J. Matt Barber
The magical land of Progressitopia
By J. Matt Barber
There once was a land, a magical land, with a chicken in every pot. And in this land, which was called Progressitopia, there were two peoples. There were those who saw the world as it was, and there were those who saw the world as they oh-so-very-much wished it could be. The former were called the Trads, and the latter, the Progs. It was the Progs who held dominion over this great land, and so it was they who wrote, or re-wrote, her history.
Now, in this kingdom we must remember that Christianity, or "Christianism" as it would later be called (long since forbidden), along with similar such mythological and dogmatic phantasms, remained the foremost, if not the sole, thorn in the Progs' collectivist butt. Any and all thought or practice that might, in any way, undermine full realization of, and strict adherence to, progressive thinking was, therefore, strictly verboten.
In fact, the Trads, the traditionalist remnant, had proven singularly responsible for the famines, Civil War II and Progressitopia's endlessly spiraling state of affairs, both foreign and domestic – a state that, notwithstanding all predictions to the contrary, somehow became significantly and enigmatically worse subsequent to the onset of progressive governance.
There was, however, one exception to this rule: Islam. Shadowing the glorious dawn of progressive reign came, from o'er the sea, a mighty and fearsome caliphate. The Muslim faith spread like wildfire. Recruitment efforts were buoyed, and appreciably so, in that, while yet a loving and peaceful religion, any skeptic or "infidel" who failed to convert was either immediately raped and enslaved or summarily beheaded, stoned, shot or blown limb-from-limb.
Whereas Progressitopians, with their one-child-only abortion mandate, stopped reproducing altogether, adherents to the religion of peace rutted like rabbits. Every corner of the globe became thickly populated by devotees of the most praised Prophet Muhammad – peace be upon him.
As global violence and jihad spiked, it seemed for a time that Progressitopia and the Islamic caliphate would be one another's undoing.
And then something extraordinary happened.
The King of Progressitopia, a brave and handsome man most wise, with visor of gold and scepter of 3-iron in hand, bowed before the great caliph and presented a series of official mea culpas on behalf of his land. He prayed Allah's forgiveness for incurring his wrath – just desserts for centuries of Progressitopian Imperialism.
And so these two seemingly incompatible kingdoms, with wholly polarized worldviews, agreed to forge an incongruous socio-political partnership – an "Islamo-Progressive Alliance." The alliance was built upon the maxim: "The enemy of my enemy is my friend." The common enemy, of course, had formed its own unholy alliance: the "Zio-Christian Axis of Evil."
And so it soon came to pass that independent Islamic settlements cropped-up throughout Progressitopia. The Michganistan Territory became, for all intents and purposes, Mecca to the Western Hemisphere.
Presently, the Islamo-Progressive Alliance found itself enjoying a comparatively peaceful seven-year truce. Apart from a weekly handful of suicide bombings, mass shootings and random beheadings, carried out chiefly against Progressitopia's women and children, things were simply capital.
But then, trouble in paradise – economic turmoil. Toward the middle of the new millennium's third decade, Progressitopia's national debt ballooned to over 60 trillion. For many years, Trad economists and "debt alarmists" had warned that Progressitopia's skyrocketing debt and deficits were unsustainable. These anti-progressive thinkers openly questioned the progressive strategy of taxing and spending one's way to prosperity.
They felt, irrationally so, that such approach represented, as one provocative naysayer phrased it, "an epically stupid and patently impossible self-contradiction. No more can one spend his way out of debt than can he cheat his way out of adultery."
Another fundamentalist cynic offered a less hurtful, yet no less sensationalist analogy: "When a bridge's infrastructure becomes unsustainable," he alleged, "it will ultimately collapse if its integrity is compromised to the degree that it can no longer support some burgeoning mass. So too it goes, apparently, as relates integrity to politicians, governments and national debt."
Right-wing propaganda aside, Progressitopia's economy did, nonetheless, unexpectedly collapse for reasons ultimately deemed inconclusive.
Now, as heretofore told, and as go the history books, Christianism had, from time immemorial, been the very bane of free-thinking humanity's existence. This hateful mythology had been largely to blame, in concert with its sister-faith, Judaism, and its insufferable cousin, conservatism, an equally curious mental disorder, for all of the world's wars, slavery, racism, sexism, disease, capitalism, global warming and, most onerously perhaps, gluten sensitivity.
Moreover, both Christianism and conservatism were ultimately determined to have been the catalyst for the systemic phobia outbreak that inexplicably began around the turn of the century. First there was homophobia, an irrational, chronic and debilitating fear of the square-hole-round-peg people, or, as this flamboyant troupe, so enamored with acronymic wordplay, preferred to be called: the "SHRP community." Since SHRPs displayed impeccable fashion sense and a flair for the fabulous, Neanderthalic Trads were, most naturally, terrified by them.
Then came Islamophobia, the irrational fear of having one's head lopped off, followed by transphobia, the fear of naked men in ladies' locker rooms, polyphobia, the fear of communal rompathons, as well as an all-inclusive litany of other phobias relating to myriad sexual orientations, gender identities and expressions.
Next, there emerged the great progressiphobia pandemic of '27. This involved an equally absurd, though no less universal, fear of progressive thought, practice or people. This, for a time, threatened to halt Progressitopia's progressing progress altogether.
Finally, there occurred a worldwide outbreak of phobia-phobia. This was, of course, a condition delineated by the once again irrational denial that any of the aforementioned phobias had "any basis in reality whatsoever," but, rather, were "simply ham-fisted pejoratives intended to marginalize one's political opposition."
But, alas, we must for now part ways. My gluten-free frittata grows cold.
