The Chicken Show – The Weird Side of the Internet

The Chicken Show – The Weird Side of the Internet – by Liam Sweeny.

Art has an amazing power. Bringing peace? Sure. Sparking joy? Why not? Stimulating wonder and creativity? Of course.

Pissing people off? Ding ding ding ding ding. This is probably the most important, and coincidentally the most fun thing about art. But pissing people off in general is so easy these days that you need something special to draw a news story out of pissing people off. If it was news to be pissed these days, they’d be giving out the police blotter as a screensaver.

So I ask you, dear reader, to make the call with the narrative to follow. The place is a Catholic cathedral in Germany. The offending issue? A show celebrating the 1,250^th anniversary of the German region of Westphalia. Apparently no one knew what the show was going to be about, and they set down in their seats to enjoy the piece de resistance – a parading of raw chickens, plucked, wearing diapers. Diaper chickens in a Catholic cathedral and people were pissed.

This probably wouldn’t rate the weird news except that German president Frank-Walter Steinmeier and the local archbishop was there.

I don’t know. Chickens? What’s the sacrilege here? A chicken in a diaper is somehow against church teaching? I’m a Catholic, and I’ve never heard “Thou salt not diaper the chickens.” So what is it, just a general lack of respect?

Chickens could be disrespectful in a church, which, in its normal employ, requires the focus and attention of all those sitting in the pews. It’s not for, say, sitting there thinking about the game later, or going over your checkbook, or planning how you’re going to snub your gay cousin at the family picnic. Nobody looks around, picking on people’s outfits, commenting on the baseball coach and his affair with the vice principle of the local university. It’s not like people do any of these things in a church.

More from Liam Sweeny…