Author Archives: Ovid

Courtly Love isn’t about Love, You Piece of Shit

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Here’s another article on the past and how you are wrong about it.

[Also: if you want to help me in my eternal quest to not starve/be homeless, you can buy my book about American History, buy my other book about World Mythology, or just stuff money in my Patreon. I’m not choosy, just jam it in there. Also this is my Twitter.]

Right, where was I? Oh yeah, Courtly Love.

The laws of chivalry themselves have basically nothing to do with romance. They’re all about trying to regulate just how much of an asshole a guy on a horse can be. The secret ingredient that links chivalry to romance in our tiny brains is called courtly love. It’s the great-great granddaddy of “Nice Guy Syndrome,” and it has always been fucked.

OKAY SO WHAT IS COURTLY LOVE?

According to the thousands of poems, songs, and stories about courtly love, the process goes something like this:

1. Pick a total babe who is married to someone better than you.
2. Pine after said babe until you are literally ill.
3. Babe virtuously rejects you because, let’s be clear, this is a terrible idea and also her husband is better than you.
4. Do a bunch of heroic shit that nobody asked you to do, to make yourself worthy of babe.
5. Babe still says no, and you go write a fucking poem about it. OR
5b. Babe is finally like “okay fine,” in which case, great job Romeo, now you have to bust your ass to keep from getting caught. OR
5c. You get caught and the whole world catches on fire.

Courtly love was originally dreamed up by horny poets in the early 1400s, but it flourished because it served a social purpose. Most popular stories, myth and legend especially, survive because they illustrate rules that we think are important for keeping our society together. Coincidentally, most of these rules have to do with humping.

So whose social purpose is served by this miserable dicktease of a courtship ritual? Who comes out a winner? The lady is locked into a straightjacket of protocol that makes actual consent super hard to suss out, the knight is running around murdering dudes nobody asked him to murder because he’s too proud to just jack off into his helmet, and if the two of them ever do get together, every example we have shows it ending apocalyptically. No, you know who’s the real winner here? The husband.

WHAT COURTLY LOVE IS ABOUT: SECURING YOUR HOT WIFE

Think about this from the perspective of a Medieval monarch: you have a smoking hot wife who your buddy gave you because he wanted to use your beach house, and you also employ about a hundred of the best-armed, best-trained psychopaths in the world. These people all live inside of your home with you. At some point, at least one of these psychopaths is going to want to have sex with your wife. And these aren’t just regular psychopaths, either. These are handsome, fit, wealthy psychopaths, in an era where “wealthy” means “everybody else sleeps in mud, and I am the one who pees in that mud.” And your wife, let me reiterate, is married to you because her dad wants to use your beach house. If your stable of monsters starts spitting game at your wife, it is highly likely that your wife will want to sex them back. You need a game plan.

You can’t just tell these guys to cut it out. You hired these guys because they’re unstoppable bastards. You can’t just stand aside and let them fuck your wife, either, because then you look like a weenie, and nobody wants to bow down to King Weiner. Plus there’s all the shit with heirs and succession. It’s a logistical nightmare. But how are you gonna stop them? Put them in jail? These dudes own their own jails. Send another knight after the knight who fucks your wife? Spoiler alert: the second knight also wants to fuck your wife.

What you can do, though, is control the culture by advocating for an elaborate code of etiquette that lets these handsome nightmare people do everything *but* fuck your wife. This is, at the core, what courtly love is: a code of behavior that provides a dubiously healthy outlet for all that pent up wife-fuck-want. Every part of courtly love reinforces the same message: “you can look, but if you touch then I will chop your fucking hand off.” This is perfect for our hypothetical king with his hypothetically hot wife, because it lets him turn a blind eye to all the erotic roleplay as long as it stays “virtuous,” while reserving the right to bring the hammer down as soon as shit goes public.

WHAT COURTLY LOVE IS NOT ABOUT: GETTING YOUR DICK TOUCHED

What I’m trying to get at is this: Despite what everybody seems to think these days, courtly love was *never* designed to help you get laid. It is a system explicitly designed to prevent people from getting laid. The entire process is an erotic Rube Goldberg machine that is a thousand times more likely to chop off your dick than fondle it, and maybe you also kill a bear, I don’t know. If I’ve said it once, I’ll say it a thousand times: DO NOT LOOK TO MEDIEVAL EUROPE FOR SEX TIPS.

And yet pretty much every movie produced in the 90s is an ode to courtly love with one key point altered: where the old stories had tragic consequences, the new stories have zero consequences. The Wedding Singer, Wet Hot American Summer, Revenge of the Nerds, The Fucking Karate Kid, and about a million other movies all follow the courtly love formula, right up to the point where the love is consummated and there is NO NEGATIVE FALLOUT. The 90s took “If you fuck someone’s honey, bad things will happen” and turned it into “If you fuck someone’s honey … you will have fucked someone’s honey?”

What we’ve done, and where the whole “Nice Guy” thing comes from, is we’ve taken the purpose and the outcome of courtly love and flipped them. We act like because our love is noble, we deserve satisfaction. Courtly love says “your love is evil and you will never be satisfied, so you might as well make it noble.” Neither one is super healthy, as evidenced by the amount of death and vitriol both camps have dealt out, but at least courtly love is honest about what you can expect.

Look, I’m not saying you shouldn’t try to fuck your boss’s spouse. Fuck away, for all I care. All I’m saying is that our modern conception of hopeless romance, of the tormented lover pining away in the night, striving to become worthy of the unattainable beloved, is based on a ridiculous, outdated, socially motivated code of behavior that was invented at a time when marriages were business mergers and adultery carried the god damn death penalty. And I get that it feels good to feel bad, to experience the exquisite pain of loving somebody you know you can never be with. I’ve done it loads of times, and I got some great poetry out of it. Just, for God’s sake, don’t pretend like your secret pain has a noble lineage. The noble lineage is inbred.

Chivalry Isn’t Dead, You Just Don’t Know What the Fuck it is.

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[Hey, if you want to read more stuff I wrote, you could always buy my book. Or my other book.]

So Chivalry.

I’ve heard a lot of people say it’s dead. It used to be a lament, and then it turned into a joke, and now it’s just a fact that almost everybody accepts. Chivalry is dead, because it’s 2015 and nobody wants to suck your dick for holding the door open for them. And it’s true, nobody wants to do that to your hog in exchange for that minor favor. But that’s not what the fuck chivalry is. Chivalry is a complicated, difficult, and ultimately good code of ethics that you probably have a fundamental misunderstanding of. So let me set some things straight:

1. CHIVALRY IS NOT ABOUT TREATING WOMEN LIKE DELICATE FLOWERS

This is probably the main thing people fuck up about chivalry. The truth is, chivalry has basically fuck all to do with women, and everything to do with horses.

See, the word “chivalry” comes from the French word “chevalier,” which comes from “cheval,” which means “horse.” Chivalry is literally just “rules for if you have a horse.” This was an important set of rules to have in chivalry times. Horses were the Blackhawk Helicopters of the Middle Ages; if you had a horse, you could absolutely kill anybody who didn’t have a horse and nobody was going to say a god damn thing. The only thing stopping you was chivalry.

