Ever since the events of November 2016, progressive yard signs have sprouted up in liberal, typically upscale, enclaves from coast-to-coast. Even the most casual observer can’t help but notice them. As David Brooks noted recently in an op-ed in The New York Times, conservatives find the signage downright condescending, if not threatening. It therefore seems that, in the interest of national harmony, a clarification is long overdue. I offer such clarification below.
Hate Has No Home Here.
Actually, not so much. It’s more like: Hate Has No Home Here, Except Sometimes. Such as when my husband, Joe, hums under his breath at the breakfast table. Or, worse, when he flosses his teeth directly into the mirror, such that all the little bits of food that were stuck between his teeth adhere to the mirror until someone, such as me, cleans it up. But the worst of all is when he invites his cousin Beth and her husband, Duke, over for dinner, because, as he puts it “I don’t have a million relatives like you do, I have a small family and it’s important to me to keep in touch.” Beth is merely boring, but Duke is world-class. He loves to talk about golf, a sport that neither Joe nor I play. He also likes to hold forth on subjects he knows diddly-squat about, such as Israeli politics, the difference between Kurds and Druze, women’s health writ large, and the economy. What does he know about the economy? I’ll tell you what he knows: he knows nothing. The man is an insurance broker. He knows about insurance. I can’t stand him, and not just because he talks over me, never asks me a thing about myself or the kids, and occasionally forgets to flush the toilet. God almighty, I’d rather be stuck on an elevator. Black people, LBGTQ, Muslims, and others who have historically experienced oppression, however, are welcome to come by anytime.
Love Trumps Hate
Except it doesn’t. For example, take the Thirty Years’ War. It resulted in the deaths of eight million people. Guess what it was about? It was about how to best worship Jesus Christ, who, unlike the God of the Old Testament, is a God of Love. On the other hand, good old-fashioned get-off-your ass anger might get you somewhere.
Resist
This is a good one. Resist! Who could resist such a call! I, for one, can’t—except I can! Why should I resist? I like my two, okay three, glasses of Chardonnay with dinner. Likewise, what’s wrong with really good dark chocolate? As for binge-watching “Orange is the New Black,” a girl’s got to get up to speed on the reality of life behind bars somehow, doesn’t she? Reading is so Victorian-age. Today’s coda is: if it feels good, it is good. In other words, what this yard sign is urging is freedom to be who you are, where you are, and wherever in life you are! Yes, ladies, it’s time to resist getting up with your alarm, making healthy homemade dinner for your family, and signing up for that Butts and Guts class that all them skinny bitches at the school-bus stop are always blathering on about.
One World, One People
This is a good one! Only try telling that to Jews! You know them—those non-stop talkers who have been blathering on about God for the past four thousand years or so but somehow can never ever agree among themselves about anything ever, including the question of who actually is a Jew. For example, because both my mother and my father were Jews, I myself am generally considered to be a Jew, except by certain hard-right ultra-Orthodox sects, who consider me a barbarian for all kinds of reasons, including that I wear jeans and sometimes mess up and mix milk with meat. Only that’s just scratching the surface! In my own suburban synagogue, we can’t agree about anything, and regularly split along pro-and-anti should-we-keep-the-new-rabbi lines, as well as over just about everything you could possibly think of, including whether the new chair for the library should be green, like the last one, or blue. But when it comes to the ultimate question regarding ontological issues and end-time: in this world, the cockroaches will certainly be here long after humans have died off, and in this future-time, the cockroaches will refer to humans as a single unit, kind of like how we talk about “insects.” Thus “One World, One People,” refers to the future, when cockroaches will talk about how in the “one world” that they dominate, there once roamed, in the impossibly distant past, a single entity, “people.” Like there’s only one kind. So what this sign is ultimately trying to say is that it’s a good idea to keep a bottle or two of Raid around.
Nevertheless, She Persisted
Wow! Talk about a mind-fuck! Because, first of all, who is the “she” the sign is referring to? Some people believe that this mysterious, unnamed female refers to Eve, the first, if mythological, human female. But if this were the case, is it Eve’s persistent insistence that she and her consort eat of the Tree of Knowledge and therefore bring about the downfall of all human kind that’s being celebrated? Seems unlikely. Others point to the unnamed “she” in the sign as referring to Hillary Clinton, and her almost inhuman ability to persist within her marriage to a man who can’t keep his fly zipped. But studies conducted at both the University of Maryland, College Park, and the University of Iowa, point to another, more grounded conclusion. The “she” in this ubiquitous lawn sign refers to the woman who owns the sign company that first came up with this slogan, Mary Packer, of Norwalk, Connecticut who simply would not give up when her downer of a husband told her that her dumb-ass idea of selling yard signs to well-off tree-huggers was going to do nothing but lose them a bundle. Hats off to Mary for a job well done!
No Matter Where You’re From, We Are Glad You’re Our Neighbor
Because the fact of the matter is that no matter what your particular ethnicity, race, religion, national origin, mother-tongue, or sexual orientation may be, you wouldn’t be our neighbor in the first place if you didn’t have shit-loads of money, because, let’s face it, even most middle-class people can’t afford to live here, and as for poor people, yeah, right. So yes, come and live among us, dine at our ethnic restaurants, enjoy our parks and libraries, and swim in our public pools. Just don’t watch Fox News, because if you do, no one will talk to you about anything, ever, including the weather.
All Are Welcome Here
This one is a straight-up lie. Ignore it.