I'm part of a local group of ham radio operators that has a typical club email list. Recently, the president of that group, an elderly gentleman, posted a rather partisan anecdote, which I'm sure you've seen before, to the entire list. This wouldn't normally get to me, but our club is a-political in nature and it's deemed bad form to delve into divisive issues such as politics (and at the same time, we all aren't so insulated from reality that we can't let a little politics slip into the discussion now and then).
He's been moving more and more into problematic territory and this is only the latest of his forays into shoving his views down everyone else's throats. AT the moment, I am new enough to the club, as well as young enough, to get away with throwing a well-thought piece back at him. The other liberals in the group are a bit afraid to speak up. I will not remain silent. :)
(jump the hump)
For starters, I'm thinking that ants are probably a great allegory for the GOP. The fact that they live in a hierarchical society with no upward mobility for the masses is a good start. The fact that come winter, the royalty flies off and leaves the masses to fend for themselves, usually starving to death (contrary to this simpleton's anecdote) since all the food stores were put away for the royalty. Never mind that if you don't go along to get along in an ant colony, the others gang up on you and tear you to pieces. In an ant colony, there's a decider, and then there are all the rest. But so far, these aren't fun or funny allegories.
Here's the anecdotes as sent to us on the list and any help you can provide with coming up with a real comeback to this 'tale' would help. I've Googled it and it appears all over the wingnut Blogosphere, so maybe it's time we start having a little fun with their fairytales:
The Ant and the Grasshopper
OLD VERSION: The ant works hard in the withering heat all summer long,
building his house and laying up supplies for the winter.
The grasshopper thinks the ant is a fool and laughs and dances and plays the
summer away. Come winter, the ant is warm and well fed.
The grasshopper has no food or shelter, so he dies out in the cold.
MORAL OF THE STORY: Be responsible for yourself!
************************************************************
MODERN VERSION:
The ant works hard in the withering heat all summer long, building his house
and laying up supplies for the winter. The grasshopper thinks the ant is a
fool and laughs and dances and plays the summer away.
Come winter, the shivering grasshopper calls a press conference and demands
to know why the ant should be allowed to be warm and well fed while others
are cold and starving.
CBS, NBC, PBS, CNN, and ABC show up to provide pictures of the shivering
grasshopper next to a video of the ant in his comfortable home with a table
filled with food. America is stunned by the sharp contrast.
How can this be, that in a country of such wealth, this poor grasshopper is
allowed to suffer so?
Kermit the Frog appears on Oprah with the grasshopper, and everybody cries
when they sing, "It's Not Easy Being Green."
Jesse Jackson stages a demonstration in front of the ant's house where the
news stations film the group singing, "We shall overcome." Jesse then has the
group kneel down to pray to God for the grasshopper's sake.
Nancy Pelosi & John Kerry exclaim in an interview with Larry King that the
ant has gotten rich off the back of the grasshopper, and both call for an
immediate tax hike on the ant to make him pay his fair share.
Finally, the EEOC drafts the Economic Equity and! Anti-Grasshopper Act
retroactive to the beginning of the summer. The ant is fined for failing to
hire a proportionate number of green bugs and, having nothing left to pay his
retroactive taxes, his home is confiscated by the government.
Hillary gets her old law firm to represent the grasshopper in a defamation
suit against the ant, and the case is tried before a panel of federal judges
that Bill Clinton appointed from a list of single-parent welfare recipients.
The ant loses the case.
The story ends as we see the grasshopper finishing up the last bits of the
ant's food while the government house he is in, which just happens to be the
ant's old house, crumbles around him because he doesn't maintain it. The ant
has disappeared in the snow. The grasshopper is found dead in a drug related
incident and the house, now abandoned, is taken over by a gang of spiders who
terrorize the once peaceful neighborhood.
MORAL OF THE STORY: Be careful how you vote.