That’s what chivalry was for. Chivalry was – and still is – basically a way of saying, “okay, I have an optimized death machine between my legs, maybe I should look out for people who don’t have one of these.” So it’s not that chivalry is specifically about defending women because women are weak. It’s that chivalry is about defending people who don’t own horses, and in the middle ages women didn’t own shit.

It’s 2015 now. Women can own as many horses as they want. But there are still power structures built into society that put some people in metaphorical Blackhawk helicopters, and other people underneath those helicopters (sometimes the Blackhawk Helicopters are also literal). Real chivalry is about noticing when you have a horse and somebody else doesn’t. It’s about being careful not to trample people just because you can. It’s about holding the door for a dude in a wheelchair. It’s about actively trying to recruit more people of color in your workplace. Sometimes it really is about sticking up for women, but only if your help is wanted. And even then …

2. CHIVALRY IS NOT A POINTS SYSTEM REDEEMABLE FOR FREE SEX

There are no prizes for being chivalrous, other than the prize of being a decent god damn human. This is because the people who chivalry was invented for were so fucking rich that prizes were totally meaningless to them. In addition to horses, knights also owned fancy armor, sick weapons, and huge tracts of land. They were powerful, exciting people relatively free of disease. They weren’t exactly hard up for sex opportunities, is what I’m trying to say. They didn’t need to invent a complex code of ethics to justify getting shit for free, because they already had all the shit. What do you get for the man who has everything? How about some fucking morals.

Anyway, if you’re desperate for booty, tales of chivalry aren’t the best place to go for inspiration. King Arthur’s court is basically one endless sex disaster, what with Arthur’s accidental incest and Lancelot’s righteous wangfoolery. Tristram and Isolde is a bonerific nightmare that borders on farce. Sir Galahad, the Greatest Knight Ever, is also the biggest virgin in the universe, and he is thrilled about it. It turns out you’re not even allowed to see the grail if you thought about a boob once. The chivalric canon is not overly sex positive, you guys. In fact the only problem-free sex I can recall from my chivalric reading is the story of Sir Gawaine and Lady Ragnell, in which everything turns out for the best because – spoiler alert – Gawaine leaves the decision up to his wife. Funny how that works out, huh?

3. CHIVALRY IS NOT PERFECT, AND NEITHER ARE WE

Like most things invented in the past, chivalry has some problems. One of the problems with chivalry is that horses are no longer the height of technology. The main problem with chivalry, though, is that it can very easily cross over into paternalism, and nobody likes to be treated like a child. It is important to remember that just because you have a horse and somebody else does not have a horse, that does not make you their dad.

Even if you have the best intentions, chivalry isn’t a code you can blindly follow for A+ results. Even if chivalry was perfect, which no moral code is, it’s impossible to be a non-shitty person absolutely all the time. Like, the Knights of the Round Table were probably the most righteous group of horse-havers ever to have horses, but Gawaine chopped a lady’s head off, Lancelot fucked his boss’s wife, and Percival was the biggest idiot ever to hold a sword. Galahad was perfect I guess, but Galahad also had a magic chair with his name written on it in fire and ascended to heaven because he found a neat cup. Galahad was a fake person. All of those dudes were fake fucking people. We made them up. The people we made up to be the ideals of chivalry were still remarkably shitty. Back here on earth, nobody is chivalrous all the time, and that’s not sufficient reason to write anybody off. We are all shitty sometimes. Also Galahad is a dickhead.

OKAY SO WHAT IS CHIVALRY THEN?

Chivalry boils down to three things: mercy, charity, and humility. Mercy means being conscious of your advantages, and treating other humans gently. Charity means giving without expecting anything in return. Humility means accepting your mistakes, and recognizing that those who don’t have your advantages aren’t your inferiors. Anybody can embody these traits – woman, man, or even horse. At this point, you may be thinking “hey, this is bullshit, these are just basic guidelines for not being an asshole!” and congratulations, you’re right. That’s all chivalry is: basic guidelines for how not to be a sack of shit. And as long as a sack of shit is not a good thing to be, chivalry will never die.

THE BIRDS (but not the Hitchcock version) (but kind of the Hitchcock version)

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I want you guys to know that there is no way I would tell this story
if I weren’t being forced to by my patreon backers
and the reason for this should be pretty clear:
it is a play written by Aristophanes
and it is called

THE BIRDS BY ARISTOPHANES

(adapted for internet by Fake Ovid Naso)

two assholes are wandering around in the wilderness
their names are Pisthetearus and Euelpides
which are such terrible names that they must belong to terrible people
and oh, what’s this, looks like I was right
these towering twanks are carrying birds around with them for some reason
why would they do that
I guess we’re about to find out, because this is when they start talking:

PISTHETEARUS: this bird is eating my fucking hand why did we buy these

EUELPIDES: to guide us to the land of the birds you idiot

PISTHETERUS: okay I guess I deserve that. I guess we are both big idiots

EUELPIDES: and to think, all we wanted to do was avoid all our legal responsibilities in Athens by finding a group of gullible birds to help us found our own city where we are kings

PISTHETEARUS: the struggle is real

suddenly the birds start going APESHIT
because there is a new bird here
and his name is TEREUS
you remember Tereus, of course
he is the one who raped his wife’s sister
and then cut out her tongue
and then the sisters killed his son and fed it to him
and they all turned into birds the end.
In this play, he’s a good guy!
also he lives with Procne
his wife who fed him his kids
I’m glad everything worked out for those two crazy lovebirds

TEREUS: what’s up guys what are you doing here what’s going on

EUELPIDES: we are running from the law

PISTHETEARUS: use your wings to help us find a dope city with no laws

TEREUS: ok well I have a few cities I could suggest …

EUELPIDES: those cities are all garbage

PISTHETEARUS: we will found a new city, a city of birds

TEREUS: we will?

EUELPIDES: yes

PISTHETEARUS: we’ll call it Nephelococcygia

EUELPIDES: it means “cloud cuckoo land”!

PISTHETEARUS: it’s what that level in Banjo Kazooie is named after!

TEREUS: sweet well i’ll summon all the birds I guess

he does this
oh god all the birds are here the stage is full of birds oh fuck

BIRDS: what the fuck why are these humans here we hate humans

SEE? WHAT HAVE I BEEN SAYING THIS WHOLE TIME

TEREUS: no chill out these guys are cool

BIRDS: well since you are such a good judge of character we’ll hear them out

EUELPIDES: look guys, we all know birds are the most powerful force in the world. you eat all the bugs to ensure good crops, you tell omens, you shit on lame people we don’t like. you guys run the world

PISTHETEARUS: and it’s time yall started acting like it!

EUELPIDES and PISTHEATRUS are SPECIES TRAITORS

BIRDS: yeah you know what let’s build a city in the sky and demand tribute from everyone

TEREUS: I don’t see how this could go wrong!

