A polite way to tell someone their pamphlets look absurd

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Well, there is this really nice Chinese family that runs a vegan cafe nearby where I live. They have pamphlets they distribute that promote veganism. The issue is that they look ridiculous. They aren't misleading or lying and are actually extremely accurate. The problem is that they have a chicken saying "I love you, don't eat me" on it and a cow saying "We pray for you." I guess in China this sort of thing is may be touching or something but in the U.S. it is hilarious. People are mocking it. Even a fellow vegetarian said that when he saw it in their cafe he had a very hard time not laughing. I don't want them hurting the vegetarian cause but I also don't want to hurt their feelings. What's a nice way to tell them how absurd the pamphlets look?

maybe thats the point. making vegans seem fun

Let me answer this with two movie quotes.

It's a trap.
The only way to win is not to play.

I'd leave it alone. This little restaurant is NOT affecting the overall vegan cause. Any negative impact sounds minimal. Also, these sorts of things are often difficult for us to discuss and rarely come out right. Because of this, I would only approach the issue if it were really causing someone or something some kind of harm OR if you find yourself in a conversation where they are specifically asking you for your opinion.

Just my $0.02

Are they silly cartoons or photos?


As a vegetarian, I might laugh, but it wouldn't affect my opinion of the business.


And this business doesn't seem to be doing badly, even though they do something similar.

http://www.chick-fil-a.com/#thecows

Well people might be mocking it, but you don't know if it's meeting the goals of the makers or not. People might laugh at first, but later in private remember it and think about it some more. The inadvertent humor might be making people more likely to pick it up, over, say, a more proper pamplet that no one picks up or finds memorable. It could be very successful "marketing."

(doubled post deleted)

once when i was at a tavern, a person showed me one of their new business cards (of which they had a few hundred printed), and asked for my appraisal.
they were looking at the business card and they handed it to me and i took it the way it was handed to me.

i said "wow! that is original", and they said "how do you find it original?" and i said it was a novel idea to have them printed upside down.

no further inquiry was made as to my impression.

What is the problem here?
Is it your embarrassment that this nice Chinese family who I suspect are Buddhists are being mocked?
Or is it your embarrassment that your countrymen are ridiculing foreign nationals for their beliefs?


What's a nice way to tell them how absurd the pamphlets look?
There isn't any.
It only looks absurd if you think killing things for food is funny and people who don't do that are begging for ridicule.

Tough call, aziraphale.

I am going to cop out of this discussion by quoting the Wests predominant Buddhist philosopher : William Shakespeare :
"To Thine Own Self Be True"

I also suspect that this is EXACTLY what the really nice Chinese family are doing.

I didn't think of it being a marketing strategy, thanks to everyone who suggested that. That's a possibility, but it doesn't look at all like it's trying to be humourous. It just looks rather silly. Vispera, yeah, I guess the impact is pretty minimal, but I'd be concerned that many people after seeing it might think "vegetarians are lunatics" and even a small impact is an impact. Lene, it does affect me in that many people already think I am nuts for believing in true animal rights but more importantly it might nullify the very good points made in the pamphlets. These are very good pamphlets, but dear god those talking animals make it look silly. But, I guess, better memory might have a good effect. Syzygyish, I don't understand what you mean by my "embarrassment." I'm not embarrassed by them. They really mean well. I do think it's a bit sick that people are mocking them since it is rather obvious that they haven't been here very long and it takes a while to understand a new culture. However, I don't get embarrassed by other people's actions. You are correct that they are Buddhists. To be specific, they are followers of Ching Hai. The thing is, it is so silly looking that no matter what you think of veganism it looks pretty absurd. My friend James found it very funny and he is a vegetarian, though not a vegan. He didn't find it funny because it was about veganism (he would be mocking me if he did), he found it funny because it had a talking chicken telling him that si loves him. That is, to many people, very funny. Additionally, I am a vegan and an anti-speciesist and while I did not find it humourous I did face-palm because, as I have said many times, it is really hard for most people to take a pamphlet with a talking chicken on it seriously.

Hi aziraphale.
OK, now my curiosity is seriously piqued!
As a lover of the absurd and generally weird,
I NEED TO SEE THAT PAMPHLET!
Can you scan it and post it up here?

I did a quick search for "I love you, don't eat me"
and you can t-shirts with that printed on them.
In a world that has lolcats and Southpark and George Bush administrations, how absurd could it be?


























Is it weirder than this :

I think the only way you could tell them is if you were also, at the same time, volunteering to redesign the pamphlets, or offering your design services. Otherwise it seems kind of pointless...

Syzy, next time I go I'll get it.
xD It's probably a bit worse than some lolcats, and maybe on par with that one, but don't get your hopes up. NOTHING is more absurd than the Bush Administration was.
I'd say it's slightly under PETA's Sea Kitten campaign.