Someone called our attention today to the fact that Norway has knighted somewhere between one and three penguins (I’m having trouble nailing down the specifics, but the second of the three was the one that was knighted, with it unclear whether that knighting extended to his predecessor or successor). The most surprising piece of the story, of course, is that the penguins live in Scotland, but I think that makes it better. You want your penguin knights doing recon. That’s always been conventional military wisdom.
Sadly, this is often celebrated. To which we say: One to three? That’s enough for you, society?
If you have the power to knight, you knight penguins. That’s a hard and fast rule. Sure, credit to Norway for being the country that’s done it, but even so…1 to 3? There are a little more than five million Norwegians in Norway. There are nearly eight times that many penguins in the world. Penguins are at least a dozen times cooler than humans. If Norway has even just fifty living knights, they should have nearly five thousand knighted penguins.
And as for the rest of you: Britain, you’re letting someone knight your penguins? Come on, guys. This is an arms race, or at the very least a flippers race. Forget about nukes. Start getting the penguins on your side.
I’m not saying we should equip penguins for mortal battle. But I am saying we should equip penguins for a really cute not-mortal battle in which they walk around smacking each other, spinning around, and falling comedically before getting stretchered off by other penguins wearing little medic hats. You want to end war? No. You want to change it to penguin war. They’re there for the knighting, Europe.
😄