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The True Story Of Rudolph The Red

A Christmas parable. By the Rev. Eamonn McCann

Eamonn McCann, 02 Dec 2011

Rudolf the Red knows what’s up, the leading reindeer winked to reassure an agitated elf.

Don’t listen to a word he’s telling you, interrupted Santa Claus. When have the reindeers ever stood up for ordinary elves, them with their gold-plated pensions and cushy conditions?

Typical divide-and-conquer tactics, Ruldolf shot back. We might have expected this sort of stunt from you, you fat parasite bastard.

It had been like this ever since the IMF foreclosed on the North Pole - finger-pointing, fractiousness, division and threat.

So Ruldolf’s going to lead the Elf Liberation Front (ELF) now, is he?, scoffed the rotund Claus, holding his sides to make a show of his mirth. Ho, ho, ho.

I can remember when you were a bit of a radical yourself, came Rudolf’s rejoinder. Back then it was Ho, ho, Ho Chi Minh.

Well, that was then, shrugged the supposedly bountiful full-bellied bourgeois. This is now. Some of us have decided to live in the real world. Everybody has to make sacrifices. That includes reindeer, no matter how vital they think they are. They have been petted and pampered while elves - for whom I have always had the highest admiration - have had to eke out an existence. I’m on the side of the less well-off against the least deserving. We are where we are.

We know where you are, you lying bastard, snarled Rudolf, imposing measures that no citizen of the North Pole region ever voted for. What about all those promises about steady growth in toy-production, reaching ever-expanding markets and rewards shared out fairly if we all kept our heads down and caused no disruption? Now the whole manufacturing sector has been kyboshed. You’re not going to solve this by producing fewer ray-guns, or reducing hay rations all round or cutting the number of sleigh runs. That’ll just take demand out of the economy. Fair enough, you could balance the books in the short term by cutting back on the categories of children eligible for toys. Very few would object to the offspring of bankers, members of the government, Sunday Independent columnists and suchlike being dropped off the list. We might all get a momentary sense of satisfaction from that. But the problem is systemic. It won’t go away.



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