Jesus Dress Up

File:Jesusdressup.jpg

Jesus Dress Up refrigerator-magnet set - Normal Bob Smith

Jesus Dress Up was created by artist Normal Bob Smith in 1991 as a black-and-white colorform, which he photocopied and distributed to friends.

In August 2000, Normal Bob Smith converted the drawings to digital art and launched a website, allowing users to virtually play with a dress-up doll by placing movable layers of clothing on top of a crucified Jesus. Outfits in the original version included a light-blue tuxedo, football uniform, snorkeling gear, and devil pajamas.

Internet Reach

Within a month of its launch, JesusDressUp.com received over 150,000 original hits, and by October 2000 had over 250,000 original visits. Almost entirely by word-of-mouth referrals, the website received nearly 6 million monthly hits by the end of 2000.

In 2003, Normal Bob Smith produced a companion refrigerator-magnet set, which was sold through the website and was subsequently picked up by retailer Urban Outfitters. Normal Bob Smith was told that the Jesus Dress Up refrigerator-magnet set was the sixth-highest-selling toy for the chain during the 2003 Christmas season.

The domain JesusDressUp.com has remained in the top two Google search results for the word “jesus” since March 2004, only recently being beat out of the number one spot by Wikipedia’s page on Jesus.

As of November 2006, Normal Bob Smith has sold more than 15,000 sets of the Jesus Dress Up magnets. There are three versions, the original, Final Justice, and Christmas Dress Up.

Jesus Dress Up magnets were featured in the Neil Abramson documentary film Bob Smith USA, which premiered at the American Film Institute’s SilverDocs Film Festival in Washington DC in June 2005.

Reactions

On March 14, 2004, Jesus Dress Up sparked national controversy when a Philadelphia man, known only as “Gerry,” voiced his outrage after seeing the magnets at an Urban Outfitters store in a King Of Prussia mall. He wrote a letter of complaint to the chain and brought his story to his local NBC affiliate when he received their response: Urban Outfitters stated that the magnet was not being sold to offend anyone, but to reflect a diversity of opinion among its customer base.

The story was broadcast on NBC in Philadelphia, then MSNBC’s Scarborough Country, on which it received coverage alongside Mel Gibson’s The Passion of the Christ premiere. The magnet set also appeared on Comedy Central’s Tough Crowd with Colin Quinn, where it was discussed by Scott Thompson, Kathy Griffin, and other comedians.

Urban Outfitters received more than 250,000 complaints, due mostly to organizational efforts from OneMillionMoms.com and OneMillionDads.com, activism group websites sponsored by the American Family Association. Following the controversy on March 17, Urban Outfitters cancelled its remaining orders with the artist and publicly stated that they would no longer order the magnets to carry on their shelves but would sell their remaining stock.

As a result of this attention, on March 28, 2004, an activism group called Laptop Lobbyists alerted Normal Bob Smith’s web-hosting company and succeeded in shutting down the Jesus Dress Up site. Charles Wheelus, President of Pick Internet Solutions Inc., said in response to the protests, “I am as appalled as you. I find the content of these sites to be obscene and offending.” JesusDressUp.com was offline for several days until a new web hosting service was found.

External Links

• “Urban Outfitter outrages Philadelphia Catholics” The Catholic Standard & Times
• “NO! to the Blasphemous ‘Jesus’ Doll!” The American Society for the Defense of Tradition, Family and Property (TFP)
• “Urban Outfitters Heeds Public Outrage, Pulls ‘Jesus Dress Up’” ChristiansUnite.com
• JesusDressUp.com
• The artist’s website