Recently it came to our attention that the U.S. Department of Agriculture has been dabbling in literature. In a clear sign that its 100,000 employees have far too little to do, the sprawling federal agency has issued a nauseating children’s book called “The Two Bite Club,” in which a mother cat and her adorable kittens Will and Anna learn to make federally-approved healthy food choices. According to the USDA website: “Parents or caregivers read the book to children and encourage them to try foods from each food group by eating just two bites, just like the characters in the story.”
The PDF is available here: try not to gag on your broccoli.
Naturally we viewed this as a sinister intrusion of federal power into the sphere of family life and a gross infringement on our freedom to eat Pop Tarts for breakfast and snack on salt and vinegar-flavored potato chips while catching up on Game of Thrones. American patriots bled and died to ensure these sacred freedoms. So we resisted in the only way available to us: we asked our community of writers to sharpen their pens and write their own brief satirical stories. Take that, USDA!
The hilarious results are being published over the course of a week, starting with a trio of takeoffs on the story of Goldilocks and the Three Bears. Enjoy! And be sure to check back tomorrow for the next batch of stories.
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1. The Helpful iPlate of Doom by Marina Fontaine
“Hello. I’m an iPlate, here to help you make healthy food choices. Please deposit acceptable food and wait for green light to start eating.”
2. The Bachelor Bears by Dennis Maley
Three bachelor bears lived communally in a cabin deep in a national park. One bear was undersized, another was a middle-sized bear, and the last had been overserved. The large bear was almost too big for the front door of the cabin.
3. Goldilocks and the Three Bears Coffee Co. by Jack Morgan
Once upon a time, in the Kingdom of Progressistan, there lived a girl named Goldilocks, who was considered beautiful by the outdated standards of the white-supremacist, heteronormative patriarchy. Goldilocks lived in government subsidized housing on the edge of an enchanted forest and she would venture out into it to commune with the Earth Goddess daily.
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image via shutterstock / Katrina Elena
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