ne fine spring day, Chicken Little awoke, and before going out for his morning seed, he looked outside his window. The snow on his roof was melting and the eaves were covered with long dripping icicles."Oh my gosh, the Earth is warming," he cried! I must tell someone.
Poor Chicken Little was less than a year old, and nobody ever told him that it got warmer every spring. He got on his motor scooter, and sped off down the road.
Henny Penny was outside pecking at seed. "Henny Penny, the earth is warming," cried Chicken Little! "I saw it! All the snow on my roof is melting!"
"Why, you're right, said Henny Penny." I thought it felt warmer today." Henny Penny was much older than Chicken Little and she could feel the weather in her bones. "We must tell someone!" They both got into Henny Penny's Corvette, and sped off down the road.
They drove down the road until they ran into Turkey Lurkey.
"Turkey Lurkey, the Earth is warming." they cried! "Chicken Little saw it, and Henny Penny felt it in her bones!"
"Nonsense," said Turkey Lurkey. "Why look here at my Turkey thermometer. It's as steady as a rock."
"But maybe it's warming so slow that we can't see it move," said Chicken Little.
"Well then, we'll do a scientific experiment."
He looked at the thermometer. It read 40 degrees. He then put the thermometer under his wing so nobody could see it, and pulled out his pocket watch. "We won't look at it for five minutes, and see if it has changed."
When he took it out from under his wing it was almost 100 degrees. "Oh my," said Turkey Lurkey, "It's warming at such a rapid rate, that it will be a thousand degrees in less than an hour if we don't do something."
So they all got into his Volvo station wagon, and went driving down the road at a very high rate.
They ran into Ducky Lucky. "Ducky Lucky, the Earth is warming," they cried! "Chicken Little saw it, Henny Penny felt it, and Turkey Lurkey proved it with science!"
"Well if we don't do something, we'll surely all be roasted," said Ducky Lucky. "That's what happens when birds get too warm, they all get roasted."
"Whatever will we do," they cried? "None of them had ever been roasted before, but it didn't sound very nice.
"We should tell the King," said Ducky Lucky! "Come on, we can all fit into my truck!" So they climbed into Ducky Lucky's truck and headed towards the palace.
Further down the road they met Foxy Woxy. "Foxy the Earth is warming," they all cried! "Chicken Little saw it, Henny Penny felt it, Turkey Lurkey proved it, and Ducky Lucky is certain that we'll all be roasted."
Foxy Woxy stroked his beard and thought for a while. He leaned his white paw on the hood of Ducky Lucky's truck. It was very warm. He looked at the truck, and looked at the birds and said.
"Why it's probably your cars that are causing the Earth to get warmer. I think you should stop driving right now."
The weren't sure if that made any sense. Foxy Woxy was not a scientist, but he was a recent graduate of the Kennedy School of Government at Harvard. He certainly had a much higher degree than any of them.
They got out of the truck. "But how will we get to see the King?"
"Don't worry about the King," said Foxy Woxy. "I'm good friends with him, I'll talk to him for you." He got into Ducky Lucky's Truck and drove off.
So Ducky Lucky, Turkey Lurkey, Henny Penny and Chicken Little all turned around and walked home. When they got home, they saw that Foxy Woxy had towed away, Turkey Lurkey's Volvo, Henny Penny's Corvette, And Chicken Little's Motor Scooter. "As long as it stops the Earth from warming" they all agreed.
The next day, there was a knock at Chicken Little's door. It was Foxy Woxy. "The King said that your wood stove is causing the Earth to get warmer too. He assigned me to gather up all your firewood to save us all from roasting."
"But what if it gets cold again," asked Chicken Little? "Certainly it is better to roast than to freeze."
But Foxy Woxy wouldn't hear of it. He gathered up all Chicken Little's firewood, and threw it into the back of Ducky Lucky's truck, which now had "Foxy, Woxy, and Associates" painted on the door. He drove on down the road and took all the firewood from Ducky Lucky, and Henny Penny, and Turkey Lurkey, as well. They wanted to ask if it was really on orders from the King, but because they now had no cars, they couldn't go anywhere. Still they agreed, it was better than roasting.
That night, there was a blizzard, and Ducky Lucky, Turkey Lurkey, Henny Penny, and Chicken Little all froze to death. The next morning, Foxy Woxy loaded them all into Ducky Lucky's truck, which had a new sign painted on the door, "Foxy, Woxy, and Associates. Purveyors of Firewood and Frozen Poultry."
And they ended up getting roasted after all.
