Mouseland

Mouseland – A political fable first told by Clarence Gillis and later made famous by Tommy Douglas in Canada in 1944 has been paraphrased.

The Moral of the Story 
 
As leader of the CCF amd later the NDP, Douglas used this story many times to show in a humorous way how Canadians fail to recognize that neither of the two major parties were truly interested in what mattered to ordinary citizens; yet Canadians continued to vote for them.

The story cleverly deals with the false assumption by some people that CCF'ers (NDP'ers) are Communists. The ending shows Tommy Douglas has faith that someday socialism, which recognizes human rights and dignity, will win over capitalism and the mere pursuit of wealth and power.

The parallels with the 2014 election in South Africa are self-evident.

Mouseland (paraphrase)

This is a story about a place called Mouseland…

Mouseland was a place where all the little mice lived and played, were born and died. And they lived much the same as you and I do.



They even had a Parliament. And every five years they had an election. They used to walk to the polls and cast their ballots. Some of them even got a ride to the polls. (And got a ride for the next five years afterwards too!) They were just like you and me. And every time on election day all the little mice used to go to the ballot box and they used to elect a government. A government made up of big, fat, white cats.



Now if you think it strange that mice should elect a government made up of cats, you just look at the history of South Africa and maybe you'll see that they aren't the only ones who get confused about who to elect.



Now I'm not saying anything against the cats. They were nice fellows. They conducted their government with dignity. They passed good laws - that is, laws that were good for cats. But the laws that were good for cats weren't very good for mice. One of the laws said that mouseholes had to be big enough so a cat could get his paw in. Another law said that mice could only travel at certain speeds - so that a cat could get his breakfast without too much effort.



All the laws were good laws. For cats. But, oh, they were hard on the mice. And life was getting harder and harder. And when the mice couldn't put up with it any more, they decided something had to be done about it. So they went en masse to the polls. They voted the white cats out. They voted in the black cats.



Now the black fat cats had put up a terrific campaign. They said: "All that Mouseland needs is more vision." They said: "The trouble with Mouseland is those round mouseholes we all use. If you vote us in we'll establish square mouseholes." And they did. And the square mouseholes were twice as big as the round mouseholes, and now the cat could get both his paws in. And life was tougher than ever.



And when they couldn't take that anymore, they tried a government half black cats and half white cats. And they called that a ruling alliance.


You see, my friends, the trouble wasn't with the colour of the cat. The trouble was that they were cats. And because they were cats, they naturally looked after cats instead of mice.



Presently there came along one little mouse who had an idea. My friends, watch out for that plump little fellow with an idea. And he said to the other mice, "Look fellows, why do we keep on electing a government made up of cats? Why don't we elect a government made up of mice?" "Oh," they said, "he's a Communist.  He hasn’t paid his taxes - lock him up!" So they put him in jail.



But I want to remind you: that you can lock up a mouse and you can lock up a man - but you can't lock up an idea.