CSM EDITORIAL

The scorpion, a creature of venom and survival, asks the frog, a simple beast of water and mud, to carry him across the river. The frog hesitates, knowing the scorpion’s nature. But the scorpion pleads, his voice sharp and desperate. “If I sting you, we both will die,” he says. The frog, swayed by logic, agrees. Midway across, the scorpion strikes. As they sink, the frog gasps, “Why?” The scorpion replies, “It is my nature.”

This is a story of inevitability, of the futility of fighting what we are. The scorpion cannot change, just as the river cannot stop flowing. The frog, trusting and logical, is undone by his own reason. It is a fable of fatalism, of the harsh truths of existence.

Millionaire and Conservative Party donor Rupert Lowe, after years of lingering on the Tory fringes, is convinced by Nigel Farage to join and stand for Reform. But perhaps Lowe should have done his due diligence on Farage, a man often compared to a pound-shop Putin. Had he asked around the old boys (very few women) left in the embers of UKIP, he would have quickly discovered that Farage was a man for the pulpit, never the leader’s desk. Farage played a constant game of whack-a-mole with any pretenders to his throne, ensuring everything revolved around him—and that everyone else paid the price.

The Persian turtle version of the fable is older and darker. In this telling, the scorpion asks the turtle for passage. The turtle, armoured and wise, refuses. “You will sting me,” he says. The scorpion argues, his words quick and cunning. “If I sting you, I will drown.” The turtle relents, carrying the scorpion on his back. But the scorpion strikes, and as the venom seeps into the turtle’s flesh, the turtle dives deep, dragging the scorpion to the riverbed. “Why?” the scorpion cries, drowning. The turtle replies, “It is my nature.”

The turtle’s version is one of retribution, of justice meted out by the slow and steady. Where the frog is naive, the turtle is calculating. The scorpion’s nature is unchanged, but the turtle’s nature is survival, patience, and the cold resolve of the deep. The fable shifts, becoming a lesson not just of inevitability but of consequence. The scorpion’s sting is met with the turtle’s dive, and both remain true to themselves.

So, the question remains: is the much-loved Rupert Lowe a frog or a turtle? Either way, Marmite-like Farage is sunk, and Reform is mortally wounded, if not already dead.

Our suspicion is that courageous Rupert Lowe, a Radley man who, whether fighting cancer or any other battle that he has faced in his lifetime, is a turtle.