Friday, February 1, 2013

Broccoli and Hoes in Fuktupia



Once upon a time in the municipal corporation called Fuktupia, there lived people who loved broccoli. They ate its flowerettes in casseroles or covered in butter. They used its leaves for medicine. They could even take the stalks and make houses, cars, and textiles from it.

Then, one day, another corporation moved to Fuktupia that sold plastic cauliflower. DUPE-on-US wanted the entire market for their plastic cauliflower, so they sent secret agents to the Fuktupia Council with lots of money and pretty women for the greedy ones, and a pack of lies about broccoli for the others.

So it came to pass that broccoli was outlawed in all of Fuktupia. However, many people refused to obey the law and they still grew broccoli, but often they were arrested. They had to pay massive fines, and sometimes, if they were found to have many rows of broccoli, they went to jail. This made the rich people happy and much richer, because they had investments in stocks and bonds, and they actually made lots of money when people had to spend time in jail, waiting for their bonds to be matured.

Now it happened that Sheriff Doonmajob of Fuktupia County knew that broccoli tasted good and was of much value to heal. But what could he do? The law said that broccoli eaters must be arrested, so he arrested them.  

Lucky for his office, sometimes his deputies would find huge fields of broccoli, which they had to burn (most of). But the real prize was the cars and land and money that broccoli growers had, because after the broccoli was outlawed, the price went way up and the few broccoli growers that were left in Fuktupia got very wealthy. The lawyers at DUPE-on-US INC were smart, and they knew that if Sheriff Doonmajob made money on arresting people, that he would keep the broccoli off the market.   

Many years passed, and DUPE-on-US INC knew that the people were getting wise about their shady dealings and what they had done to take away their delicious broccoli. Too many people were growing their own broccoli, as well as carrots and collards and corn, and plastic cauliflower stocks were down. DUPE-on-US INC had to do something! They decided to go back to the Fuktupia Council and ask for a law to ban hoes, rakes, and shovels.

Now Sheriff Doonmajob was really in a moral pickle. He knew that the people would starve without their hoes, rakes and shovels to help them grow all their food (not just the illegal broccoli).  But he also knew that if he dared send his deputies after the people’s tools, they would be very angry and not elect him again.

So Sheriff Doonmajob came up with a plan. He told the people that even if Fuktupia County passed a law against hoes, rakes, and shovels, that he would not obey it. Ahhh! The people were so happy to hear that good news!! They celebrated and posted good words about Sheriff Doonmajob on all their facebook pages.

But one young man, Wise Willie, was known as a math genius because he could put one and one together like no one else could, asked everyone this question, “If Sheriff Doonmajob would take your delicious broccoli because it was the law, even though there was nothing wrong with eating delicious broccoli, why wouldn’t he take your hoes, rakes, and shovels when that’s the law, too?”

And all the people of Fuktupia knew that Wise Willie was correct, but they didn’t want to listen to him anymore. They praised Sheriff Doonmajob and went back to their kitchens to steam some plastic cauliflower.

After all, they had lived in Fuktupia a very, very long time.