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Notes -
Animal Farm
Apropos of nothing
Once upon a time there was a farmer named James, exactly where and when he lived isn't important, save to say that his land was both fertile and good for grazing. He and his family owned a flock of sheep, and the proceeds he got from selling their wool at the market was enough to provide for him, his wife Alice, and their son with just a little extra left spare to take good care of the flock.
They weren't poor by any means, James and Alice lived lives of middling comfort, nothing extraordinary but equally content and with all their needs and even some of their wants fulfilled. Truth be told they'd have been quite comfortable were it not for the fact that their son, Poot, was a special child. He was going to turn 16 soon and it showed, he was quite big for his age, both vertically and horizontally, and it was impossible to ignore whenever he entered a room.
Unfortunately while his physical development had been very healthy and robust, mentally he had always struggled. Never extremely badly, Poot was literate enough, and he even had his moments of lucidity, but never for long enough and continuously enough that he could function independently. His parents worried about what would become of the farm when they grew older and who would keep everything running, but that is a story for another day.
Poot though was unconcerned about the future, he lived for the moment. It just wasn't important to him. Poot liked getting his own way with things and he didn't like it when someone else stopped him. Poot also liked spending time with the sheep. It wouldn't be exactly fair to say he liked the sheep, but in them Poot found an outlet for him to act out a world where he got whatever he wanted, whenever he wanted it.
The sheep though were enamoured with Poot. For the sheep the world was divided into two types of creatures, those who were like them and those who were like the Other. The sheep had always felt that the Other were better than them in some ways, comparing the way the Other ate and lived to their meager manger but they were loath to admit it. The sheep desired what the Other had, and thought it only fair that they too were allowed to share in it. Poot was most definitely one of the Other, but he had enough sheep like characteristics that they were able to identify with him, and it gave them hope that one day they too could become like the Other.
And so like that Poot and the sheep developed a symbiotic relationship. Whenever Poot was feeling particularly dejected because his parents had forbidden him from doing something he made his way to the manger, where amongst the sheep he was unquestionably king and could do as he wished. Poot had a disruptive streak within him and often he would take his anger out by scattering the hay and upending the water pails in the barn. Even though this meant the sheep lost out on a meal they did not mind it too much for such actions only served to show how Poot was similar to them while still unquestionably being one of the Other. The satisfaction and hope they got from such a display was well worth the lost food. Of course whenever this happened the grownups later had to come in and clean up the mess, but the manger was never in perfect condition anyways and it was better than letting Poot run rampant in the house.
Just as the sheep thought of Poot as the Other they liked the most, the Other they disliked equally as much was V.E.T. . V.E.T. was not one of the family, and unlike the family who the sheep saw on a daily basis, V.E.T. only appeared infrequently. Named after the eponymous letters etched onto his jacket, he was a harbinger of pain and suffering whenever he did show up.
Apart from regularly manhandling the sheep by forcing open their mouths and shining bright lights into their eyes, one of V.E.T.'s favourite pastimes was deliberately poking them with a painful needle one by one in a row. The sheep never could understand what would drive someone to be so cruel as to do this for no benefit at all, for the sheep's lives after this sadistic act by V.E.T. were were very much the same as before he did this. Worst of all sometimes when V.E.T. came he would pick out a particularly old sheep and take it outside with him. That sheep never returned back to the manger. There were terrible rumors about what he did to his unlucky victim but the sheep had never seen conclusive proof, it was as if the sheep V.E.T. had taken simply stopped existing.
As Poot grew older his destructive tendencies became more and more pronounced. Where previously he would only throw around the objects in the barn he had recently taken to punching whatever was right in front of him when he got angry. He had already destroyed three sheep-pens and even splintered one of the boards making up the external wall of the barn when James put his foot down and forbade his son from going to the manger. James decided to make sacrifices to save up enough money and hire a babysitter trained in dealing with special children whenever Poot had one of his outbreaks.
