple’s products in the country.

Interfax news-agency reports about “several” cases, where the radical orthodox, including priests, swapped the Apple logo for an image of the cross, the symbol of Jesus Christ. According to the ultra-radical orthodox activists, the bitten apple symbolizes the original sin of Adam and Eve and is generally anti-Christian.

Of course. Because it couldn’t just be an apple, with a bite taken out. Plus the forbidden fruit isn’t an apple anyway. But whatever.

…one of the results of the Pussy Riot controversy is that the Duma, the Russian Parliament, is considering laws to make offending religious feelings a criminal offence. The question, obviously, will be whose religious feelings? How large a group will have to be offended? My understanding of Russia is not what it once was (back when I lived there for example) but I would expect the law to really say that offending the hierarchy of the Orthodox Church will be an offence and offending anyone else won’t be. But that does assume that they write the law that way.

It’s always possible that they’ll write it much more broadly and that any small group will be able to claim that pretty much anything at all is blasphemous according to their specific religious beliefs. Even the Apple logo.

Or the apple. Or the apple plus all other kinds of fruit, to make sure.

[Patiently: No, it’s not the same as “bitch” and “cunt.” Go away.]

 

Comments

  1. jenniferphillips says

    Oh for fuck’s sake, that’s ridiculous. I’m assuming that apple-with-a-bite-out-of-it = Original Sin something something, but it’s such a LONG stretch to get there.

    I remember reading something circa Steve Jobs’s death about why the apple has a bite out of it–turns out it wasn’t intended as a dig against orthodox Christians, but just needed for scale. The silhouette of the unbitten apple wasn’t clearly distinguishable from a cherry…which would have likely generated a whole different controversy, I’m sure. No one can win against these delusional fools.

  2. AsqJames says

    I always thought it did indeed represent that apple (notwithstanding the fact that apple wasn’t actually an apple (and never existed anyway)). I took it as a broad metaphor for curiosity and the human search for knowledge – the driving force behind every technological advance we’ve ever made.

    And if you think about it, there’s a lot there for religious folks to get upset about. The Bible promises good stuff after you die; science not only delays your inevitable death by decades, it gives you cool gadgets to occupy you in the meantime.

    My perception may be wrong, but I’ll go on believing it anyway because it has no practical impact on my life or anyone else’s (I neither buy Apple products nor abjure them and make no effort to persuade/dissuade others from doing so).

  3. Acolyte of Sagan says

    Aaaagh! For the love of..well, you know. Apple computers used the bitten apple image because otherwise they would have infringed copyright on the Beatles Apple Records logo, which was un-bitten.
    Or something like that.

  4. Valindrius says

    Naturally, this means that anyone with an Apple product will either have to remove said product or be expelled from Freshers’ Fayres in future. After all, if the sensibilities of some religious students must be protected in the name of a poorly written policy then the sensibilities of all possible religious students must be protected too.

  5. steve84 says

    @AsqJames
    It can stand for curiosity in a sense. The very first Apple logo showed Isaac Newton and the whole tree. But that wasn’t the reason for the name. Steve Jobs simply liked apples and worked in an orchid once.

    There are other more complicated theories like wanting to appear before Atari in listings, an homage to Alan Turing or to the Beatles’s record company.

  6. Corvus illustris says

    I suppose cherries are taboo? After all, if Adam and Eve hadn’t lost theirs…

    No, on the contrary, there is a “Cherry Tree Carol” with which the Christians (well, maybe only western ones) are perfectly at ease.

  7. JVC says

    I’m going to claim that the logo is Alan Turing’s cyanide laced apple (with a bite out).

    It isn’t true, but it should be.

  8. Pierce R. Butler says

    steve84 @ # 6: Steve Jobs … worked in an orchid once.

    He must have been more skilled with microcircuitry than Wozniak led us to believe.

    The version that I heard was that during the rush to startup, young Mr. J told his partners the name had to come before Atari in the phone book, and the decision had to be made before they adjourned – and he suggested Apple in commemoration of his days as a migrant farmworker (unless they had something better…).

  9. AsqJames says

    @Steve84 & @JVC,

    Hmm, Einstein and Turing both are very appealing creation myths, but I can’t work out which I should embrace as the true word of Jobs. I’m swaying between Curiosityism, Gravityism and Turingism. The orchid story is clearly an attempt by Jobs’ acolytes to portray him as fulfilling the ancient prophecies of Einsteinian Gravityism, but is an unnecessary embellishment.

