Police Ban Disrespectful Soup

It happened last month, in France, during the festive season. Cops closed down a soup kitchen because it served the wrong kind of soup. Disrespectful soup. Xenophobic soup. What was the problem, exactly? Was it perhaps full of questionable ingredients like frog's legs and calf's brains and saliva-soaked Gauloise butts? Can't be — those things are delicacies in France. Did Tyler Durden piss in it, then? Surely not — the French would applaud him for such revolutionary performance art and insist on giving him a generous subsidy.

No, the problem was that the insolent potage du jour had (commence wringing hands) pork fat in it. So, even though the soup was offered to all comers, Jews and Muslims couldn't partake; their Holy Books tell them that eating even a teaspoonful of pig-derived nourishment is a smite-worthy abomination unto the Lord.

Such a fact is, of course, mirth-inducing on the face of it — as are so many irrational, random, but never-questioned decrees of organized religion. But rather than having a discreet laugh at the expense of the pork-abhorring faithful, the police (let's not call them pigs, shall we?) dutifully swung into action, putting an end to the distribution of the evil concoction and ordering the soup-kitchen volunteers to show up in court on charges of unlawful discrimination.

And there endeth the story — sort of. Because yesterday, the sour-pussed, clenched-jawed judges ruled that even in France, it's not against the law to give out free bowls of soup.

The administrative court said the distribution was "clearly discriminatory" but could not be stopped because the organisers offered to feed anyone who asked for help.

So far, so silly. Still, the soup kitchen isn't out of the political crosshairs just yet.

The mayor of Paris condemned the ruling and urged the police to appeal the ruling. "Faced by this initiative which stinks of xenophobia, I want once again to express city hall's desire to fight all forms of discrimination, racism and anti-Semitism," mayor Bertrand Delanoe said in a statement. 

Until there's an appeal, the ladle-wielding evildoers will no doubt continue to discriminate against Jews, Muslims, vegetarians, and Babe fans alike. Who knows — they might even be serving the meal from this tureen. The swine!

[hat tip: Greg in Oz; illustration by Michael Sowa]

Comments

[colson]

I don't want to hold any ill-will against the French but they make it waaaay too easy.... sadly, England is following in the Frechie social tradition as is America (however slowly it goes)

[ben]

I, as a vegetarian, find it discriminatory to distribute a soup which contains anything else but vegetables and pure water (filtered to remove any trace of microorganism).