IT FUCKING DOESN’T. ONE WEEK LATER EUELPIDES AND PISTHEATRUS HAVE WINGS AND ARE RECEIVING ENVOYS. They are actually trying to sacrifice a goat to consecrate the city rn but they keep getting interrupted

POET: Hello I am here to yell poems at you!

PISTHETEARUS: POETRY IS DEAD

Pisthetearus beats the poet until he goes away.

PROPHET: I’m a prophet and I’m here to say that if you don’t give me a bunch of food and booze BAD THINGS WILL HAPPEN

PISTEATRUS: BAD THINGS ARE HAPPENING RIGHT NOW. TO YOU.

Pisthetearus beats the prophet until he goes away

METON: I am a famous math guy, here to do math on your city and help you efficiently plan your road system!

PISTHETEARUS: WHERE WE’RE GOING WE DON’T NEED ROADS. WE’RE BUILDING A CITY IN THE SKY YOU IDIOT

what do you think pisthetearus does.
a police inspector and a guy who makes decrees also show up
and also get beaten with sticks.
some time during this process Eulpides disappears
maybe he got sick of living in a city full of birds
maybe the secret police got him
I don’t know
I will believe literally any bad thing you tell me about birds.
anyway some dude shows up

SOME DUDE: yo the birds finished building the city wall

PISTHETEARUS: they what?

SOME DUDE: yeah they built a giant wall out of stone and I guess it floats in the sky

PISTHETEARUS: what how

SOME DUDE: I don’t know they used their wings and beaks and shit they’re fucking birds DID YOU NOT REALIZE WHO YOU WERE DEALING WITH

PISTHETEARUS: no no no this is great. see all we have to do now is send envoys to the humans and the gods telling them all that we are in charge now and all the sacrifices should go to us because we are birds

SOME DUDE: I don’t see how this could go wrong!

AND IT DOESN’T. The gods try to make a big deal out of it but the humans are super into the idea, probably because pisthetearus bribes them all with free wings. pretty soon Prometheus shows up

PISTHETEARUS: Yo! Prometheus!

PROMETHEUS: shh dude the gods don’t know I’m here. I just wanted to tell you that they’re all fucking starving up there because you’re jacking all their sacrifices and they’re gonna have to give into you soon. I’m on your side buddy

Prometheus what are you DOING an eagle literally eats your liver EVERY DAY Prometheus REMEMBER WHO YOUR FRIENDS ARE

PROMETHEUS: alright I gotta go now but remember: all hail our new bird overlords

PISTHETEARUS: this is all suspiciously easy, almost as if a vast bird conspiracy anticipated my –

POSEIDON: NO TIME TO THINK CRITICALLY, GODS ARE HERE

HERCULES: I am another god who is here!

TRIBALLUS: I’m a racist caricature masquerading as a god! Besides these two expository sentences, I only speak gibberish!

PISTHETEARUS: Boys, boys, I know you all want to murder all birds in an epic cyclone of blood and thunder …

HERCULES: Yeah that sounds pretty good

yes come on finally

PISTHETEARUS: But what if I were to offer you some … FRIED CHICKEN INSTEAD?

HERCULES: fried chicken you say?

OH COME ON. COME THE FUCK ON HERCULES

PISTHETEARUS: yeah and all Zeus has to do is cede authority to the birds and let me marry the Director of Operations for all of Olympus

POSEIDON: That sounds like a bad deal

PISTHETEARUS: I’m sorry were you not listening to the part where I offered you FRIED CHICKEN?

HERCULES: He has a point, Poseidon

TRIBALLUS: BLUR BLUR BLUH BLUH BLUH!

POSEIDON: Okay fine, but only because Triballus put it so eloquently.

PISTHETEARUS: Hooray! I’m marrying a goddess and nothing bad happened!

BIRDS: EXCEPT THAT YOU HANDED CONTROL OF THE LAND, THE SEA, AND THE HEAVENS TO A MALIGNANT FORCE OF NATURE OLDER THAN THE GODS THEMSELVES. WE WILL RULE FOR A MILLION YEARS. YOU FOOL, YOU HAVE USHERED IN A NEW ERA: THE AGE OF FEATHER AND TALON.

PISTHETEARUS: Still totally worth it!

ALL: The moral of the story is if you give a bird a city pretty soon he is going to want dominion over all mankind!

THE END. I FUCKING WARNED YOU. DIDN’T I FUCKING WARN YOU?

god, fuck you Aristophanes.

The Jungle Book is a Book about Jungle

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Somebody said do jungle book so here we go

right so there’s a couple wolves
mom!wolf and dad!wolf
they’re hanging out with their cubs
then this hyena shows up like “hehe what’s up guys”
(hyenas are the jimmy fallon of jungle creatures)
“did you hear
my boss Shere Khan got tired of hunting in his territory
your territory is his territory now”
and wolf dad is like “what the perfect fuck
that dickhole president can’t come here
all he ever does is kill the humans’ cattle
if you do that for too long the humans burn down the forest
he’s gonna get our forest burned the fuck down
because he is too lame to hunt actual animals
instead of bullshit lobotomized livestock
fuck this man I got a family”
and the hyena is like “yo don’t shoot the messenger bro”
and the wolf is like “I can’t I don’t have thumbs
humans are the ones who shoot things and make fires”
and the hyena is like “haha speaking of humans
check out this baby stumbling up the hill right here
look at this dumb human baby
all dumb and covered in blood like a dumb blood baby”
and dadwolf is like “WHAT THE FUCK IS THIS DOING HERE?
ARE YOU SHITTING ME?
DID SHERE KHAN JUST MURDER A WHOLE HUMAN FAMILY
AND NOW THE BABY IS HERE
SNUGGLING ADORABLY WITH MY CUBS BECAUSE HE IS TOO IDIOT TO SCARED?
HASHTAG JUNGLEPROBLEMS, CHRIST.”
and then Shere Khan is like “I’ll show you jungle problems
because see you’re right
I did just murder a bunch of humans
but I’m kind of ocd about my murders
and I don’t like that a baby got away
I want to eat that baby
give me that baby.”
and momwolf is like “FUCK YOU SHITBEAST
YOU TAKE ONE STEP CLOSER TO THIS DUMB BLOOD BABY
AND I WILL TURN YOU INTO A GOD DAMN PAPER SNOWFLAKE
YOU KNOW ME, HAIRBALL
I’M BASICALLY JUST A BUCKET OF ANGRY KNIVES HELD TOGETHER BY A LITTLE PISSED-OFF FUR
GO.”
Then she names the human baby “Mowgli”
which means “Frog”
because I guess she’s not clear on which animals are which.

but before Mowgli can join the pack, he as to be accepted
so mom and dad wolf take him to the pack council
(the wolves are a neat semi-anarchist collective)
and they let the other wolves sniff his butthole
but then Shere Khan shows up like “GIVE THAT BABY TO ME
I WANT TO EAT A BABY”
and the wolves don’t want to fight over a dumb baby
so they’re like sure
but mom wolf is like COME ON
and king wolf is like “You know the rules
we can’t accept this baby unless at least two people vouch for him
OTHER THAN YOU”
which is not likely to happen
except suddenly a BEAR shows up
this sleepy bear named Baloo
who I guess works for the wolves as a freelance schoolteacher?
professor bear?
I don’t know
they let him hang out, is what’s important
and this bear is like “Ok whatever I think you should accept him
it’ll be funny.”
but one more person still needs to speak up
and that’s when Bageera the Panther shows up
and is like “Ok guys I killed a big tasty deer just now
and I will tell you where it is if you let this boy be a wolf
otherwise I will fuck you all up
you know I’ll do it
I’m crazy
who knows why I do what the fuck I do
I’m a god damn monster.”
and the wolves are like “wow
we have got to stop telling the whole jungle where our meetings are happening.”

