Original fairy tales mete out the very best punishments for character flaws.
In The Three Little Pigs the first two pigs import cheap Chinese building materials with which they build their houses. They get eaten by the Great Canadian Wolf, ravenously unhappy with ongoing NAFTA negotiations. The Wolf, thinking the third pig has foolishly imported bricks from Mexico, is eventually trapped in an American-made cast iron pot and is himself devoured. Lesson: Don’t be a glutton. When it comes to bacon, leave the third pig for someone else.
In the original Rapunzel, a nameless Prince climbs the tower using the hair of the woman he loves. As he ponders why he didn’t use the stairs, Dame Gothel leaps forth from behind a curtain:
“Your Rapunzel was rescued not an hour ago by Prince Chad! But I would be thrilled to be your rescue–ee, sweetie!” Wink. Wink. Cackle-Flem-Hack. Big Toothless Grin.
Nameless Prince leaps from the window, landing in a tangle of blackberry bushes. Thinking it will ease the misery of seeing the hideous crone without her makeup, he blinds himself with the thorns. As he staggers off into the wilderness, he now ponders why he didn’t drink a bottle of cheap scotch instead. Lesson: Sometimes the second mouse gets moldy cheese.
The most valuable life-lesson comes from Cinderella – Aschenputtel, in the original German – by the Brothers Grimm. The eldest step-sister (let’s call her “Allison”) has a college education and reads the most fashionable magazines. She knows what she likes, and she likes fancy dresses, fancy shoes, fancy mansions, and flawless maid service. She knows how to coerce others to provide those things for her and she deserves them. Isn’t she the one atop the highest pedestal?
Allison manipulates her mother, her poor migrant step-sister, and the prince who’s selling expensive glass slippers. The prince negs her by mocking her gigantic cloven hooves. She shows him! Grabbing an axe, Allison chops off her toes.
“Hah! The fresh blood will provide the lubricant I need to slip these past my misshapen Cuneiform bones!”
It doesn’t. Lesson: If you want to end up completely crazy, go to college.
In the spirit of these old tales, we’ve come up with an old-school punishment for our miscreant cartoon characters: the Weed Killer Stick. We’re not sure what the poor radish in today’s comic did to deserve his suffering, but rest assured it tastes terrible. It is also perfectly safe. Neither the FDA, the EPA, nor CIA would ever approve of a product for use by the public that wasn’t fully tested, vetted, imported, and marketed, would they?
He is also building up his immunity to the poison.
Astute readers may have spotted a contradiction in our Weed Killer Stick. You are clearly not Churchians.
–> Quizzer
Tempest in a Teardrop: The Churchians 
Well that’s… interesting. Fractured fairy tales, indeed.
The weed killer stick appears to be more of a bludgeon than a poison delivery device. A big enough knobbly stick will generally do the trick on anything. If course, nothing prevents it from being loaded with iocaine powder. I wonder if vegetables can taste the “tasteless” poison?
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Fractured Fairy Tales… hmmm. The idea machinery inside my skull is whirring to life…
No, vegetables wouldn’t be able to detect iocaine powder because vegetables are tasteless.
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Oh, no, he was the Dread Pirate Radish all along? 🙂
Seriously …
Bayer will sell off that division, from a far grimmer (non-) fairy tale like Mobay Chemical (once part of IG Farben) also had. The company was originally the Americian subsidiary of Bayern. You can guess when the Bavarian “n” removal and the divestment of anything related to “[x]-icides” happened.
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Oh, that made me laugh! “Dread Pirate Radish” **snorfle***
And think. I did not know that about Bayern. Interesting. Reminds me of a story my mom told me about a old woman who up-braided my grandfather when none of the services could be conducted in German anymore. World War II came along and what the government didn’t forbid, people with German ancestry were quick to eschew.
“If German was good enough for God in the Bible, it should be good enough for you, Herr Pastor!”
She was perfectly sincere! Every so often I can appreciate the Catholic disapproval for having the laity have Bibles in the vulgar tongue.
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