What Would David Bowie Do?

Once upon a time, a belligerent German who I will call “Herr Mengele” decided to send out threatening letters to a large group of bloggers around the word, demanding money for infringing on his ‘copyright’. The bloggers, along with a British online newspaper, had posted an image of some Victorian taxidermy art.

Herr Mengele insisted that while it wasn’t his taxidermy art, he has the copyright to the widely seen images. He included with his overwrought letters a cheap postcard of the image. He also included invoices of up to several thousand EU. He demanded that money be wired directly to his German bank account by an arbitrary date, after which he would sue for damages.

The bloggers were stunned. WTF? Herr Mengele replied to questions with nefarious threats like this one:

With great pleasure will I take you to the Courts, and will just wait a bit longer to eventually get over EUR 56.000 from you.

So you know with whom you are dealing: my ex-publisher NaimAttallah/Quartet can tell you a story or two about me, kicking my shoe ALL UP YOUR ASS if you step on my toes. My friend Jos Smit from Art Unlimited, who prints all my postcards, normally tells people who don’t know me (yet) Fear him !   Or/and interview Henk Schiffmacher aka Hanky Panky (c/o Hells Angels Amsterdam) etc .

Herr Mengele continues to send threats to this very day, and alas, some bloggers were so upset that they actually gave in to his demands and paid him! No one wants a German boot up their ass (despite Sylvia Plath’s observation to the contrary) and who among us wants to incur the wrath of a Hells Angel who is named after a fancy lace thong?!

Herr Mengele also claims copyright to some explicit photos of people with tattooed penises, putting them where they don’t belong (according to Judeo-Christian tenets and my own finicky digestive system.)

The photo above is a portion of one of Herr Mengele’s more interesting pictures, which I have modified for the purposes of discussion, education and satire (as per fair use.) Can you guess what it is?

Gazing upon the most recent communique from Herr Mengele’s “Lawyers,” I must ask myself what David Bowie would do. I think he would say:

Wir sind dann Helden!

Questions, comments, threats?