We’ve all read “Green Eggs and Ham” by Dr. Seuss, where Sam follows our main character around trying to get him to eat the oddly colored food, haven’t we? As parents, we adore that book, because we use it to teach our kids that if they try new foods, no matter how “gross” they look, they will probably find out that they like them. Much like a parent, Sam offers a wide variety of incentives and enticements. However, in typical Seuss fashion, he goes to silly extremes, to teach with humor and rhyme.
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| Image by U.Leone (Creative Commons CC0) |
Many years ago, I stumbled across a young author named Cory O’Brien, who has a knack for retelling myths and stories with a flair all his own (a style which he describes as “it's 3AM and I'm drunk on chat”). In August of 2015, he posted his version of the story, which he titled “Green Eggs and Ham is about the Nature of Consent.” My initial reaction was, of course, laughter. His retelling of all the ridiculous things that Sam tries to get this guy to eat the food was a more “real world “version, which is both scary and funny for being so extreme. When he reached his conclusion, though, I was a bit dumb struck: this children’s story is technically a tale of “relentless psychological torture.”
