5 Children's Books To Confuse Your Child Into Patriotism
Educational picture books exist because kids have weak, malleable brains that can easily be distracted with colorful parables about sharing or friendship or some other bullshit. Many of these books come under fire for being too soft or too liberal, so what is a conservative parent to do when they want to teach their child their patriotic duty of righteous fear?
Well, there are options, if they know where to look. All of these are real, and none are intended as satire, as far as we can tell ...
The Prepper Pete Series Prepares Kids For The Apocalypse
It's never too early for a child to learn that society could collapse at any moment. And what better way to remind them of the mortality of everyone they know and love than with a poorly illustrated picture book?
The Prepper Pete series follows the titular anthropomorphic ant as he readies himself for all manner of apocalypse. It begins reasonably, with Pete stockpiling food and water to last the winter. Then the book lists disaster after disaster that could befall the world at any given moment. This part will be a breeze for parents who have already given their children "The Talk" about global pandemics, EMP warfare, and world-ending solar flares.
We're treated to adorable images of various critter calamities, such as frogs and bunnies flooded out of their homes, a mole smashing windows in a tiny riot, and a nerdy caterpillar who gets the shit beat out of him in a grocery store.
Pete's world is one of disproportionately sized anthropomorphic creatures. Ants are the size of bears. Shopping carts tower above the people and supermarkets alike. It's no wonder Pete lives in constant fear of the apocalypse. His environment looks like a drunken gorilla's rendition of a Hieronymus Bosch painting.
While he awaits the end, Pete spends his time dual-wielding firearms and fantasizing about shooting dudes who take his mail.
And yes, in case you missed it, this is a whole series. In Prepper Pete's Twelve Days Of Prepper Christmas, Pete's family gets into the holiday spirit by reminding one another that when the world ends, they're still going to need somewhere to shit.
Throughout the books, we get little tips to enhance our post-apocalyptic survival chances. Prepper Pete keeps his prepping a secret, so that his dying neighbors won't come after his stash. He buys gold and silver and learns how to fish with a bow and arrow. He understands that you have to stockpile resources -- otherwise, you might find yourself robbing tweakers for their garbage.
In each book, the author insists that none of this is borne out of irrational paranoia. "Some people prepare because they are afraid," Pete says. "Our family does not have to be afraid, because we are prepared." See? Why would kids fear the inevitable collapse of society when they can rest easy knowing they've stockpiled enough ammunition to gun down the hordes of starving looters that are absolutely coming?
An Island Called Liberty Teaches Kids About The Dangers Of Regulation
Every parent dreads the day when their toddler comes to them and asks, "Mommy, what effect does government taxation and over-regulation have on the free market economy?" Well, now there is a book that halfheartedly provides the answer.
An Island Called Liberty tells the story of an isolated free market paradise that is reduced to ruin by government regulation. It's written in verse, which in this case means the poetry fights to form basic rhymes at all costs, often at the expense of structure, meter, and comprehensibility. The illustrations look like the author threw a handful of blank pages at a three-year-old and said, "Draw your own goddamn pictures, you little shit. What did you expect, some kind of handout?"
Once again, it starts innocently enough:
The text assures us that everyone worked hard and thrived, and those who couldn't did fine because friends, neighbors, and family always pitched in, and no one fell through the cracks. Thus, Liberty is a thriving utopia, governed by two laws that basically amount to "be excellent to each other." But then this prosperous city is upended by the one thing it cannot handle: taxes.
The citizens collectively decide to pay for nonsense like education, roads, and medical care. But things quickly snowball out of control, and next thing they know, they're paying for environmental research and regulating toys so that babies don't choke on them. Absolute madness.
Throughout, the author dazzles the reader with descriptions of bureaucracy and government agencies and review boards -- all concepts that preschoolers are sure to grasp.
Finally, three-quarters of the way through the story, we are introduced to something resembling a main character. Bridget Blodgett, "whose forte was making widgets and wodgets," finds her factory suffering from all the policy changes. The high taxes are a secondary concern, however, to the fact that all of her employees have been lured away to work for the government. Even with every other establishment shuttered by taxation, Bridget can't find any out-of-work laborers to employ. That's exactly how America became the socialist cesspool it is now. The tax bureaus forced everyone to work for them.
Soon, Bridget has the only running business on the island. Of course, this means that all of the taxes now fall on her. At the end of the book, Bridget fucks off and the economy collapses. The islanders decide to renounce their taxes and bureaus instead of resorting to cannibalism or something. Businesses flourish once again, schools and roads presumably deteriorate from lack of funding, and everything is fine and dandy. The last lines of the book, however, end on an ominous note:
The lesson they learned from way back when, eventually faded ... and it happened again.
So the moral, kids, couldn't be simpler: If you give people total freedom, they will use it perfectly and everyone will prosper. But eventually, they will use that freedom to organize public services, which is proof that people can't be trusted with total freedom.
The Tuttle Twins And The Mystery Of Libertarian Politics
The Tuttle Twins are like the Hardy Boys, if Joe and Frank had spent 14 months in the womb. These kids divide their time between hanging out in their dad's van and believing whatever strangers tell them. Each book is an interpretation of a different elaborate economic theory. They explore capitalism, corporate regulation, and other free-market principles. The high point of the series is The Tuttle Twins And The Search For Atlas, and yes, it is dedicated to Ayn Rand.
The book follows the twins as they go to perform as guest clowns in a traveling circus, which is in no way weird or creepy. In Rand's Atlas Shrugged, John Galt is a wealthy industrialist who goes on strike when the world fails to appreciate the services he provides. In the Tuttle Twins version, the book's stand-in for Galt is this professional beefcake, "Atlas":
Note that he's also the kind of person who wears himself on his shirt. He is the circus strongman and star attraction, but he feels undervalued because he gets paid the same rate as the rest of the circus performers. So he quits and disappears, which prompts characters to compare the situation to the collapse of the Soviet Union. Oh, you'd better believe there are bar graphs.