But they accept Mowgli in exchange for the deer
and then the classic thing happens
Mowgli gets raised by wolves
automatically making him a badass
because a wolf with thumbs is a wolf without limits
but the whole time he’s growing up
Shere Khan is being all shady
convincing the young wolves to hate Mowgli
because he’s hairless and sexy or whatever
basically tearing a page out of Melkor’s book
so that when the leader of the pack finally gets too old
(when you fail to bring down a deer in the hunt, the other wolves kill you)
Mowgli knows he’s in trouble.

Actually Mowgli doesn’t know shit
Mowgli has grown from a dumb baby
into a dumb young adult
and he doesn’t give a shit about anything.
It’s actually Bageera who knocks some sense into him
he’s like “Dude
you’re supposed to be a wolf
but your closest friends are a bear and a panther
you are not winning the PR war here
so instead you need to win the actual war war.
Check it out:
go to the village
steal a clay pot full of fire
[which they call the red flower
because I guess they can talk and form governments
but they can’t understand fucking fire]
and then when Shere Khan tries to fuck with you
set his shit on fire

so Mowgli does this thing
he steals the fire pot
he brings it to the wolf meeting
and when Shere Khan shows up
all like “Hey guys I know it’s been like 14 years
but I still really want to eat this baby
and now that leadership has changed maybe we can do this?”
Mowgli is like “That’s a valid argument
but here’s a bunch of fire.”
and he sets Shere Khan and all of his shitty wolf friends on fire
and they all run away
and miraculously manage to not set the actual forest on fire
and Mowgli gets to stay alive
but then he’s like “Shit
I don’t have any friends now
because I just set fire to all my friends
I guess I better go and try to be human”
and Baloo and Bageera are both like “yeah probably”
so he goes back to the village
and probably has a horrible time
because he missed the critical period for language acquisition
but at least he got to be raised by wolves.

The moral of the story
is that fire is the best counterargument.

The end.

Joshua Norton is the Emperor of My Heart

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A long long time ago
or maybe just a long time ago
some internet person tried to pay me
to retell the Principia Discordia.
As payment I demanded twenty dollars in quarters
and photographic proof of having amused strangers in traffic
which i thought was a suitably discordian payment.
The person in question completely failed to deliver either of these things
which
now that i think about it
is probably a suitably discordian payment method

but rather than trying to transliterate the entire corpus
of the Epiphanies Rudely Imposed Upon the World by Her Royal Weirdness Eris Discordia
(whose most notorious achievement I have already documented in any case)
today I am going to tell you about the Goddess’s Only Begotten Son
EMPEROR NORTON
RULER OF THESE UNITED STATES
AND – FOR A SHORT TIME
PROTECTOR OF MEXICO

This is a real story about a real person
a real person born in England in like 1818
who grew up in South Africa
and only moved to the US when his parents died
/ when he realized how rad America was.
So Norton (whose first name is not actually Emperor
but is in fact Joshua)
shows up in San Francisco as a pretty rich dude
like, his parents were rich and then they died
and that made him rich because richness is i guess genetic
anyway Norton is a pretty shrewd investor
so he quickly turns his money into even more money
and then he comes across THE ULTIMATE FINANCIAL OPPORTUNITY

you see, China suddenly decides it’s not gonna export rice anymore
and San Francisco is full of Chinese people
who are used to having rice
so all of a sudden there is a HUGE demand for rice
and like NO RICE
so Norton buys up like a million tons of rice
and has it shipped to san Francisco
so he can be the big rice man.

BUT HE FORGOT ONE CRUCIAL THING:
CHINA IS NOT THE ONLY PLACE WHAT GROWS RICE
so all of a sudden these two huge ships arrive from peru
just brimming with fucking rice
and overnight Norton’s boatload of bucks
becomes a boatload of sucks.
He tries to get out of paying for all that rice
but his reasons are bullshit and everyone knows it
so within the space of like a week
dude is suddenly not rich anymore.

So what does Norton do?
Does he jump off the top of a building?
NO
HE DECLARES HIMSELF EMPEROR OF THE UNITED STATES
DUH.
Like, first he disappears for a little while
but when he reappears
he just starts writing royal decrees
and sending them to san Francisco newspapers
like “Hear ye hear ye, I’m emperor now”
or “Avast, congress is hereby dissolved”
or “Yarr, build a bridge over that there Oakland Bay”
oh fuck I slipped into pirate mode there for a second
although you have to admit
the only thing cooler than being emperor of the united states
is being PIRATE-KING OF THE UNITED STATES

but anyway yeah
Norton is totally serious about all of this
he’s all writing letters to Queen Victoria/Abe Lincoln
trying to marry one and moderate the other one’s civil war
he’s issuing his own currency
and selling royal bonds
and inspecting the quality of the streets and the police
but none of that is really that remarkable.
Crazy people believe crazy shit all the time
especially when it comes to their crazy selves.
What’s ACTUALLY insane
is how people RESPOND to this guy.
Restaurants accept his currency
and actively seek out his royal seal of approval.
The city council pays for him to have fancy clothes
like gold epaulets
and a coonskin cap with peacock feathers in it.
One time a police officer accidentally arrests him for being crazy
and people get SO CHEEZED
that the chief of police is forced to order his release
and issue a public apology
which Norton responds to with a ROYAL PARDON.
Boy, it sure is pretty dope to be white in America, huh?

YOU KNOW WHAT IT’S NOT DOPE TO BE IN AMERICA THOUGH?
CHINESE
at least not in the 1800s
who would have thought that the country that went on to intern the Japanese
would harbor anti-Chinese sentiments during the civil war era huh
yeah, people are straight rioting in San Fran
(which Norton explicitly forbade anyone from calling “Frisco” by the way
so keep that in mind)
and they really want to kill them some Chinese people
so they show up in Chinatown, bout to bust some skulls
and who’s standing there
rudely obstructing their murder route?
EMPEROR FUCKING NORTON
OBVIOUSLY
THIS IS A STORY ABOUT EMPEROR NORTON
KEEP UP.
Norton just stands in front of these rioters with his head down
and fucking prays at them until they feel awkward and go away.
Then he goes back to selling bullshit royal bonds to tourists.

