talkpolitics | A pastoral idyllic dystopia

Hi, you bunch of ~~totalitarian tyrants~~ friends of liberty and democracy! Too often I hear such fancy words like 'socialism', 'nazism', 'fascism' being thrown out into the public space around your frequencies, and very often I can't help myself but facepalm. While it's true that terms tend to change their meaning over time as the context undergoes alterations, some words like the above still hold a somewhat heavyweight value and wouldn't start to mean something completely different just overnight. I've sometimes tried to provide my modest share of anecdata on the subject, as I've myself lived under communism and socialism for a certain period. And because we seem to be much into parables lately, here's one from me. I'm aware most of you might be unfamiliar with the specifics of the history of the societies in my part of the world, and would be unaware of the exact meaning of some of the references included in the story, so don't hesitate to ask about whatever appears unclear.

Somewhere in a distant, God forgotten valley...

In the beginning, there was the flock.

And it was happy.

Every morning the shepherd would lead them to pasture. Every now and then he would bring a naughty sheep or two back to the flock, using his staff. And he would be kind to the good sheep. Being occasionally beaten with a staff was no biggie. It was only the shepherd's dogs that scared them a little - they were so big and shaggy, and they had such deep throaty voices, whose gurgling roar was enough to bring even the most unmanageable sheep back to the flock.

And so the days went one after another. And the flock was happy.

You would see the old shepherd leaning against his staff, looking with tender love to his entrusted livestock; the dogs would run around him waving their tails in delight and guarding a very happy group of sheep who endlessly roamed the valleys and the hills.

But one day, the winds suddenly changed, and a sharp gust brought a new scent - the scent of change.

The shepherd apologized to his flock, he said farewell to his sheep, and he retired on a well deserved rest in his small hut near the village. Not long thereafter, he died there alone and forgotten.

The dogs wondered for a while on their own, and when they realized that there was no-one to look after them any more, they took to the mountains and soon became wild.

Only the flock remained, numb in its perplexity. Where do we go now!?

Then the weakest ram bleated: "De-e-e-emocraaa-a-a-cy-y-y! And the rest of them started bleating after him. They declared him a dissident, mostly because of his miserable looks, which must have meant that he had been abused by the previous authorities. Soon the sheep would begin looking at anyone fatter than this ram with vile suspicion, singling them out as alleged traitors and secret agents.

Discontent broke out - Freedom? Really!? But what shall we do with it now?

Some took off to the distant hills almost instantly - those who had heard from the migrating birds that the grass is greener there, and more succulent, and there's plenty of fresh water, and the Sun is always shining, even at night. So they went to the hills, most of them never to return. Only their faint bleating would occasionally come with the wind from across the hills, but was it a happy bleating or a bleating of pain, no-one could really tell for sure, because the clamor among the flock had already become too noisy to hear anything else.

They had no leader now, and is a flock with no leader a real flock?

What's worse, starvation slowly crept into the flock.

And they all raised their voices to the skies with a prayer to God to hear their plea and bring them a new leader who would show them the way, and who would take care of them. And in return they vowed to pay back with their wool, their milk and even some of their flesh if needed, just to receive this blessing of being lead and directed through the valley of life.

And God heard their begging.

And He answered, but in a most cruel way.

It was the wolves that came down from the forest. Some of them still had their dog collars on their necks, but they had changed their ways beyond recognition. They divided the flock between themselves into Spheres of Influence, and they lived in prosperity and abundance.

Some of the sheep fell victims to the Transition, and their scattered bones were tread down into the earth under the hoofs of their frightened brothers.

And the flock was silent. It was silent in its obedience, because even a single "baaa" was being punished swiftly and mercilessly. The wolves would often go into the cot under the cover of night, and the leaders of dissent would disappear with no trace.

The wolves themselves were getting fatter by the day, and their wolven looks would get blunter under the thick layers of complacent fat. Some even changed the color of their fur, some even curled it a little and powdered it and perfumed it in order to be more liked by the flock, so it could recognize them as its own leaders. As if they were coming from among its ranks, they were "one of us" and their mission was to protect and lead "us".

But the flock never moved away from the same valley, and the tales about distant valleys with lush pastures remained only legends secretly told at home in the evenings... Even the little grass which had remained before that, was now eaten to the last stem, because no-one wanted or was allowed to go anywhere else, and the leaders were too lazy to choose a new direction for the next day.

Dark clouds gathered on the horizon, and the flock was shrinking more and more with every next season. And the smarter sheep among it blamed it all on the "demographical problem".

The leaders started bloody feuds between themselves, because their source of food and wool was severely diminished now. And even some of the sheep resorted to cannibalism because they were hungry as hell.

Many of the older sheep began recalling memories of the old shepherd, and with trembling voices they told their children the story of the man who had tenderly caressed them with his staff, and about the dogs who had been their good friends in the games, and whose voices were like a choir of cherubs...

And the flock waited again, far skinnier and hungrier than in those days of old. It waited for a new Leader to come.

The One who would again lead them forward, and the One to whom they would pledge their wool, their milk, even their flesh.

Many impostors came along. None of them fulfilled their promises. All they did was steal more wool, more milk and more lamb meat. And the flock stayed in the valley ever since, losing its last willingness to move or to protest. Waiting for the true Savior.

And it is still waiting today.

Somewhere in a distant, God forgotten valley...