    I may need to organise an AppleCon in Nicea where we can meditate on it and choose the one true dogma, clearly there’s no way we can believe in all three at the same time.

    Once we’re done we’ll declare holy war on Pierce’s prosaic and heretical beliefs.

  10. Rodney Nelson says

    I find lower case “T” is blasphemous as a likeness of a Roman means of punishing criminals used for killing Jesus. As French people say à bas avec le “T” minuscule!

    So do I have a cookie?

  11. kantalope says

    It was the fruit of the tree of knowledge that was forbidden? Apparently, fruit from the tree of stupid was all you can eat?

    Anyway – this is going to run afoul of the Macians and their splinter groups the i-thingians — if those groups are not religious, who is?

  12. bad Jim says

    Actually, Apple did run afoul of the Beatles’ trademark. There was even a lawsuit. Wozniak, I think, admitted that the Beatles were an inspiration for Apple’s name.

    Now for something completely different:

    Once upon a time, the Pope decided that all the Jews had to leave Rome. Naturally there was a big uproar from the Jewish community.

    So the Pope made a deal. He would have a religious debate with a member of the Jewish community. If the Jew won, the Jews could stay. If the Pope won, the Jews would leave.

    The Jews realized that they had no choice. They looked around for a champion who could defend their faith, but no one wanted to volunteer. It was too risky. So they finally picked as their representative an old man named Moishe who spent his life sweeping up after people. Being old and poor, he had less to lose, so he agreed. He asked only for one addition to the debate.

    Not being used to saying very much as he cleaned up around the settlement, he asked that neither side be allowed to talk. The Pope agreed.

    The day of the great debate came. Moishe and the Pope sat opposite each other for a full minute before the Pope raised his hand and showed three fingers. Moishe looked back at him and raised one finger.

    The Pope waved his fingers in a circle around his head. Moishe pointed to the ground where he sat.

    The Pope pulled out a wafer and a glass of wine. Moishe pulled out an apple.

    The Pope stood up and said, “I give up. This man is too good. The Jews can stay.”

    An hour later, the cardinals were all around the Pope asking him what happened. The Pope said: “First I held up three fingers to represent the Trinity. He responded by holding up one finger to remind me that there was still one God common to both our religions.

    “Then I waved my finger around me to show him that God was all around us. He responded by pointing to the ground, showing that God was also right here with us.

    “I pulled out the wine and the wafer to show that God absolves us from our sins. He pulled out an apple to remind me of original sin. He had an answer for everything. What could I do?”

    Meanwhile, the Jewish community had crowded around Moishe, amazed that this old, almost feeble-minded man had done what all their scholars had insisted was impossible! “What happened?” they asked.

    “Well,” said Moishe, “First he said to me that the Jews had three days to get out of here. I told him that not one of us was leaving.

    “Then he told me that this whole city would be cleared of Jews. I let him know that we were staying right here.”

    “And then?” asked a woman. “I don’t know,” said Moishe. “He took out his lunch and I took out mine.”

  13. oursally says

    The same dinky wingbats are trying to ban a brand of milk because it has a rainbow on the carton. No, honestly.

  14. sambarge says

    Perhaps this is a sign of my Catholic education but I totally associated the apple with the bite out of it as a reference to the Garden of Eden.

    The forbidden fruit was from the tree of knowledge. The bite gave humanity knowledge. Computers are a source of information and knowledge. Frankly, I thought that was exactly what it meant.

    I suppose the difference is, I don’t have a problem with a computer company using a logo about knowledge. The fact that people believe in a god that wants to keep them ignorant is a problem.

  15. Snoof says

    I’ve heard it said that the forbidden fruit was depicted as an apple as pun on the Latin words mālus (apple) and malus (evil).

  16. Ant (@antallan) says

    “Steve Jobs simply liked apples and worked in an orchid once.”

    Yep, and the Mac was named after the McIntosh cultivar.

    But about the logo, surely everyone knows that it’s an apple with a byte taken out of it!

    /@

  17. fastlane says

    They can change the logo, but only if it’s a pic of Jeebus on the cross…with a bite taken out him. 😀

    Or would that be too catholic for them?

  18. eric says

    Apparently, fruit from the tree of stupid was all you can eat?

    Excellent.

    My guess is that the Duma will use the Orthodox Church’s complaint to make some money. Charge Apple a “fine” for using the trademark in country or something, then let sales go ahead.

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