Wrapping Yourself in Cripples

 

Suppose, just for a moment, that you’re a ruthless dictator or even, dare I say, a corporate CEO. You’re feeling under siege because the voices of dissent have become quite numerous lately and you’ve had to spend an inordinate amount of your time and energy crushing them. Thus, you have been attracting increased scrutiny and this makes you uncomfortable. You need a feel-good distraction that’s designed to take everyone’s mind off of what an asshole you are so you can commit genocide in peace. (After all, that’s how you thought it would be when you took this job.)

You need your reputation laundered. Well in that case, may I suggest finding some cripples to embrace. It’s just like seeking insulation by wrapping yourself in the flag except you’re wrapping yourself in cripples.

It’s a tried-and-true means of making yourself look like a sweetheart. But you must be careful. It is imperative that you resist the temptation to embrace any old cripples. Because, like I said, the goal is to conjure up a “feel good” distraction. So you must be aware that not all cripples are warm and cuddly, as hard as that is to believe. Some cripples do things that piss people off, like go around protesting and demanding their rights. You certainly don’t want to associate yourself with them.

 No, you need something like the Special Olympics. It needs to be something safe and reliable and completely uncontroversial. It needs to be something that no one would dare publicly criticize in any way, for fear of being labeled insensitive. And who could possibly criticize a bunch of limping cripples in leg braces bravely racing each other around a track? It doesn’t matter if there’s a lot more than that to the Special Olympics. As long as enough people believe that’s all there is to it, that’s all that matters.

 If you’re a ruthless dictator, all you have to do is send your spouse to the opening ceremony of the Special Olympics to throw out the first beanbag. (What is the proper title for the spouse of a ruthless dictator? The First Bitch?)  Notice how I used the word spouse instead of wife. That’s because I ‘m not sexist. I wouldn’t want to give the impression that women aren’t capable of being ruthless dictators. Just look at Margaret Thatcher.

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The Orange Man

 I call him The Orange Man because he wore an orange shirt and an orange baseball cap. He peddled an orange bike and there was a rope attached to the back of it from which he pulled an orange wagon. The wagon was full of what appeared to be random scraps of cardboard.

It was the 4th of July. As I exited my cripple van via the ramp deployed from the side door he stopped peddling and stared at me. He said something about how he used to own a cripple van like mine, even though he wasn’t in a wheelchair. He said he put 50 thousand miles on it and it served him well.

And then he said that his nephew (or maybe was his cousin or son) was interested in designing wheelchairs when he was a kid but now he’s working for Tesla.

And I almost said, “So he works for Elon Musk, huh? But then again, don’t we all?”

But The Orange Man struck me as a Fox News type of guy. So instead, I just said “Oh.”

Then The Orange Man said, “Well I’m sorry to tell you but your wheelchair is forever out of balance. Because no two tubes can be shaped exactly the same.”

“Why not?” I said. 

“Because tubes have memories,” he said. “Just like you have a memory. I bet you remember when you were straight and strong and you could walk.”

“Not really,” I said. “I’ve always been this way.”

“Well I feel for you,” he said.

“No need,” I said. And that’s when I thought the best thing to do was to just get the hell out of there, So I spun around and left.

But then I heard his voice coming from behind me, shouting, “Well at least you’re free!”

I was right. He really was a Fox News type of guy.

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The Battle of the Street Beggars

There are a lot of those Latin American immigrants who are seeking asylum in the U.S. hanging around the city here. When they first started showing up here about a year ago, I was pissed. I wasn’t pissed at them.  I was pissed at the guy who put them on a bus and  dumped them all here, Governor Greg Abbott of Texas. I figured he was trying to pull some racist bull shit, like guys like him love to do. I figured he was trying to make everyone up here believe that these dirty Spanish speakers were invading our country and taking away our jobs.

At first, the more I saw of those immigrants, the more I felt sorry for them.  They looked like regular folks who were just seeking decent work so they can take care of their families and enjoy their lives.

But now I ‘m thinking maybe Abbott was right. Maybe they really are invading our country and taking away our jobs. They’re taking away cripple jobs. Because what’s the job most closely associated with cripples? Street beggars, right? I’m not basing that on data from sociological research or anything like that. I’m just going by how I think cripples are viewed by verts (which is what I call people who can walk because it’s short for vertical).

Anyway, it seems like a lot of the Latin American immigrants are going for those jobs, probably because those are the only jobs they can get. You don’t need a permit or a license or anything. All you need to do is go sit on a corner with a cup. And you don’t really need a cup.

When I have personally encountered these Latin American immigrants., it has usually been when I passed them as they were being street beggars. I know it’s them because they usually hold a sign scrolled with black marker on a sturdy hunk of cardboard that identifies them as such. They are wise to do this because it gives them a marketing advantage. Let’s face it, if you’re walking down the streets of Chicago and you’re feeling generous enough to toss a few coins at a street beggar, you can’t do that with every street beggar you see, or you’ll go broke. You must be discerning. You have to give your money to the beggar that you feel will give you the best bang for your coins, so to speak.

 That used to mean that crippled beggars had the marketing advantage because, all things considered, most people found it doubly satisfying to toss their coins at a crippled beggar rather than some begging vert.  I’m not basing that on data from sociological research or anything like that. I’m just going by how I think cripples are viewed by verts.

But now it seems like the Latin American beggars are undercutting the crippled beggars. My suspicions were confirmed recently when I was walking around downtown and I came across a family of begging Latin Americans. It looked like their cup was pretty full. But around the corner was a forlorn-looking crippled beggar. He shook his cup and it sounded pathetically empty.

I can’t blame people for wanting to give their money to Latin American immigrant beggars. It’s like giving a big middle finger to Abbott, which makes it feel extra good.

But if cripples can’t beg anymore, we’re screwed!

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