The dystopian runaway bunny

The Runaway Bunny, a 1942 picture book by Margaret Wise Brown and Clement Hurd, follows a small rabbit who wants to run away and become trans-species (a fish, rock, crocus, bird, sailboat, circus acrobat, or little boy). The mother rabbit keeps telling him, “If you run away, I will run after you.” In a conclusion that is utopian for all parents, he finally decides to stay where he is and remain his mom’s little bunny.

Next year will be the book’s 75th anniversary, and by then we may need a dystopian sequel that goes like this: A private, 147-student school runs away from the Obama/Clinton administration, which pursues it until the principal gives in and says, “You win. I’ll remain your little bunny.”

The bunny in question here: St. John’s Lutheran School in the wonderfully named Baraboo, Wis. The Federalist reports that the school wants parents to provide a birth certificate with the child’s sex on it, and to agree that the school has the right to “discipline and dismiss students” for “choosing an outwardly sinful lifestyle.”

The position of the school, which accepts federal dollars to provide subsidized school lunches, transportation help, and other government-provided goodies, is: “If we cannot legally refuse students who are struggling with homosexuality or gender identification, we must maintain our right to hold to the truths of God’s Word.” But Washington responds that those who accept a government coin must give in to Caesar—or, as the title of a new book states: You Will Be Made to Care.