Friday, March 29, 2013
The Parable of the Chocolate Cake
There once was a chocolate cake that didn't like being called that. He saw a pumpkin pie that had crust, sometimes had whipped cream on it, and was served on Thanksgiving. "I want to be a pumpkin pie," said the cake. He found some other chocolate cakes who were dissatisfied with being cakes. Together, they petitioned the government, talking to lawyers and lawmakers, picketing in front of court rooms in order to have their status changed from "chocolate cake" to "pumpkin pie". They held up signs saying things like "Don't be bigoted, let us be pumpkin pies too." Much of the media sided with the cakes, after all, why couldn't the chocolate cakes be pumpkin pies if they wanted to be? It didn't seem fair to them to exclude the cakes from becoming pies. Eventually, those who didn't want the change lost. They were forced to call any chocolate cake that wanted to be a pie, a pie. But when they got home at night, the pumpkin pies discussed with each other how the chocolate cakes weren't really pies, and when the cakes looked in the mirror, they still looked like cakes, not like pies. Legally, they were pies. In reality, they remained cakes.
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4 comments:
I think I get what you are saying, however, I believe it's not that cakes want to be pies, or vice versa, but rather that cakes are saying they ought to have a place on the Thanksgiving table, too.
I disagree. In the case I'm alluding to, the cakes say there is no difference between themselves and pies. They want the definition of cakes to be changed.
Well, I must not be familiar with the case you are referencing. Most of the cakes and sympathetic pumpkin pies I have heard would agree with what I said.
In keeping with my analogy, though, there are many arguments for keeping pumpkin pie the star of the Thanksgiving table. Although not literally. 'Cause I don't like pie. And I do like cake.
I don't mind the chocolate cake being at the table. I just don't like it redefining itself as pumpkin pie. I'd like it to have every right that the pie has though.
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