Saturday 25 April 2009

92 Humans/Strife/Jihad

Jihad is one of those nebulous terms like ‘fancy dress party’; it is difficult to gauge how much effort to put in. Should the Jihad be by the heart, tongue, pen, hand or sword? Should I go dressed smartly, charismatic, cleverly, normally or with the full on feathered chicken suit? The chicken suit is the lesser jihad as after the initial shock value it becomes tiresome watching a clumsy yellow puff of nonsense knock drinks over and sweat a lot.
One of the most disastrous and bloody jihads was the Girl Guide Gihad of 1956. 14-year-old genius Girl Guide Greta Gnathostomata decided to introduce a new category into the merit badge system. At the age of 8 while still in the Brownies, Greta achieved the highest award in Guiding, the Baden-Powell Challenge Award (BPCA). She then spent the next 6 years training an elite corps of high achievers. Greta and her garrison wanted more, they wanted the ultimate challenge, and with a subtle bit of interpretation of point 8 in zone 5 of the BPCA they created the Girl Guide Gihad badge. They desired to convert the World to Guiding.
All the girls had advanced badges in Camp Craft, Agility, Needle Craft and Fund Raising and most had Active Response, First Aid and Ballistics, and so were ideally equipped to wage war. The element of surprise was on their side. No one would suspect a Girl Guide. And no one suspected the first attack to be so vicious and cunning. Imagine holding a party where every guest turns up as a giant feathered chicken. Carnage.
They very nearly achieved their goal. Fortunately Marilyn Monroe decided to marry the playwright Arthur Miller on June 29th of that year, and that glamorous spectacle turned the thoughts of the Gihad from world domination to boys. If it wasn’t for Mr and Mrs Miller we would all be wearing woggles, attending Jamborees and know the words to "Ging-gang-goolie".

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