Art imitates life. It’s one of the reasons why teaching great works of literature is vital in a high school education.

One title that is read and taught in many high school English I classes in North Carolina is Animal Farm.

Animal Farm is an allegorical fable that Eric Blair (George Orwell was his pen name) uses to comment on the rise of the Soviet brand of communism and the absolute corruption that comes over those who grab power. In it animals take over a farm from their human owner, Mr. Jones, and immediately set up a “utopian” society in which all animals are equal. They even come up with a list of commandment for all to abide by.

They read as follows:

THE SEVEN COMMANDMENTS
1. Whatever goes upon two legs is an enemy.
2. Whatever goes upon four legs, or has wings, is a friend.
3. No animal shall wear clothes.
4. No animal shall sleep in a bed.
5. No animal shall drink alcohol.
6. No animal shall kill any other animal.
7. All animals are equal.

Idealistic to some, but human (“pig”) greed gets in the way. As a few pigs consolidate control of the farm, abuses of power occur. Think of it as redistricting of sorts. Maybe gerrymandering. Maybe even attempting to restructure the judicial system to gain a certain ideological bent on most benches.

What happens throughout the book is a rewriting of the commandments. Those who retain power get to write the rules. They also get to rewrite the rules. Think of the Voter ID Act or the HB2 bill that targeted the LGBTQ community among other things. Think of the special sessions and the way that the last summer’s state budget was passed within committee instead of open debate.

And then think of education.

In Animal Farm, the rules get rewritten so that those in power can get more power. Eventually toward the end of the book the seven commandments read as such:

1. Whatever goes upon two legs is an enemy.
   2. Whatever goes upon four legs, or has wings, is a friend.
   3. No animal shall wear clothes.
   4. No animal shall sleep in a bed – WITH SHEETS.
   5. No animal shall drink alcohol – TO EXCESS.
   6. No animal shall kill any other animal – WITHOUT CAUSE.
   7. All animals are equal – BUT SOME ARE MORE EQUAL THAN OTHERS.

These rules and “revisions” of four of those rules are made in secret and through an undemocratic process. Sound familiar? We had a state budget go through without any debate or amendments in NC not that long ago.

We are still operating by that same budget.

Concentrate on that last commandment – “All animals are equal, but some are more equal than others.”

That brings to mind the recent bill in the NC House about what should be taught in our public schools.

The same people who allow public tax money to go to unsupervised private schools that teach this…

… are the same people who do not want schools to allow students to discuss these historical realities and the effects on our country:

It’s saying that some are more equal than others and blatantly telling everybody that we should not learn from the past to be better in the future.

Welcome to North Carolina and many other GOP controlled states where ALEC / State Policy Network initiatives are rammed through legislatures that ultimately benefit the pocketbooks and fragile feelings of a dwindling few.

Oh, and don’t forget that some of those very students the NCGA wants to “protect” are still allowed to get married at 14 years of age.