For the uninitiated, Hansel and Gretel is a German fairy tale about child abuse, parental negligence, diabetes, cannibalism, imprisonment, slavery, and cremation — typical Black Forest fare. The titular children are considered a burden by their father and stepmother during a famine, so the parents decide to leave the children alone in the woods to die. The kids stumble upon a house made of candy and gingerbread, talk to a stranger, are taken captive, kill the stranger, and go home. It’s pretty cut and dry, and while completely jacked up as far as subject matter is concerned, other stories from the Brothers Grimm are far worse.
Well, at least until the NRA got a hold of the story and turned it into the literary equivalent of, well, leaving your kids alone in the woods to die.
Hansel and Gretel (Have Guns) — seriously, I did not make that up — tells the story of Hansel and Gretel, two ideal children, who after hearing their parents talk solemnly about a shortage of food and the upcoming winter, resolve to help their family by going into the woods and shooting animals for them to eat.
“Fortunately, they had been taught how safely to use a gun and had been hunting with their parents most of their lives. They knew that, deep in the forest, there were areas that had never been hunted where they may be able to hunt for food. They knew how to keep themselves safe should they find themselves in trouble. The next morning, before dawn, they left a note for their parents, and gathered their hunting gear. They headed into the forest, grateful that they had the skills to help their family, and were old enough to go out on their own. To be certain that they would be able to find their way home from the darkest, deepest part of the forest, Hansel left a trail of pebbles for them to follow back.”
While Hansel and Gretel are out hunting wabbits, along with other sentient creatures who had no idea they were to be murdered for the preservation of a narcissistic apex predator (including “a magnificent 10-point buck”), the children stumble upon “a cottage made of gingerbread, with a candy roof and iced decorations all around,” and presumably a sign above it that says “free ice cream” or “get my goddamn van!”
Since hungry children believe every meal should be composed of treats that would make Wilford Brimley’s pancreas fearfully shit itself, the two Second-Amendmenting kids consider checking the place out, even though they both grew up (presumably) in the 1990s when every child was told it “wasn’t safe to talk to strangers,” ad nauseam.
Hansel and Gretel (Have Guns) is apparently anachronistic, because nothing in any history book I’ve ever come across indicated that “stranger-danger” was a thing in the 19th Century.
The two live up to their knightly nature insinuated earlier in the story, opting to not stop at the house because it was safer to just walk away. But, when they hear whispers emanating from the cottage, begging for help, the gun-sporting brother and sister jump into action, like every responsible gun owner would. Right?
Like they were saving Private Ryan, Hansel and Gretel get into the house and free two brothers, held captive by a witch who planned to eat them, because every NRA-sponsored fairy tale’s antagonist needs to be as sick and depraved as human beings are capable. The witch, snoring the next room, is not aware that her dinner is getting away, because apparently Hansel and Gretel are Navy S.E.A.L.’s who can sneak into a house made of confectionery without making a sound. As all four children are leaving, the snoring stops. When she notices the witch might have woken up, Gretel stops trying to get out and instead, “got her rifle ready,” because why escape when you can “stand your ground” and shoot an old woman in the face?
The four children get home just as dawn breaks. They tell the villagers about the witch and the 2nd grade class project in which she lives, which prompts the whole of the village to transform into a “well-regulated militia,” with Hansel and Gretel sharing the role of Ammon Bundy. The militia treks into the woods and finds the house. The town sheriff locks the old woman in the same cage that held one of the boys Hansel and Gretel saved. Then, the militia killed more animals. Then they had a feast, with the old woman’s Toll (House) Brothers dwelling as desert.
The end.
Leave it to the NRA to pull a Walt Disney and homogenize literature to fit a fantasy-world narrative. Also, the ending is very anticlimactic. Boring, even. Look, if you’re going to take a beloved children’s tale and twist it into pro-gun propaganda, don’t half-ass it. My critical, sarcastic summary of the NRA’s literary fail sounds more like pro-gun propaganda than the piece written by the institution that fights common sense gun legislation every step of the way.
I wonder what kind of moronic jewels are contained in the text of Little Red Riding Hood (Has A Gun).
