Birds of various feathers must flock together: Some fables about the U.S. & Europe

Let’s consider this brief fable about a famous fairy tale figure without allies:

The problem wasn’t only Wolf. The problem was that Little Red Riding Hood was all alone with no allies in the forest to come to her aid! Without allies, Wolf felt free to eat Granny and Little Red Riding Hood, turning them into a hearty and tasty meal.

Now, let’s consider this second fable about certain world countries without a key ally:

Now that Round Orange Grifter with teeny-weeny hands has abandoned all our friends, the Angry Red Bear will continue to stomp on and kill the Lovely Yellow and Blue Flowers in the garden not its own. And the Hungry Giant Red Panda will fly above and sail across the narrow waters to gobble up the Beautiful Islands that wish, instead, to remain free.

Now, let’s consider this longer parable about birds of differing feathers flocking together:

One day, not so long ago, the predatory birds of the forest planned a secret action to fly directly into the path of Eagle in order to ruffle its feathers and seriously damage its ability to soar high into the clouds. Many good birds witnessed this event, and they immediately came to Eagle’s rescue. They joined with the now weakened Eagle to clip the wings of its ruthless attackers.

Because of its friends’ compassionate and tireless help, the battered Eagle slowly healed and regained its former strength. It was again able to ascend the tallest treetops and the peaks of the mightiest mountains.

But as the years went by, Eagle grew timeworn and stout. And Eagle accumulated a vast abundance of food to eat and enough nests to comfortably accommodate all the birds throughout this and other distant forests. This lavishness of resources turned Eagle into a very arrogant bird, indeed, even though it gained much of its riches by taking from others without ever giving anything back.

But because Eagle was the most powerful bird in the forest — with sharp flesh-tearing talons and a strong hook-shaped beak that could stun and kill its prey in an instant — all the other birds of the forest flattered and bowed to Eagle by giving it whatever it asked of them.

They turned over much of their food to Eagle. They sacrificed their newly constructed nests to Eagle. They attempted to fly out of Eagle’s line of sight any time they could.

Eagle forgot how the good birds of the forest fought so diligently to protect Eagle after it was attacked. They helped Eagle without asking for anything in return, even when some of their bird friends died in battle for Eagle.

And one day after calling a gathering to the center of the forest, this altered Eagle, who perched on a high tree branch looking down on all its former bird friends gathered beneath, tweeted, “I don’t need any of you!” The sound of its tweet rattled the forest like a great earthquake, uprooting tightly planted pines and oaks and causing landslides from once sturdy mountains. “You are irrelevant and stupid,” squawked Eagle, who just upended the old order of the once-protected green and vast lush valley.

During his incessant tweeting, Eagle listed some demands: “I will be taking the trees and all the nests you have built to comfort and protect your families for many generations at the northern sector of the forest,” Eagle sternly warned. “I need this entire sector as a guarantee for my security if those predatory birds who once surprise-attacked me ever return to do me harm again.”

As the other birds began to shake and attempted to silence Eagle’s squawks, Eagle, with a pumped-up breast and outstretched talons, asserted that these demands would be carried out “one way or another, even if I have to raid your nests, destroy your recently laid eggs, and evict you from my property.”

Before flying off, Eagle informed the birds that they must gather their families and belongings and be on their way as soon as possible.

Left stunned and shaken, the birds merely looked around at one another. Hardly a sound could be heard among them.

“What are we going to do?” eventually cried one. “I don’t want to leave my beautiful home!” squealed another. “Where are we to go?” still another cried. “We have lived here for so long that I can’t even imagine living anywhere else!”

Then, from those assembled, a small yet gradually growing voice began to resound. With a shakey voice at first, then raising ever so in confidence, a small red bird with white stripes, who was known as Dannebrog, looked out at the others.

“We have always stood behind Eagle,” began this small creature. “We fought beside Eagle after the attack. We were very generous to Eagle, who always was welcome beside us. And we made it completely clear that Eagle could use our sector to set up all the defenses that Eagle thought was necessary to ward off those who attacked in the past.”

“That’s right!” responded the crowd in unison. One bird known as Erfalasorput — a bird of red and white with a matching-colored circle in the middle of its back squawked with much force: “Eagle forgot about our support and service at our own expense in the past. And now Eagle is trying to bully us into submission. And I for one am not going to give up my home to a bully!”

With that, loud cheers erupted from the assembled flock. “We will not submit!” began the chant. “We will not submit!” the birds repeated, exploding and ever-gaining intensity and power. “We will not submit!” became their new battle cry, bringing together these friends of a feather into a common and unifying alliance for mutual protection against the once-perceived invincible force of Eagle.

Indeed, these different birds, who were at times past rivals, had come together before to promote common aims, such as creating a system to more efficiently and equitably distribute resources and to share in the common defense. This alliance had included the full support and addition of resources from Eagle.

By Eagle’s recent unreasonable declaration to seize part of the birds’ terrain, Eagle had violated and, therefore, had personally withdrawn from its past binding commitments.

Eagle soon returned, expecting the birds to adhere to its demands, but this did not happen.

Standing up for all its friends, a bright and articulate red and white bird sitting upon a maple leaf began to chirp, “We are telling you Eagle, in one voice,” began the bird named Canuck, “we will not surrender to your bullying. Though individually we are weaker than you in physical strength and power, together, we will not submit to your unreasonable and, quite frankly, demented demands.”

“We will not submit!” came the loud and sustained chant from the crowd of birds. “We will not submit! We will not submit…!”

Europun, a dark blue bird with yellow spots, then took over the collectives’ response to Eagle, saying, “You have changed and attempted to dismantle the order of the forest. And we say then, ‘So be it.’ You can go off if you wish, and you can sit in your perch high up and away from your former friends.”

“We will not submit!” the crowd again erupted.

“Our choice, though,” continued the blue bird with yellow spots, “is to remain unified, and, in fact, to further strengthen our commitments to one another in your absence. We no longer look to you for our collective protection.”

Then with a light bulb seemingly switching on in Europun’s sparkling eyes, it said, “I now realize that in a certain way, we are grateful to you for helping us prove to ourselves that we can protect ourselves. We are grateful to you for helping us realize that ‘we’ve got this’ because we do, in fact, got this.”

Surprised and then grasping Europun’s poignant meaning of the last statement, a growing and continuous joyful shout echoed throughout the birds’ collective. And a new cheer erupted, “We’ve got this! We’ve got this! We’ve got this!!”

Overpowered by the sheer weight and impact of the birds’ resistance, Eagle hurriedly escaped into flight, traveling some distance away to contemplate its next moves after this unexpected turn of events. Eagle pondered all possible options in facing the reality that Eagle had never encountered this type of opposition previously.

Eagle saw only two possible ways to go: either live alone in isolation and lonely solitude or concede to the birds’ demands of actually going back to the way things were and had been during many decades of mutual commitment and benefit to all involved.

And Eagle thought, “Hey, if I tell the birds that we should go back to our original agreement, then I will be seen as the real peacemaker, the one who sacrifices my demands for the benefit of all.”

And Eagle’s face then turned from an expression of sullenness to one of pure joy when imagining, “Maybe they will even give me a special prize for taking such a reasoned and unselfish stand. They will place me above all past leaders of flocks that have ever existed, and my name will fly proudly ever after.”

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