Emperor Norton is like most people in that he eventually dies.
It’s a bummer, but he lived a pretty good life
and somewhere between 10 and 30 thousand people show up to his funeral
which is somewhere between 7 and 20 percent of the city at that time
oh, and do you remember that bridge he ordered built?
LOOKS LIKE IT GOT BUILT AFTER ALL
SIXTY YEARS LATER
THANKS ENTIRELY TO EMPEROR NORTON AND NO ONE ELSE
also I imagine there are some Chinese people who are happy they weren’t murdered.
That’s a pretty solid legacy
i gotta say.

I think the moral of this story is one we can all appreciate:
when life gives you lemons
declare yourself emperor
issue a proprietary currency
and then use that currency to buy lemonade.

Zal and Rudabeh is like Romeo and Juliet but Nobody Dies???

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Hey rascals
I hope you guys had a good labor day
I don’t remember mine so i’m sure I did
anyway today’s myth is from Iran
and was originally written down in a book
called the SHAHNAMEH
which is the PERSIAN BOOK OF KINGS
okay check it out:

so there’s this dude named Zal
he’s a prince of a part of the Persian empire.
A little background on Zal:
he was born with white hair and a baby beard
he looked like an old man baby, it was gross
so his dad Sam was like “ew get this gross baby away from me”
and left him in the wilderness
where he was raised by a magic bird
and eventually he became a great hero and his dad decided to love him
but he still has weird white hair so that’s always gonna be a thing.

Anyway Zal decides to spend some time strutting around his kingdom
and he ends up near a city called Kabol
which I assume is the same as modern day Kabul
but who knows?
anyway the prince of Kabol, Mehrab, comes to hang out with him
they party hard and it’s great
but then some courtier has to start flapping his dumb mouth
like “psst Zal I hear Mehrab has a hot daughter”
and Zal is like “FUCK”
and then Mehrab, who has no idea what’s going on
is like “hey bro do you want to crash at my house?
you know
the place where my hot daughter lives?”

so what do you think Zal does?
Does he
maybe
crash at Mehrab’s place so he can bang Mehrab’s smokin’ progeny?
uh no
that would be crass
instead he’s like “look dude I’m flattered
but we’re from totally different religious backgrounds
my dad is a king of Persia
your grandfather was a madman with snakes coming out of his shoulders
our families have fought each other since time immemorial
life is crazy
I think i’ll just remain here in my opulent tent, thanks.”
and Mehrab is like “ok fair enough”

so Mehrab goes back to his hot daughter Rudabeh
and Rudabeh is like “Hey
I heard Zal is out there
you know, the dude who was born as an old-man baby
what’s he like, is he gross?”
and Mehrab is like “omg he is definitely not gross
if there was a miss America pageant
but for men instead of women
and for Iran instead of America
well
the competition would probably have to be altered due to cultural factors
and gender norms
and also the fact that we don’t have televisions or sequins yet
but anyway I think he’d have a pretty good shot”
and Rudabeh is like “FUCK”

so what does she do?
does she steal away in the night
to fling herself into the arms of a lover she barely knows?
no, that would be irrational.
she sends a group of servants to hang out by a pond
where she’s pretty sure Zal will be
so they can find out if he’s cute
and they come back like “OMG HE SO IS.
IF THERE WAS A VERSION OF THE BACHELOR
BUT WITH ONE WOMAN AND A BUNCH OF MEN
AND YOU WERE THE WOMAN
AND HE WAS ONE OF THE MEN
ODDS ARE GOOD THAT YOU WOULD PICK HIM
even though he has weird hair”
and she’s like “yowza
tell that albino to get his lily white ass over here”

So Zal shows up at the walls of the palace that night
and Rudabeh is standing on the battlements
and he’s like “hey babe
i’m finding it difficult to smooch you from all the way down here”
and she throws her long luscious hair down over the walls
and she’s like “here, climb this.”
So what do you think he does?
does he scramble up this living rope ladder
forcing her to support his entire weight with her neck
while he simultaneously yanks on her scalp?
NO
THAT WOULD BE CRUEL
he brought a ROPE
because he’s not a fucking savage.

Anyway they spend the night making out
and in the morning Zal has to leave
because remember
his dad and Rudabeh’s dad are mortal enemies
but he can’t deal with this shit
so what do you think he does?
does he arrange to marry Rudabeh under cover of night
and then escape to somewhere far away and live in poverty?
No, that would be impractical.
He writes a letter to his dad Sam
like “Hey, remember how you abandoned me to be raised by birds
and then you felt bad and said you’d do whatever I wanted
welp
cashing in that dumb promise now”
and his dad is like “FUCK
this is EXACTLY the kind of dumb shit a kid raised by birds would think of
but I guess that’s sort of my fault
shit”
so he calls up his astronomers
to tell him if this is a good idea
and they’re all like “actually yeah
Zal and Rudabeh’s kid will be like the greatest hero ever
this is a win-win for you”
so Sam sends a letter to Zal like “yeah okay sure”

Meanwhile, though
Rudabeh’s mom Sindokht figures out what’s up
like, how her daughter’s about to marry their age-old enemy’s son
and she
well
she’s actually super reasonable about it
which would be surprising
if it weren’t for the fact
THAT EVERYBODY IS BEING SUPER REASONABLE IN THIS STORY
it’s like WHAT THE FUCK, PERSIA
DID YOU FORGET THAT MYTHS ARE SUPPOSED TO BE ABOUT MURDER AND INCEST?
IS YOUR WHOLE COUNTRY JUST FULL OF KIND, CONSIDERATE PEOPLE
ALL OPENING DOORS FOR EACH OTHER AND NOT CLIMBING EACH OTHERS’ HAIR???
this is bullshit

anyway Sindokht goes to Mehrab like “hey husband
our hot daughter wants to marry Zal”
and Mehrab is like “I WILL MURDER HER”
FINALLY SOMEBODY IS BEING UREASONABLE
except Sindokht is like “Why don’t you sleep on it, honey
and in the meantime I’ll go see what Sam thinks of all this?”
and Mehrab
INFURIATINGLY
is like “yeah that sounds like a good idea.”

MEANWHILE, THOUGH
the high king of all Persia hears about this shit
and he’s like “SERIOUSLY?
HAVE YOU ALL FORGOTTEN
THAT RUDABEH
IS DESCENDED
FROM A DUDE
WHO HAD BRAIN-EATING SNAKES
COMING OUT OF HIS SHOULDERS???
THERE’S ONLY ONE WAY TO STOP THIS
AND THAT BURNING KABOL TO THE GROUND.”
which is just like, phew, right?
I thought I was gonna have to witness a happy marriage
and not a bloody massacre
BUT THEN SAM WRITES THE KING A STRONGLY WORDED LETTER
AND ZAL DELIVERS IT
AND THE POWER OF HIS LOVE
COUPLED WITH THE ASTONOMER’S PROPHECY
AND ZAL’S WISE RESPONSES TO A SERIES OF WEIRD FREE-ASSOCIATION RIDDLES
CONVINCE EVEN KING ASSHOLE OF PERSIA
THAT THESE TWO KIDS SHOULD BE MARRIED
FUCK THIS
JUST FUCK THIS
FUCK

anyway yeah they get married
literally everyone is happy about it so it goes awesome
everyone gives each other stupid expensive gifts
and true to the prophecy
Zal and Rudabeh have a magnificent son named Rostam
who goes on to accidentally murder his teenaged son during a duel
so I guess it all works out in the end.

