Bizarre TRiUMPhant Tales

5. Rocket's Blue Glare

This tale isn't so much about Trump as it's about a world turned upside down.

Ok, I exaggerate. I'm doing a writing a challenge story with the prompt word 'dye' which asks the question 'What happens when something changes colour?'... or as you Americans say ... color.

I'll get to that soon, but first an observation. Isn't it a bit weird that the traditionally Soviet/Russian hating Republican Party is represented by the colour ... sorry color, red? Remember the old saying 'Better dead than red?' Maybe that should have been 'Better dead than the red that isn't our red.' The traditional right wingers could have used pink instead (it almost got some traction - pinko!) but that got subverted into an early colour ... color! Sorry, have to remember that ... color slur against gays.

Gay by the way used to mean happy so I guess the Grand Old Partiers were pissed off (oops, you Americans merely say pissed to denote angry. Us Brits add the 'off' because pissed on its own means drunk over here) that homosexuals were enjoying themselves! Grrrr, they probably said - we don't like homos an durn it if queer ain't strong enough s'let's change the meaning of gay so we can insult the fruits (because at some stage it was decided that the tang of citrus or apples or berrys meant homosexual ... so what does that make all the Republican fruit eaters!!??).

The joke was on them as the gays re-appropriated both 'gay' and 'queer.' just like some black folk reclaimed the word ni ... but I'm not going there.

So to recap - The traditionally right wing conservatives (color red) hated those other reds, despised the notion of homosexuality and were not too fond of people of color. It was the Democrats (represented by blue) who identified as the liberals and progressives - they were mostly anti-war, wanting globalization and peace and brotherhood between nations. Many white Americans who also despised the Macarthy era red baiting and it's climate of fear mongering and propagation of the traditional elites were probably at least supporters of civil rights and later gender/sexuality equality, if not actively involved in agitating for change in the 1960's.

Over time, although society is always slow to grow up, racial, gender and sexuality equality became a mainstream thing, meaning a lot of people who were conservative still believed in equality in a way their parents and grandparents would have found difficult to swallow.

But those red Republicans under Reagan still hated their fellow (but different) reds - an Evil Empire, they called those damn pesky commies! But times change and even Reagan was able to compromise with Gorbachev and then the Berlin Wall fell and the Soviet Union fell apart and Russia wasn't communist anymore and we all breathed a sigh of relief, conservatives and liberals alike.

So what the hell happened? In the last few decades when many of those reds (Republicans) became more accepting and tolerant socially, why do we now have 'red' hating blues. When did the democrats adopt the doctrines of Macarthy and why are they now sounding just as war-like and gung ho and 'my country right or wrong,' as the traditional conservatives did back before Glastnost?

Things seem to have flipped in that sense and the blue reminds me of the red - this may be my outsiders point of view right here in the very last day of 2016 and of course there are some massive generalizations (there are always massive generalizations) but it really does seem that the American government and it's party of right now, are acting less liberal, less progressive, less fair minded and a lot like the other guys used to be traditionally seen to act and think!

But maybe in the end rather than blues being blues and reds being reds, flipped or not, you might want to start thinking in terms of no colors or mix those colors to get a nice violet. Seems to me violets never hated on other colors! Be violets ... but not shrinking ones.

Next up ... Donald's Shameful Secret