sacrilicious

Hearing of this bit of reporting, via Super Punch, from Thailand regarding how a strawberry flavoured soda has overtaken the traditional blood sacrifice offer to appease household spirts (culturally ingrained to the point where human consumption of this soft-drink is considered a taboo, like raiding the sacramental wine) made me think of the strange battlefront of the cola-wars where the stakes have been elevated to the purity of one’s immortal soul. What do you think? Both articles treat belief in the supernatural and ritualistic behaviour with respect—and the hands-off approach to marketing seems more mature in the former than in the latter, but the lens of a manufactured commodity—however appropriated by the spirit world—seems to make it inauthentic.