The moral of the story
is that communication between enemy states
is essential to every relationship.

The end.

One Woman’s Daring Journey Through a Labyrinth of Dicks

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Remember the Arabian nights?
they’re the nights with all the stories in them
and most of the stories are about terrible people.
This one is no exception
it’s called “the lady and her five suitors”
and that title SERIOUSLY UNDERSELLS what’s about to happen.

So this chick is married to this dude
but he’s not around a lot because he likes to travel
without his wife, I guess
or maybe she doesn’t like to travel
anyway there are clearly some deep problems with their relationship
which is why when she starts fucking this hot merchant’s son
no one is surprised
(I mean no one would be surprised if they knew about it
which they don’t.
this dame is pretty crafty, as you will see)
but then one day the dude gets in a fight with some other dude
who decides to prank him by framing him for a crime
and suddenly our heroine is running dangerously low on ilicit D.
SOMETHING MUST BE DONE

Naturally her first stop is the Chief of Police
because that’s the dude what imprisoned her boy
so she’s like “Hey
my ‘brother’ seems to have been falsely imprisoned
I am all alone without him and it is very sad
could you let him out please?”
and the Chief of Police says
very shrewdly, if I do say so:
“only if you touch my wiener.”
then
he pulls out his wiener

so the lady is like “Oh my
well
okay
BUT
let’s do it at my place
tomorrow.”
and the police chief is like “hell yeah
I love being corrupt.”

The lady’s next stop is the judge
and she’s like “what up, your eminence
my ‘brother’ is wrongly imprisoned
and the police chief won’t let him go
so could you go over his head for me pretty please?”
and the judge is like “I will totally go over his head for you
but you are going to have to do a head-related thing for me as well
what i am trying to say is:
please touch my wiener.”

so the lady is like “wow
sure
okay
BUT
let’s do it at my place
tomorrow.”
and the judge is like “haha yes
finally that worked.”

the lady’s next stop is the grand vizier
advisor to the king, chief administrator, secret traitor, whatever
and before she can speak he stops her and he’s like “no no
don’t tell me
you’re here to touch my wiener.”
and she’s like “No I’m here to ask you to release my ‘brother’ from jail”
and the vizier is like “uh huh
like I said
you’re here to touch my wiener”

so the lady’s like “you know what
sure
whatever
BUT
let’s do it at my place
tomorrow.”
and the vizier is like “score
this is way easier than tinder”

the final stop on this shame-train is the sultan
so the lady walks in like “hello your majesty, I’m -”
and the sultan is like “NOT UNLESS YOU TOUCH MY WEINER”
and she’s like “OKAY FINE
BUT LET’S DO IT AT MY PLACE
TOMORROW.”
and the king is like “aw yeah
i still got it baby”

now I know what you’re thinking, dear reader
you’re thinking that this woman
has just set up the most high-powered surprise orgy of all time
but read on and you will see that what she is really planning
is in fact far far dumber than that.
You see, her next stop is a carpenter
and she’s like “Hey bro
can you build me a cabinet with four locking compartments
the compartments should be human-sized please”
and the carpenter is like “sure
that’ll be four gold please
unless …
…
…
DOT DOT DOT”
and she’s like “MY PLACE, TOMORROW.
And make it FIVE compartments.”

So the carpenter stays up all night making the cabinet
and then he crashes out and the lady takes it to her house
and gets all dressed up
just in time for the judge to arrive
and the judge is like “hey babe
I hope you’re ready to touch my wiener”
and she’s like “take off your clothes”
and he’s like “ooh okay”
and then she’s like “put on these shittier clothes”
and he’s like “uhh okay”
and then a knock comes at the door
and he’s like “who’s that?”
and she’s like “OH FUCK IT’S MY HUSBAND
GET IN THE BOTTOM COMPARTMENT OF THIS CABINET”
so he jumps in and she locks him inside
and then goes and lets the police chief in
who is like “knock knock
(who’s there?)
my wiener
(my wiener who?)
touch my wiener
please touch it”
(don’t hesitate to try this sweet pickup line on your next date)
but the lady is like “slow down there cowboy
first write me a letter of unconditional release for my ‘brother'”
and he’s like “done”
and she’s like “now take off your clothes and put on these shitty ones”
and he’s like “done
now about those wiener-touches…”
and she’s like “OH SHIT MY HUSBAND IS KNOCKING ON THE DOOR PLEASE HIDE”
and she locks him in the second compartment of the cabinet.

She pulls this EXACT SAME TRICK on the vizier, the sultan, AND the carpenter
(who really should know better because he built the damn cabinet)
despite the fact that the police chief ALREADY GAVE HER EVERYTHING SHE NEEDED
she straight up DOES NOT NEED TO IMPRISON ANYONE ELSE
so either she’s pioneering a medieval version of “to catch a predator”
or this is her idea of letting them down easy.

either way
once she has locked basically the whole government in a cabinet
(along with a carpenter)
she takes the letter to the treasurer
collects her boytoy
sells everyone’s fancy clothes
and skips town to avoid justice
leaving the sultan, the vizier, the chief of police and the judge
locked in a cabinet
FOR THREE DAYS
without food or water
until finally the carpenter gives up and pisses himself
and the piss drips on the sultan
who gives up and pisses on the vizier
who pisses on the police chief
who pisses on the judge.
it’s a whole piss party in this nasty cabinet
when a couple of the neighbors finally come over
because all the screaming is starting to disturb them
and when they figure out who’s in the cabinet
(and simultaneously solve the mystery
of why crime has gone totally unpunished for the last three days)
they bust them out
starving and covered in urine
to face the harsh light of a new day.
Then they all send for new clothes and go out for tacos.
Seriously
no consequences for anybody
other than the severe psychological trauma
of being locked in a mahogany piss-tub for half a week
but hey
that’s life?

So the moral of the story
is always take bribes in cash.
handjobs are not a fungible commodity.

the end.

Watergate is Absolutely Nothing Like Gamergate

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My Patreon backers have spoken
and apparently I’m supposed to retell a conspiracy theory today
but I already covered Roswell and the moon landing in my book
the JFK assassination is pretty boring
(once you get past the assassination part)
and I promised the Illuminati I wouldn’t blow their cover
so instead I’m going to tell you about a conspiracy theory
that describes an ACTUAL REAL LIFE CONSPIRACY:
Watergate.

If there is a more mythological conspiracy than Watergate
then I haven’t heard of it
which probably makes it a pretty good conspiracy but whatever.
Name me one other political scandal that is SO SCANDALOUS
that we’ve turned it into a nonsensical suffix
and slapped that suffix onto every event that seems even remotely shitty.
We’ve got shit like nipplegate, porngate, wienergate
donutgate, fajitagate, sodagate
bloodgate, robogate, grannygate
for fuck’s sake, we’ve had a GATEGATE
WE’VE REACHED PEAK GATE
FRIENDS, THE WORD ‘GATE’ DOES NOT MEAN ‘SCANDAL’ IN ENGLISH
Watergate was the name of a HOTEL in DC
and it is with that hotel that our story begins.

