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[Moonwalk]

12. In one of the originals, the objecting person is Islamic and won't sit next to a Bible-reading...

...woman he calls an "infidel."

What would you think of the story had it been told that way here? With an irate Muslim man as the shouting, crazed bigot, and a saintly Evangelical woman as the other passenger?

Nice as this tale is, it does leave itself open to to the very bigotry it's condemning. It can also be used as a Strawman argument. For example, what if the irate passenger were cast as a liberal, anti-war peacnik who refuses to sit next to a conservative veteran wearing a flag pin? Would we applaud this story given that it's being used as a Strawman argument to typecast and condemn those who aren't in favor of our fighting in Iraq or Afghanistan?

Parables are fun, yes, but we should watch out. The very ones we think teach a good lesson can easily be twisted to teach something else if we're not careful.