CRUELLA UNDERSTANDS YOU, KRISTI, DEAR
Kristi, darling, I understand completely. You kill a single measly illbehaved puppy, and everyone rushes to judgment! God forbid a woman do anything!
It’s a cruel world — a cruel world, darling! Wretched! Putrid! But Cruella understands. Cruella is writing a check to Kristi Noem right now. What office are you running for? Governor? Vice president? It doesn’t matter! I have your back, a back I trust is covered in a fur as splendid as it is taboo. I am rock-solid for you. Name the figure! Any woman brave enough to fly in the face of societal convention and kill some puppies is a woman after my own heart. We are the real feminists, darling! Don’t forget it!
Society tries to tell us women to be small, darling! It tries to shrink us! It says, “Don’t shoot puppies! Shooting puppies is for serial killers! Men’s work, men’s work, darling! You’re an outlier, a lion in a sea of sheep, and so we call you mad instead of what we ought to call you: brilliant!”
I am paraphrasing society a little. Too few women in politics are bold enough to look society in the face and say, “No. I will kill puppies, and I will tell the world that I kill puppies.” You are a visionary! But these small minds call us sociopaths! They say that behind our eyes and our teeth, or whatever is going on in the place where our teeth ought to be, there is the wrong amount of soul! But we know best, darling!
They say, “If you cavalierly kill a King Charles spaniel, you are the lowest of the low!” Small, pedestrian minds, walking in the crosswalk while the flashing walk sign is illuminated; we are the drivers who mow them down in our sputtering automobiles with squeals of glee! We see that highest, hardest fur ceiling and we are bold enough to punch through it, in pursuit of a glorious coat of lustrous spots.
You threaten one Dalmatian, or 101, and suddenly everyone tries to paint you as a villain and to write catchy songs with mean-spirited lyrics about how you resemble a spider waiting for the kill. I’m humming it myself, against my will!
Hold your head high, Kristi darling! Men don’t understand fashion, no matter how often you quote the cerulean sweater monologue from “The Devil Wears Prada” to them. They don’t understand that, unlike babies, or goodfor-nothing puppies, some things have value: dressing to the nines in deeply illegal fur. And if the only possible way to source such a fur is killing puppies, why, then you kill some puppies, or have Jasper and Horace do it. It’s a doge-at-dog world, and I am the first dog in this scenario, darling.
You must show me the coat, my dear! I must see it! I must see what wonderful use you put that despicable hound to!
No coat? But — I don’t understand. No coat? Then why would you kill the puppy? I beg your pardon? You shot a dog just — because? What kind of monster are you?
I take it back, darling. You’re on your own!