See, back in 1972, Richard Nixon is trying to be president again
because it went so well for the first four years
but he doesn’t want to leave his election up to chance
or, you know, democracy
so a couple of his aides hire five criminals
to break into the headquarters of the Democratic National Committee
(which is, you guessed it, in the Watergate Hotel)
and plant some microphones in there
the theory apparently being
that every politician has to say horrible shit sometimes
and it’s best to get it on tape when they do.

So these criminals plant the bug and get away
but then they have to go back to repair it pretty much immediately
because I guess it was made out of hot glue and garbage
and they get caught trying to do this
because the way these top secret presidentially-funded burglars are getting in
is by DUCT-TAPING THE DOORS OPEN.
We’re talking about dudes who have covertly received THOUSANDS of dollars
from Nixon’s re-election campaign
and the most fearsome weapon in their criminal arsenal
is fucking DUCT TAPE
SHITTILY APPLIED?

So Nixon hears that these bozos got arrested
and he’s like “What the fuck
who told those assholes they should do that?”
so either he told them to do it and then forgot
or he’s shitty at controlling his own people
so, mega boner either way.
He realizes pretty quick that this will look bad if it gets out
so he tells two of his top aides, Haldeman and Ehrlichman
and also his head lawyer, Dean
to do whatever they need to do to make this go away
which basically amounts to
“fuck up a whole bunch.”

Like, they try to have the CIA make the FBI stop investigating
but that doesn’t really work
and they do succeed in burning a safe full of evidence
but that doesn’t stop the FBI from following the money
and figuring out that every single one of those burglars
was paid in some way by Nixon’s re-election committee
which Haldeman, Ehrlichman, and Dean are all involved with
plus the media just goes totally nuts
largely due to a bunch of leaks by someone calling himself Deep-Throat
(Come on, he cannot be ignorant of what that name mean)
and the investigation ends up convicting 69 people
(only 68 were actually guilty, the last one was for the lols)
So Nixon figures he has to initiate a DOUBLE-CONSPIRACY
by firing Haldeman, Ehrlichman, and Dean
before anyone can connect him to them
and hopefully blame all this shit on those guys
so he calls Dean into his office and he’s like “Hey buddy
gonna have to ask you to resign
sure is a shame about all those CRIMES you COMMITTED, huh?
and how you committed them TOTALLY ON YOUR OWN?”
and Dean is like “Mister President
why are you putting undue emphasis on some of your words like that?
are you … recording me?”
and Nixon is like “What? No! I’m no scumbag!
But just for old time’s sake, how about admitting to a bunch of crimes.
I mean, I know about them, but it’s nice to reminisce, right?”

So Dean goes to the committee that’s investigating this whole Watergate thing
and he’s like “Um, I think the president has tape recorders in his office?”
and everybody’s like “Oh shit
I bet there’s CRIMES on those tapes.
Nixon, have you been bugging your office?”
and Nixon is like “…yea”

OK HOLD ON
This whole fucking fiasco is happening
because Nixon wanted to put BUGS IN POLITICIAN’S OFFICES
because he was sure that they would say some HORRIBLE SHIT
and you’re telling me
that this whole time
Nitwit von Boogerheim was bugging his OWN FUCKING OFFICE?
Dude

Nixon’s brilliant plan is to just be like “No you can’t hear the tapes
I’m the president. it me.”
But they still make him release transcripts
which don’t reveal any crimes
but do reveal that he’s generally a shitty dude
who thinks the American people are a bunch of chumps
so that doesn’t do him any favors
and then the Supreme Court is like “Yeah dude
you kind of have to show those tapes”
and Nixon’s like “WOOARRRRGH
FINE
HERE’S YOUR STUPID TAPES.
HAVE FUN IMPEACHING ME, JERKS.”

and they do
they impeach him so hard they do it THREE TIMES
and Nixon is finally like “Okay okay
you got me
I still don’t think I did anything wrong
BIG WINK
but I love America so much that I don’t want it to see me like this
so I’m resigning gracefully
after a long and bitter war of lies and corruption
peace out, chumps.”
Then Gerald Ford becomes president
and immediately pardons Nixon for every crime ever
because I guess you tend to feel pretty sympathetic
for the dude who just made you president.

The moral of this story
is one we can all stand to learn:
if you’re wretched enough to hatch criminal conspiracies while president
you should at least be smart enough not to preserve RECORDED EVIDENCE of it

The end.

Hyppolitus, A Play About Sex Problems

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Holy cow it’s been a long time since I did a greek myth
so
speaking of holy cows
here’s a story about the daughter of pasiphae
(Pasiphae fucked a holy cow)
this daughter’s name is Phaedra
and the play about her is appropriately titled:

HIPPOLYTUS BY EURIPIDES
(adapted for internet by Fake Ovid Naso)

All of the horrible shit that’s about to happen is happening in Athens, Greece, which is the city that Theseus is the king of. Theseus is on his third wife at this point, because he abandoned the first one (Ariadne) on an island and the second one (Hyppolita) killed herself at his wedding to his third wife (Phaedra). This play is not named after any of those people. It’s named after Theseus’s son from his second marriage: Hyppolitus. Aphrodite is here right now and she does not like Hyppolitus at all.

APHRODITE: Oh my god fuck Hyppolitus. Seriously, somebody please fuck Hyppolitus. That little sanctimonius piss merchant has made a pledge to Artemis that he won’t fuck no ladies no-how, and no matter how much poon I shovel his way, he sticks to his limp-ass guns. Well fine. If he’s not gonna get fucked the fun way, I’m gonna fuck him in the un-fun way. BOOM! Phaedra’s in love with him now. Have fun dealing with unstoppable stepmom lust, cricket-dick.

Aphrodite exits directly into the towering orgy that is her life. Then there’s a scene where Hyppolitus shows up at Athens and fails to pay respects to Aphrodite but we already know he’s a swaggerless eunuch so let’s skip to the good shit: here comes Phaedra and her horny nurse

NURSE: Ok seriously you need to eat something.

PHAEDRA: Nah I’m good.

NURSE: You have not eaten anything in like six days. I get that thin is in or whatever but you are going to fucking die and there is only a small subset of people in the kingdom who are into that shit.

PHAEDRA: Dying seems pretty cool.

NURSE: Clearly something is up right now and you need to tell me what it is

PHAEDRA: Promise you won’t freak out?

NURSE: I promise

PHAEDRA: I wanna sex up Hyppolitus

NURSE: OH WHAT THE FUCK

PHAEDRA: You just said you wouldn’t freak out!

NURSE: Yeah well you just said you wanna slap laps with your step-son so I guess it’s a pretty crazy night all around huh?

PHAEDRA: So you understand then. The only logical solution here is for me to kill myself. Every other solution involves having sex with my step-son.