The twins find Atlas immediately after they start looking, since the adults did all work for them. Seriously, the kids wander around town for a while, then their dad comes up and says he talked to a guy who told them where to go. Considering that this is a book about individual merit, it's weird how little agency the main characters have.
Anyway, they meet Atlas in a gym, where the strongman is busy bench-pressing his feelings. When the kids ask why he left the circus, he teaches them the important lesson that some people are more valuable than others. Atlas deadlifts the twins like the dense lumps they are, and tells them all about how price gouging is a necessary part of a healthy economy. Note: THIS IS NOT SATIRE.
Atlas sees himself as a more valuable producer than the circus's entitled clowns, and therefore he should earn greater rewards and perks. And, you know, some employees are going to get paid more than others, but using himself as an example of a prime producer is some bullshit. The clowns work the crowd, juggle, perform acrobatics, and light themselves on fire. That stuff takes skill and effort too. Atlas's superior contribution is that he can lift, bro. He spends all day at the gym, then acts like he is God's gift to circuses. There hasn't been a bodybuilder this self-absorbed since Schwarzenegger said weights make him cum.
Everyone goes back to the circus, where Atlas saves everyone's lives and guilts the ringmaster into paying him more. The book concludes with a lovingly illustrated picture of Ayn Rand and an appeal to go buy the accompanying activity workbook. Capitalism at its finest!
A Book To Help Children Become Soldiers In The War On Christmas
After all these wacky but ostensibly well-meaning books, it's almost nice to read one that is unabashedly hostile.
Help! Mom! The 9th Circuit Nabbed The Nativity (Or, How The Liberals Stole Christmas) is the third book in a series about how dastardly liberals are out to ruin the lives of children. These books came out in the height of the George W. Bush presidency, and decried the way that liberals had apparently taken over the country.
As a group of schoolchildren rehearse for their school's upcoming Nativity play, they are interrupted when a bunch of liberal caricatures (backed by a group of Ninth Circuit judges who look like they're straight out of Pink Floyd's The Wall) put a stop to any sort of religious shenanigans.
To give the author credit, this book goes straight for the jugular. When liberals write children's books, they have vague messages like "It's good to care about the environment" and "Gay marriage is acceptable." But the Help! Mom! books attack with precision. They target specific people, albeit with some punny name changes. Al Gore becomes Al Snore. Hillary Clinton becomes Congresswoman Clunkton. Really clever stuff. It combines unbridled outrage with a Mad Magazine sensibility. Feel free to take the rest of the day to study this illustration, because there's a lot going on:
The evil, sweating liberals come and throw out the nativity scene and Christmas tree. Al Gore steals the kids' Joseph and Mary costumes and dresses them like random animals, because he has a hilarious fixation on saving the environment. Then the kids have to battle the likes of the ACLU and, uh, librarians to save their chance to sing about Christmas.
In the end, a stand-in for Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas saves the day by waving the original copy of the Constitution at the liberals until they scatter. Never mind that Thomas would have had to pull some National Treasure shit to get the actual Constitution. He can break the law like that, because he's upholding freedom, you see. Unlike the evil Ninth Circuit judges, who just want to erode our rights.
Clinton's character is arrested, of course, as the fantasy of seeing Hillary put in prison goes back to the dawn of time. According to the author, this kind of book is "something that people are hungering for." She has a point. There are hardly any books out there that teach children to properly crush and humiliate their enemies.
Know Your Enemy With This Anti-ISIS Coloring Book
So by now your child has prepared a survival bunker in which to establish a true financial meritocracy that freely celebrates all their non-secular traditions. Well you know what's still going to try to kill them?
Fucking ISIS.
ISIS: A Culture Of Evil is an unflinchingly graphic coloring book produced by the innocuous-sounding Really Big Coloring Books, Inc. Publisher Wayne Bell claims that the book is not intended for children, but on their website, the product description reads: "This book is designed to educate and teach youth and adults about Radical Islam." See? Fun for all ages!
After all, the best way to fight your enemy is to know them. And the best way to know your enemy is to color in detailed drawings of them decapitating civilians and throwing acid in a woman's face.
Actually, take a moment to imagine an adult lovingly coloring in that page. That's just as weird!
This book has been warmly received in conservative media. It bills itself as "Truthful -- factual -- indifferent to political correctness," and you sort of have to give it credit for that. There are some moments where they tout the exploits of a popular anti-ISIS fighter who may not exist, but other than that, they're dead on about the various atrocities committed by ISIS. Until the book becomes a Roland Emmerich production.
It's important to remember that some weirdo had to draw all these pages. Some guy sketched out a cartoon of a mass shooter mowing down a bunch of innocent people, and then showed it to his boss to get some notes. Or maybe someone just stood over the artist's shoulder the whole time, saying things like, "Ah yes, draw more bullet holes in that screaming woman. I don't think they get the point yet."
In all their marketing material, the publishers are very proud of how the book is resistant to political correctness. They even have a page that shows a potential terrorist using PC culture to his murderous advantage. At a certain point, it becomes obvious that this book was made just to show off how bold and edgy the publisher is ... which is when you realize that none of these books are for children. They're for grownups who want to boast to other grownups how they're spitefully undoing all of that liberal brainwashing.
And if these don't do as well sales-wise as all of those lefty books about sharing and open-mindedness, well, the marketplace has spoken.
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For more, check out 5 Famous Kid's Characters You Didn't Know Were Propaganda and 5 Classic Children's Books With Horrible Hidden Messages.
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