What you have witnessed since Christopher Hitchens's opposition to the 1991 invasion of Iraq] is something unique in natural history: the first ever metamorphosis of a butterfly back into a slug.
About this quote
- What does it mean?
- The speaker uses a metaphor to describe a political figure's dramatic shift from opposing war to supporting it as unnatural and regressive.
- In plain terms
- A person changed their mind about war in a way that feels backwards and wrong.
- What can you take from it?
- Watch for sudden shifts in principles that contradict earlier stances.
Where it applies
Putting it to work
Questions to consider
- Why do politicians change positions?
- Is consistency always valuable?
Another view
The biological metaphor is hyperbolic and may obscure the actual reasons for the change.
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