Hindu God Toilet Seat Dropped By Etsy After Outrage

DUMBO, BROOKLYN — A toilet seat cover that depicts a Hindu god will no longer be sold by Etsy.com after religious officials demanded it be removed from the DUMBO-based retailer's website.

The toilet seat showed Lord Ganesha — a Hindu god of wisdom and a remover of obstacles — holding a tube of toothpaste and hovering above a rat tail comb, a play on traditional depictions that show the deity riding a rat and symbolizing Ganesha's power to control baser instincts.

Hindu statesman Rajan Zed has called the polyurethane toilet seat cover, “highly inappropriate.”

“Lord Ganesha was highly revered in Hinduism and was meant to be worshipped in temples or home shrines,” said Zed in a statement criticizing the Dumbo-based retailer that was released Monday. “Not to adorn a toilet.”

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The $85 toilet seat is one of many sold by Debbie Hughes, of Buffalo, New York, who told Patch in an email that it was supposed to be "a fun tongue-in-cheek piece of artwork to adorn a bathroom, not meant to spur anger and controversy."

"The last thing I consider myself is a controversial artist," said Hughes. "I apologize if it's being interpreted wrong, I never intended to hurt people by painting toilet seats."

Hughes also sells toilet seat covers that depict SpongeBob SquarePants, Ellen DeGeneres and a calavera, the skull used to celebrate the Mexican holiday Día de los Muertos, or Day of the Dead.

Zed, the president of the Universal Society of Hinduism, demanded the DUMBO-based arts-and-crafts retailer pull the product from its website and that CEO Josh Silverman issue a formal apology.

Zed, referencing the Etsy mission statement, asked, “Is offering products like this Etsy’s way to ‘create a better world?’”

Update: The original edition of this story was published before Etsy removed the product from its website and did not include the artist's comments.

Photo courtesy of Rajan Zed