Two Civic Engagement Jokes

Joke One: Two cows are standing in the pasture. The first one turns to the second and says: “I’ve been thinking a lot lately about the threats to democracy. Unless we educate young people to see themselves as full-fledged partners in helping to make our communities better and unless we give them plenty of opportunities to practice the democratic arts of discussion, deliberation, shared decision making, and conjoint social action, our democratic experiment will falter and ultimately perish.”

The second one turns to the first and says: “Moo.”

Joke Two: A former teacher who has done everything possible to give back to her community is waiting to die. As a teacher, she was fully committed to democratic pedagogies. She regarded her students as her teachers and found countless ways for them to take the lead on important in-class and out-of-class projects. Her goal was to prepare them for a rich and active public life. But she didn’t just teach these things, she also lived them. She volunteered at the local food pantry, she advocated for better, more innovative anti-poverty programs, she campaigned for progressive candidates, and she relentlessly lobbied public officials to make good on their promises to create a more just and equitable society. Although she never thought about it much during her lifetime, as she prepared to die, she imagined the celebratory greeting she would receive in heaven for her selfless service. She was sure she had earned a place of honor there.

When she actually died, however, she found herself on a rather ordinary street corner handing our leaflets publicizing a community meeting to protest cuts in Food Stamps. She turned to one of her fellow-leafletters and asked where they were. “In heaven,” he replied. “Really,” she answered, ‘it’s not at all what I expected.”

“What did you expect?”

“Uh, I’m not sure. Singing angels, perfect harmony, perpetual peace.”

‘That’s how it used to be but then everybody got so bored they couldn’t stand it any longer, so they changed it. Welcome to the New Heaven.”

“But then how is it different from life on earth?”

“It’s not except for the gift of eternal life and the fact that for us the phrase ‘long haul’ has a whole new meaning.”