NURSE: Okay calm down. Let’s think about this like rational people.

PHAEDRA: But we’re characters in a greek tragedy

NURSE: Oh yeah, shit. Tell you what: I can make a potion that will make you stop loving Hyppolitus, but first I need to get him to give you a token of his affection, so I’ll go explain the whole situation to him and it will all work out perfectly with no complications.

PHAEDRA: What a shitty plan

NURSE: Remember when you were gonna starve yourself to death because you like a boy?

PHAEDRA: Fine, do your thing.

Nurse goes into the castle to find Hyppolitus.

NURSE: Yo Hyppolitus I have something to tell you but first you have to pinkie swear not to tell anyone else

HYPPOLITUS: Sure, what’s up?

NURSE: I need you to fuck your step-mom.

HYPPOLITUS: Super not going to!

NURSE: Come on she’s technically not even related to you

HYPPOLITUS: One: it’s still creepy. Two: if it wasn’t creepy I still wouldn’t do it because I am a VIRGIN who HATES SEX.

NURSE: We’re talking about the chick your dad left your mom for. She’s obviously super hot.

HYPPOLITUS: That is HIGHLY UNCONVINCING.

NURSE: Her mom fucked a bull. She’s probably kinky!

HYPPOLITUS: God dammit if you hadn’t made me promise not to tell anyone about this I would SO BE TELLING EVERYONE ABOUT THIS

NURSE: Well duh that’s why I made you promise.

HYPPOLITUS: UGH. GIRLS ARE SO GROSS. I’m going out hunting. When my dad gets back home you are going to be in SO MUCH TROUBLE.

Hyppolitus runs away. The Nurse goes outside to tell Phaedra she fucked up.

PHAEDRA: How’d it go?

NURSE: Not … great?

PHAEDRA: Shit. Guess I better go kill myself.

NURSE: Guess so.

Bummer. Theseus gets home a few minutes later and finds his wife’s corpse

THESEUS: Aw man not again. I just got this one! Hey, there’s a note attached to her: “Dear Theseus, Hyppolitus raped me and I was so ashamed about it that I killed myself. Love, your dead wife.” Aw, fuck! Hyppolitus, get in here!

HYPPOLITUS: Hey dad what’s upOH MY GOD PHAEDRA’S DEAD

THESEUS: Don’t act so surprised you sex criminal

HYPPOLITUS: But I didn’t … she came on to me!

THESEUS: Wow. Seriously? That’s what you’re going with?

HYPPOLITUS: Man I wish I could tell you more, but I sort of … promised not to?

THESEUS: Weak. You’re exiled. I hope you die. In fact, I’m gonna do better than hope. I’m gonna cash in one of my favors with Poseidon to actually make you die.

This all happens. Hyppolitus gets banished, and then Poseidon causes an earthquake and Hyppolitus’s horses freak out and drag him to death. It’s pretty brutal. Then, Artemis shows up!

ARTEMIS: Hey, sorry I’m late. You didn’t kill Hyppolitus yet, did you? Because he’s innocent. Totally innocent the whole time.

THESEUS: Oh. … Well shit.

ARTEMIS: I guess the moral of the story is …

ALL: Women are liars!

NURSE: Hey, is anybody worried that stories like these enable a culture of victim-blaming and rape denial?

ARTEMIS: THE END!

Green Eggs and Ham is About the Nature of Consent

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So this guy is hanging out in his house
and then all of a sudden this tiny dude busts in
and he’s like YO MY NAME IS SAM
DID YOU HEAR ME
I SAID
MY NAME IS SAM
SAM, THAT’S ME
LEMME SPELL IT OUT FOR YOU:
S as in SAM
A as in SAM WITHOUT THE S
M as in MY NAME IS SAM
and the other dude is like “WHAT THE FUCK DO YOU WANT?”
and Sam is like “Eat this green food I brought with me.”
and the guy is like “What?
no
ham is not supposed to be green
eggs are not supposed to be green
those things are clearly riddled with disease
I do not like to put diseases in my mouth
thank you Sam you may now leave.”

But Sam is not going to give up
because Sam is a relentless garbage-chef
instead he settles in for the long haul
in a house that is not his
and starts asking questions
he’s like “What if I put them in a house?”
and the dude is like “No we are already in a house”
and Sam is like “Okay what if I threw in a live rodent”
and the dude is like “Wow you somehow made moldy breakfast less appetizing
A+ job please go away”
but Sam is like “How about if I put them … inside a box?”
and the dude is like “You can put them wherever you want
as long as I don’t have to eat them”
and Sam is like “Okay okay
what if I paired them with a vicious forest dog
like a wolf or maybe a fox?”
and the dude is like “Please leave my home.”

So Sam sees that he’s not getting anywhere
and he leaves
BUT NOT FOR LONG.
Next day, this poor dude is crossing the street
when Sam shows up in a misshapen convertible
and tries to RUN HIM OVER
and then he’s like “WOULD YOU EAT GREEN EGGS AND HAM IN A CAR?”
and the dude is like “YOU ARE ACTIVELY TRYING TO MURDER ME”
and Sam is like “WHAT ABOUT IN A TREE?”
and the dude is like “DON’T HIT A TREE YOU’LL KILL US BOTH
PLEASE STOP HARASSING ME
I DO NOT WANT YOUR SHITTY FOOD
I DON’T CARE HOW MANY SHITTY PRIZES YOU OFFER ME”

Then Sam goes eerily silent
he stops his car
and is deep in thought
the dude thinks maybe the nightmare is over
but he is not so lucky
an idiot grin slowly spreads across Sam’s face
he opens his hairy lips and screams:
“A TRAIN!
A TRAIN A TRAIN A TRAIN!!!!!”
and the dude is like “Are you even listening to me
who are you
why is it so important to you that I eat your trash food”
but Sam can’t hear him
Sam is lost in his own horrifying world.
The guy goes home that night and discovers that his power has been cut
Sam is waiting for him in the darkness
like, “How about now?
It’s dark
you can’t even tell what color the ham is.”
the guy screams and runs
but Sam follows him on tiny, gnarled feet
offering a goat, or a ride on his yacht
if he will only nibble on these festering morning treats.
He chases the poor man all through town
until finally the man can take no more
he turns to Sam and yells “FINE
YOU WIN
I’LL EAT YOUR DAMN COMPOST
ANY AMOUNT OF MEDICAL BILLS IS BETTER THAN THIS”
he kneels before Sam
who triumphantly skewers a rubbery green egg on a fork
and places it on the man’s outstretched tongue.
It tastes like burnt plastic dipped in bad milk
and yet he smiles
he realizes that he loves his tormentor
Sam only wants the best for him, after all
he will happily eat whatever this tiny shitty man offers him
he will dine with vermin, livestock and wild dogs
he will eat hot garbage on boats and in cars, in houses and in boxes
he will live in the dark
slurping up whatever congealed slime Sam sees fit to offer him.
it will truly be
a paradise.

The moral of the story
is that the way to a man’s heart
is through relentless psychological torture
i mean his stomach

the end