© J. Matt Barber
October 6, 2014
There once was a land, a magical land, with a chicken in every pot. And in this land, which was called Progressitopia, there were two peoples. There were those who saw the world as it was, and there were those who saw the world as they oh-so-very-much wished it could be. The former were called the Trads, and the latter, the Progs. It was the Progs who held dominion over this great land, and so it was they who wrote, or re-wrote, her history.
Now, in this kingdom we must remember that Christianity, or "Christianism" as it would later be called (long since forbidden), along with similar such mythological and dogmatic phantasms, remained the foremost, if not the sole, thorn in the Progs' collectivist butt. Any and all thought or practice that might, in any way, undermine full realization of, and strict adherence to, progressive thinking was, therefore, strictly verboten.
In fact, the Trads, the traditionalist remnant, had proven singularly responsible for the famines, Civil War II and Progressitopia's endlessly spiraling state of affairs, both foreign and domestic – a state that, notwithstanding all predictions to the contrary, somehow became significantly and enigmatically worse subsequent to the onset of progressive governance.
There was, however, one exception to this rule: Islam. Shadowing the glorious dawn of progressive reign came, from o'er the sea, a mighty and fearsome caliphate. The Muslim faith spread like wildfire. Recruitment efforts were buoyed, and appreciably so, in that, while yet a loving and peaceful religion, any skeptic or "infidel" who failed to convert was either immediately raped and enslaved or summarily beheaded, stoned, shot or blown limb-from-limb.
Whereas Progressitopians, with their one-child-only abortion mandate, stopped reproducing altogether, adherents to the religion of peace rutted like rabbits. Every corner of the globe became thickly populated by devotees of the most praised Prophet Muhammad – peace be upon him.
As global violence and jihad spiked, it seemed for a time that Progressitopia and the Islamic caliphate would be one another's undoing.
And then something extraordinary happened.
The King of Progressitopia, a brave and handsome man most wise, with visor of gold and scepter of 3-iron in hand, bowed before the great caliph and presented a series of official mea culpas on behalf of his land. He prayed Allah's forgiveness for incurring his wrath – just desserts for centuries of Progressitopian Imperialism.
And so these two seemingly incompatible kingdoms, with wholly polarized worldviews, agreed to forge an incongruous socio-political partnership – an "Islamo-Progressive Alliance." The alliance was built upon the maxim: "The enemy of my enemy is my friend." The common enemy, of course, had formed its own unholy alliance: the "Zio-Christian Axis of Evil."
And so it soon came to pass that independent Islamic settlements cropped-up throughout Progressitopia. The Michganistan Territory became, for all intents and purposes, Mecca to the Western Hemisphere.
Presently, the Islamo-Progressive Alliance found itself enjoying a comparatively peaceful seven-year truce. Apart from a weekly handful of suicide bombings, mass shootings and random beheadings, carried out chiefly against Progressitopia's women and children, things were simply capital.
But then, trouble in paradise – economic turmoil. Toward the middle of the new millennium's third decade, Progressitopia's national debt ballooned to over 60 trillion. For many years, Trad economists and "debt alarmists" had warned that Progressitopia's skyrocketing debt and deficits were unsustainable. These anti-progressive thinkers openly questioned the progressive strategy of taxing and spending one's way to prosperity.
They felt, irrationally so, that such approach represented, as one provocative naysayer phrased it, "an epically stupid and patently impossible self-contradiction. No more can one spend his way out of debt than can he cheat his way out of adultery."
Another fundamentalist cynic offered a less hurtful, yet no less sensationalist analogy: "When a bridge's infrastructure becomes unsustainable," he alleged, "it will ultimately collapse if its integrity is compromised to the degree that it can no longer support some burgeoning mass. So too it goes, apparently, as relates integrity to politicians, governments and national debt."
Right-wing propaganda aside, Progressitopia's economy did, nonetheless, unexpectedly collapse for reasons ultimately deemed inconclusive.
Now, as heretofore told, and as go the history books, Christianism had, from time immemorial, been the very bane of free-thinking humanity's existence. This hateful mythology had been largely to blame, in concert with its sister-faith, Judaism, and its insufferable cousin, conservatism, an equally curious mental disorder, for all of the world's wars, slavery, racism, sexism, disease, capitalism, global warming and, most onerously perhaps, gluten sensitivity.
Moreover, both Christianism and conservatism were ultimately determined to have been the catalyst for the systemic phobia outbreak that inexplicably began around the turn of the century. First there was homophobia, an irrational, chronic and debilitating fear of the square-hole-round-peg people, or, as this flamboyant troupe, so enamored with acronymic wordplay, preferred to be called: the "SHRP community." Since SHRPs displayed impeccable fashion sense and a flair for the fabulous, Neanderthalic Trads were, most naturally, terrified by them.
Then came Islamophobia, the irrational fear of having one's head lopped off, followed by transphobia, the fear of naked men in ladies' locker rooms, polyphobia, the fear of communal rompathons, as well as an all-inclusive litany of other phobias relating to myriad sexual orientations, gender identities and expressions.
Next, there emerged the great progressiphobia pandemic of '27. This involved an equally absurd, though no less universal, fear of progressive thought, practice or people. This, for a time, threatened to halt Progressitopia's progressing progress altogether.
Finally, there occurred a worldwide outbreak of phobia-phobia. This was, of course, a condition delineated by the once again irrational denial that any of the aforementioned phobias had "any basis in reality whatsoever," but, rather, were "simply ham-fisted pejoratives intended to marginalize one's political opposition."
But, alas, we must for now part ways. My gluten-free frittata grows cold.
© J. Matt Barber
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