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'A place for adoptees to share their positive adoption stories about how their birthparents choosing adoption over abortion impacted their life.'
Good Lord, was it really? Oh dear. But oh well.
How bizarre though. Imagine this in consumerism - 'this is a place for (say) MacBook owners to share positive stories about how their purchase has impacted their life.'
‘if life gives you lemons, make lemonade.’ Huh? But… but… Lemons are amongst the best and most wonderful gifts of nature. They are adaptable, versatile and delicious. A slice for your gin and tonic – juice to zing life into salads, stews, fish and seafood. Oil and sweetness from the rind and zest that is pure and perfumed and precious. They are a staple of what doctors agree is the best dietary regimen we can follow. So if life gives you lemons, shout ‘Thank you, Life, thank you!’
Our response, however, is ‘make lemonade’ in other words – just add sugar and sell it.
Add sugar and sell it. This can be translated across into culture, can it not? When life gives you folk literature, gothic fairy tales and myth, what does Disney do? Add sugar and sell it.
When the body of world art and tradition gives you complexity, ambiguity and difficulty – add sugar.
When news and events present obstacles, problems and conflict – add sugar.
Sugar is an unalloyed good in and of itself and as a metaphor, a symbol. It might seem that we have the taste buds and desires of children. We know this from popular foodstuffs: melted cheese, fried chicken, milk-shakes, cookies, candy, fizzy sugared drinks, pappy hamburgers smothered in sugared sauce – even so-called high-end coffee is flavoured with sweet vanilla, cinnamon or hazelnut. Adults are helped to stay childish though sport, games, gadgets, monster-trucks and escapist movies, cowboys, superheroes, comic book villains and thrilling science fiction. Homer Simpson or Peter Griffin from Family Guy, are lovable forgivable funny and charming inasmuch as they are children.
It’s all about how many cup-holders our cars have, nothing to do with suspension or engine, it’s all about feeding our stomachs and minds with things that are sweet and easily assimilated: non-complex carbohydrates and non-complex concepts.
Non complex concepts like Adoption? Oh, add sugar and sell it...
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