The Square World

When I was very young my father would read me a story about a leader who wanted everyone to be square and so he would force everyone to line up, enter a machine, and when they exited they were all square.  He loved squares so he turned everything square.  I remember vowing to never let anyone force me to be something I was not, to fight any effort to make everyone the same.  This was the early 1950s, so I assume that thoughts of communism had something to do with this story’s publication.  A few years back my son was able to find a version of the story I was talking about – it is called The Square World.  It was created in 1944 by Dick Huemer and Joe Grand and was a proposed short film or cartoon that “would have satired the conformist society of Nazi Germany.”  Sadly, it is as relevant today as it was in the 50s.

The story begins by telling the reader “IN THE beginning, the people in the land of What’s-Its-Name looked just like the people everywhere else.  Some had short shapes and some had tall shapes. Some had round shapes and a few were rather square. Everyone seemed quite content with these many different shapes, everyone except one man. This man was a rascal. This man, alas, was the Mighty-Highty-Tighty, the ruler of the land.”   We learn that he was only content with his own shape:  “I do not like so many shapes,” he growled. “My shape is the right shape. All other shapes are wrong. I do command that henceforth everyone be shaped like me. And that means square! Ha ha!”  And then "He chuckled with horrid glee.”  We then learn how Mr. Highty-Tighty first turned all the people into squares and then everything else as well.  “At length, the great task was done. Life itself now seemed completely square. Each family breakfasted on square poached eggs, square sausages, and square pancakes. When each square father went off to work, he gave his wife a sad, square kiss, and strode off blowing square smoke rings from the end of his square cigar. When the square children went off to their square school, they rode on a square school bus that bumped along on four square wheels. And when people met their friends along the street, they didn’t bow or shake their hands; they  sighed, and hailed them with the sign of a square.”  The story ends, however, with the failure of Highty-Tighty’s plans for the future when he learns that he cannot make new born babies square.

I’m not sure exactly what the moral of the story is intended to be, but I can tell you what lesson I learned as a child, and what remains true for me today:  We must stand up and fight against any person or government that demands that we all look, think, act alike.  We must rebel against any such mandated conformity. 

As I grew older and learned about our constitution and our form of government, I realized how important the first amendment is and how it is a true ally in any fight against such conformity.  For one of the first things that anyone seeking a rule like Mr. Highty-Tighty must do is to remove the protections for free speech.  That is, part of any mandated conformity will of necessity require limiting what people can say and making sure that all speech conforms to the approved structures and views. 

Thus, you will understand why I become uncomfortable with political correctness which is easily the first step towards a land of conformity with no room for opposing views, or even, today, anything that any one finds the least bit unpleasant.  You will understand why I become uncomfortable when people are told that it is not enough to be tolerant of the views or lifestyles of others, that you must accept those views as your own.  That is, I am uncomfortable when anyone believes they are a Highty-Tighty who has the right to tell everyone else what to eat, what to say, what to think, what to believe and I am uncomfortable with the Highty-Tightys who believe that it is government's job to do so.

My hero in the story was a rebel (who apparently did not really exist, at least not in the version of the story recently found, but whom I and my father must have concocted).  That rebel refused to be turned into a square and led some sort of revolt against Mr. Highty-Tighty, ultimately shutting down his square making machine.

It is that rebel within me that can’t help but speak out against the intolerance that is growing almost daily in this country.  People are not free to say anything that others might find offensive; if they do they are labeled as haters or bigots or racists or some equally offensive term.  I see this intolerance and this disregard for the rights of free speech of all coming most frequently from the leaders and others on the Left.    They have a vision of the world which is really not that far removed from that of Mr. Highty-Tighty.  They believe that everyone should think as they do and if they do not then it is OK to silence them; that is, put everyone in the machine so that we all come out just the same.  We can eat the approved foods, we can hold the same values, we can say only what offends no one, we can all be just alike.

What I don’t understand is why the Left does not see what it is doing.  In trying to create its brave new world it is destroying the key freedom necessary for any such world.  With its underlying attack on free speech it is creating a conformist world where the one in command determines the manner in which all must conform.  That is indeed a brave new world of the type envisioned by Aldous Huxley in his novel of the same name and the "World State" described therein; a world I think most of us would choose not to inhabit.

So, you see, I am not going to conform.  I will rebel.  I will stand for free speech for all, even for the most disgusting ideas with which I do not agree.  I will tolerate other views, but I will not be forced to accept those with which I do not agree and I will stand for that right for everyone.  I accept that means that the Left will likely call be a bigot or racist or worse.  But I will demand free speech for all and I will speak out against the Highty-Tightys and their Leftist square-making machine.