This new state of affairs suited neither Poot nor the sheep very well. Poot because he could no longer physically act out whenever he felt like it, and the sheep because by losing their connection to Poot they had lost their role model, for none of the Other who were not Poot resembled them in any shape of form and the sheep so very desperately wanted to prove to themselves that deep down there was no difference between the Other and them.
This lack of contact proved to be quite disturbing to the sheep. There was much consternation amongst them about how they could continue without access to their role model and many of them were totally perplexed until the tension reached a point where something just had to happen. "BAA" went one of the sheep. Another one replied "BAA". A third one joined in "BAA". Very quickly there was a whole cacophony as each sheep joined in on the mass bleating in its own time and key. This lamentation might have all been for naught except that the sounds reached Poot, who upon hearing it remembered the sheep and a desire to go rampage around the manger came back to him.
Very slowly Poot snuck out of the house, his parents did not see him for it was late in the evening and they had already put him to bed. As soon as he entered the barn the sheep were struck with awe, their prayers had been answered and their idol stood before them. Poot himself though wasted no time in starting to wreck everything. He had graduated beyond minor things like upending pails and now went straight to punching a hole in the building's wall. The sheep did not mind this particularly, even though this hole would let in the cold from outside and worsen their living conditions, being close to Poot and his unashamed sheep like behaviours was well worth paying this cost.
Poot might have caused serious damage to the manger were it not for the fact that the ruckus awoke Poot's father who hurried over, worrying about cattle rustlers. Upon seeing that it was Poot James immediately took steps to diffuse the situation, Poot was already larger than him and James wasn't sure he could physically control him on his own any more. Fortunately though he was able to coax Poot to leave the barn by distracting him and sent him off back to bed. After this he went back to check on the barn, the damage Poot had caused was bad but at least it was fixable.
(continued below)
(continued from above)
This episode was enough to placate the sheep for a few days but eventually they started to desire to see Poot amongst them once again. Just like the last time they were not sure about how to do this but this desire only grew stronger until things came to a head. "BAA" went one of the sheep. Another one replied "BAA". A third one joined in "BAA". Very quickly there was a whole cacophony as each sheep joined in on the mass bleating in its own time and key. Poot once again heard the sounds and the desire to go smash things up sprouted again, for by now he automatically associated the bleating of sheep with the release he got from breaking stuff. Once again he snuck into the barn and began to go on a rampage. This time he managed to cause even more damage before James discovered what was happening and delicately extracted his son from the situation. James decided to put Poot under constant babysitter supervision to prevent such a thing from happening again.
Poot wasn't the only one who had heard the sheep. Poot's mother, Alice, had always been sensitive to noises and the bleats had given her a bad headache. She wasn't particularly happy about the situation and she had never really liked sheep, if it had been up to her they'd be growing crops instead on their land. Alice took a bunch of painkillers to help, but they had never really worked for her and it took some time before she was back to her normal self.
Of course by this point even the sheep had noticed a trend. Whenever they all bleated together it was followed by Poot making an appearance. Thus the next time they desired to see Poot they knew exactly what to do. "BAA" went one of the sheep. Another one replied "BAA". A third one joined in "BAA". Very quickly there was a whole cacophony as each sheep joined in on the mass bleating in its own time and key. Poot heard this sound and the desire to run amok swelled up in him again but under the watchful eye of the babysitter he was not able to sneak out to the barn.
The sheep though continued bleating, they were convinced at every moment that very soon Poot was about to make an entrance, just like all the previous times they had all bleated together. They continued to do this well into the small hours of the night until they were all exhausted and the next day Alice had a very bad headache indeed. The next day the sheep continued their long bleat as soon as they could muster up the energy to do so. From inside the house Poot heard them every second but his babysitter guard was ever vigilant and never gave Poot the opportunity to slip out unseen.
James was concerned that something was wrong with the sheep and naturally wanted to get it fixed as soon as possible. Before long V.E.T. made an appearance at the barn. He wore an expression of confusion and straight away got down to his pastime of manhandling the sheep. The sheep though recognised the intimidation tactic for what it was and continued with their mission. They had had enough of being maltreated, they wanted to see Poot and even the threat of sharp needles from V.E.T. wouldn’t make them stop.
