The Rampant Lion: Europe’s Crack Rapid-Reaction Force Loses Manhood
SEND Her Victorious - Europe’s crack rapid-reaction force gets a new lion:
The proud motto of northern Europe’s crack rapid-reaction force is ad omnia paratus. Prepared for everything, everywhere. But the heraldic lion above the Latin tag now sends a less plucky message – he has just been digitally emasculated and, though technically still a lion rampant, he does not seem to be ready for anything, anywhere.
The change was implemented after a group of women Swedish soldiers protested that they could not identify with such an ostentatiously male lion on their army crest. A complaint of sex discrimination was then lodged with the European Court of Justice.
“We were forced to cut the lion’s willy off with the aid of a computer,” Christian Braunstein, from the Tradition Commission of the Swedish Army, said.
Now the Nordic Battlegroup, a force of 2,400 soldiers, is looking deeply embarrassed. For sceptics who already consider the Nordic Battlegroup to be something of an oxymoron – it is led by the Swedes, who were last in battle in 1809 – the operation on the lion is not an auspicious omen.
“A castrated lion – the perfect symbol for European defence policy,” an American military blogger sneered.
And they allowed the tongue to remain?!
December 15th, 2007 at 9:12 pm
Couldn’t David Beckham lend them some of his?
December 17th, 2007 at 6:31 pm
He would have us believe there is plenty to go around.
Although… once my wife came into the room while he was being interviewed on Fox Soccer Channel ( I Know I know….”Soccer”)
Anyway she burst into laughter at the sound of his voice, “I thought he was supposed to be such a stud,” she chuckled, “What’s with the voice? You dont sound like that.
Well of course not, I’m from NW 10 where men are men, or something like that.
She’s American you know