How Do You Like Them Apples?

So I'm from Minnesota, land of the Honeycrisp (U of M, released 1991) — although I am more of a SweeTango (U of M, released 2009) kind of girl. And goodness knows, the apple has been a societal metaphoric image since Eve. But I'm particularly mulling, lately, the use of the phrase "a few bad apples."

You see, the actual phrase is "A few bad apples spoil the bunch."

(Variations include "spoil the barrel" or or even biblical "a little leaven leavens the whole lump." But you get the intent).

We've had a bowl of red delicious apples in a bowl on the counter, so I've actually noticed this in action. One apple gets rotten and mushy, so I pull it out and compost it. The next day, I realize I should also have thrown out the one it was touching. But then the next day I realize that apples on the other side of the bowl have gone bad. Pretty soon, I realize that the whole bowl is disgusting, the entire contents need to go, and I'm washing the bowl with a lot of soap and hot water.

It's a whole bowl full of rotten apples, emitting ethylene, it's not just pulling the pepperoni from the pizza and still eating the slice (though I can tell you as a vegetarian that's not always the best option either).

So when people say "a few bad apples" I actually agree. I agree that there are some really bad apples in there. And I also, sadly agree that those bad apples have infected others, who may not even know that they are affected until suddenly that soft spoiled part shows up. And I agree that the problem is systemic throughout, and the entire precinct, I mean bowl, needs to be cleaned out. (As to ways to do that, what that means societally, how to work collaboratively across mindsets to do so, etc. that's for another post).