True to form after a short discussion with James V.E.T. did indeed bring out the sharp needles and started poking the sheep with them. However these sharp needles were nothing like any they had ever seen before. This time very soon after a sheep had been poked it suddenly grew very tired until it no longer had any energy to continue with the bleating and fell asleep.
One by one the sheep were supressed by V.E.T. but as this was going on each and every single standing sheep redoubled their efforts, they were sure that if Poot just showed up he would take on and defeat V.E.T. and all things would be good again. At this moment Poot though couldn’t care less. His babysitter had taken him on a nature outing to see butterflys and Poot was too preoccupied with finding and squishing as many caterpillars as he could to have any concerns about the sheep.
After they had all been placated James went and searched the entire property to find the root cause behind the sheep hysteria. He had heard that sheep often cry out when there are predators nearby and wanted to make sure that they were completely safe. He was not able to find anything though, which caused much consternation as he could not think of anything else rational which would have caused the sheep to behave in the way they did.
Hoping that the problem would resolve itself when the sheep came back to he went out to fetch some more clean hay and water for them to make sure they were feeling better after a period in which they had clearly been in high stress. He then went to check on Alice who had recently been feeling very poorly given the incessant noise.
When the sheep woke up they were indeed more placated but eventually they remembered Poot and set about trying to make him show up again. "BAA" went one of the sheep. Another one replied "BAA". A third one joined in "BAA". Very quickly there was a whole cacophony as each sheep joined in on the mass bleating in its own time and key.
Alice, who had been doing her best in the kitchen trying to work with a terrible headache heard the sheep again. Very soon her head started spinning and she collapsed onto the floor.
A week after the events above James and his wife were holding a party. All was quiet around the house and Alice’s headache had pretty much subsided completely. A seed trader, Jacob, and his wife Hilaria (contrary to her name, she was not very funny) were visiting the farm to discuss the economic benefits and pitfalls of growing cotton and some of their neighbours were interested in coming along too.
Poot was upstairs in his room with the babysitter, who had been tasked with making sure he didn’t disturb the guests in any shape or form, as well as making sure he didn’t soil himself (a bad habit Poot had picked up over the last few months as a way of getting back at others when he didn’t get his way). After spending time discussing the technicalities of growing cotton and letting people mingle around a bit it was time for dinner. At the table, mutton was being served.
Sheep get eaten either way, why not give the farmer's wife a headache before you end up on the dinner table? You're not losing anything by it and your position won't get better if you stay nice and docile while the original farmers keep raising you for meat, or the farm gets sold to the new owners who switch to growing cotton and sell you off for meat.
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I got to the part where the mum who lives on a sheep farm got a headache from hearing the sheep bleating and lost my ability to suspend disbelief.
What was the point of this, aside from booo outgroup?
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So...
Poot is Trump. Alice is the people going into histrionics over Trump. VET is an amalgamation of the COVID vaccination and the crackdown following Jan 6. The babysitter is Trump being jailed. The sheep are the Proles. I think the bit about switching to farming cotton at the end refers to some supposed scheme to kill all the proles and replace them with AI? Not sure how Hillary Clinton fits into that.
Switching to farming cotton is probably exporting manufacturing jobs to china or something?
I picked up on the specific analogies but don't really get the point of the allegory. Trump has a lot of low-iq low-skill supporters, sure, so?
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“Would it not be easier
In that case for the government
To dissolve the people
And elect another?”
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Yeah, that about sums it up.
On a related note I rewatched “Chicken Run” and felt strangely like that movie came back into my life at an opportune moment.
One could argue that was “the good ending” as the memes go and it’s the situation I hope and pray for.
Every day I feel more and more like that’s the endgame worth striving for and the most realistic victory condition for me and mine.
Worst case scenario is as you laid it out.
Best case scenario, the world of my dreams, is a whole-ass fedpost. Another day, perhaps.
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