Poker T-Shirt Maker Decides to Fight Losing Battle

When it comes to making a stand, one needs to remember to pick a fight where the opponent actually cares if they lose. Ace Kicker Tees’ owner, John Carlton, seems to have forgotten this in his recent tête-à-tête with the universe’s largest retailer, Wal-Mart.

Carlton has proclaimed that poker t-shirt maker, Ace Kicker Tees, will not allow its apparel to be sold in Wal-Mart stores because of the retail giant’s history of censoring some of the products it sells, namely books and music. In what so far seems to be simply a publicity stunt, considering it is not known at this time if Wal-Mart even wanted to sell Ace Kicker merchandise in its stores, Carlton stated, “It really worries me when big business starts dictating ethics to artists and other creative voices. One of our poker shirts has an obscenity on it. And we're simply not willing to sacrifice our first amendment rights, regardless of what sum of money we stand to make in return."

The t-shirt in question has the phrase, “F---IN’ RIVER” emblazoned on the front (actual letters substituted for dashes), referring to an exclamation a poker player might make when the last card dealt, the river card, causes him to lose the hand. Interestingly enough, Ace Kicker also produces a similar, “PG”, version of the shirt which reads, “FREAKIN’ RIVER”.

It is strange, however, that with Carlton’s talk of censorship, he then goes on to discuss how the economics of an arrangement just wouldn’t work out.

“…I believe that to get our products' pricing in line with the low-price leader would require us to decrease quality and significantly devalue the creative contributions of all the people involved in making Ace Kicker Tees,” Carlton said.

It remains to be seen if anybody really cares about Carlton’s moral stand, but one could safely assume that Wal-Mart most likely does not.