© 2005 Tim Slagle
9 comments:
Tim, since you like to make your points with old simple fables, I'll make my point to you with an old simple statement: You are a testament to the fact that opinions are like assholes - everyone's got one. You are about as smart any high school kid who read ½ of a science textbook, watched part of some documentary, and then remembered a story his parents told him, and then got high and mixed all these things together and thought he was smarter than everyone else. I normally wouldn't comment on one of these blogs that someone on the Huffpost put a link to, but this point you are trying to make (which no doubt you think is a creative and witty analogy) is so ridiculous and laughable that it must be put down.
What do you think, Tim, you think if I was so inclined to waste an hour of my time I could come up with a little childish story about Wally The Woolly Mammoth who lived tens of thousands of years ago who ignored all the signs of an upcoming ice age. I could show how Wally was tricked by Rick The Rat into ignoring all the signs of the climate change. Maybe I could even make Rick The Rat read Wally The Woolly some stupid children's stories which poked fun at the people who are warning of the ice age; and Wally was so simple minded and he always believed in simple feel good sayings that he believed Rick The Rat and therefore didn't prepare for the climate change, so both Rick and Wally froze to death. What do you think, if I wrote that story I guess I could counter your brilliant point that global warming isn't real?
I wrote this story as a counterpoint to the newly released Disney film of the same name. Disney strays so far from the original intent of the fable, that it's poignancy is lost. I thought it would be fun to write an alternate modern version, keeping the moral of the story, and it's childish rhythm intact.
There is a great parallel between the original fable, and the issue of global warming; I just made it a little more obvious. The story warns that panic is dangerous, and a request for government solutions might be used against those making the request. I didn't mean to discredit the idea of anthropogenic climate change, I was only pointing out that sometimes a solution is worse than the problem it was meant to solve.
The Kyoto Accord would not have altered the climate, but would have been utterly devastating to the US economy. Our strong economy is why we're resilient to events like Katrina; so it is more important to maintain our economy, than to attempt a reversal of climate change via international diplomacy.
Those who believe that privately owned automobiles caused Katrina, need to remember that most of the casualties from the storm, were people who didn't have cars. The people stranded at the Superdome were those who relied on public transit. If we need to prepare for more hurricanes, floods and droughts in the future, we need to insure that everyone has access to an automobile so they can get themselves out of trouble.
Yeah, Kyoto would have been devastating to the economy. Just like the Montreal Protocol was. Whine, whine, whine...
The Montreal Protocol only banned Freon, a substance necessary for refrigeration and air conditioning. Since these processes are only a minor portion of the economy there was minimal impact. I will add, that the summer after it went into effect, roughly a thousand people died in Chicago from heat exhaustion, since the price of Freon substitutes, put air conditioning out of the budget for a lot of Senior citizens.
But even if Kyoto wouldn't have any impact on the economy, what good would it have done? China and India were exempted, and they are now some of the world's largest producers of greenhouse gasses. Meanwhile, most countries that did sign, have found it impossible to comply, and are in violation of the treaty.
Tim,
Beautiful!
Ridicule is the most effective means to penetrate the skulls of Socialists One-Worlders who despise mankind.
As you can see, your arrow has hit its mark!
Thanks for introducing sanity to an issue that has gone too far along unchallenged.
The world hasn't seen these temperatures for thousands of years, we're told.
The retort 'What did mankind do thousands of years ago - drive SUV's?' just hasn't been voiced often enough.
Forget rational discussion - it requires an awareness unknown to rejects.
Rip these morons a new one and they'll stop shilling their lies fast.
First, is there climate change, or is that a fable also? Do you agree with the science from the IPCC and others that there is climate change and it is being created by global warming and that this is being, at least, accelerated by human activity? What will you say to your children in fifty years when a third of the world's animals have become extinct and the coast lines are re-drawn threatening many of the worlds' major cities and millions of human lives?
There has always been climate change, that's what makes it climate.
It will change regardless of what we do to try and stop it. Governments cannot control the weather.
And if a third of species do not become extinct in fifty years, if the coastlines remain virtually the same, and if not a single life is lost from rising oceans, will you tell your children that you were a big fool?
Let's kill'em all and let God sort'em out. Who cares, we are all going to die sooner or later. What good comes from worrying about the
details of how big the truck was that flattened you. Could it be that meat ball that should have been band from the market that you choked on while eatting in a hurry,
so you could get home and watch the latest bad news on CNN.
Wow, global warming is making me CONFUSED.
I can't even understand the comments anymore
Post a Comment