On the banks of a perennial river, lived a man, thoughtful in character, mindful to the needs of people around him. He had two sons, identical twins. Since the day they were born, he dressed them up in similar costumes and rejoiced the vain attempts of people trying to tell them apart. He also made sure to leave subtle cues that a keen eye could never miss. These cues were often based on the characteristic differences in the personalities of his sons. Anybody who saw with more than their eye, never had trouble differentiating them.
One fine day, roughly three years since their birth, the man handed his sons a box of building blocks each. One box had red colored blocks and the other yellow. The father instructed in passing, not to mix the blocks while playing. The obedient sons made sure to follow this at any cost. They often played for long hours, but never mixed the blocks.
However, things changed after the sons started gaining friendships. As friends joined their play, one box of building blocks became insufficient. Each friend had only one block and were unable to build anything of their own. One of their friends, frustrated by this, asked the twins to open the other box. The elder twin immediately denied it, quoting his father’s instructions like divine gospel.
Days passed and the friend group grew. And so did their frustration. Quarrels arose among friends, who had their own grand ideas of what to build, but not the sufficient resources to do so. Friends fell to the ground trying to snatch building blocks from one another. Faces ballooned from the punches and slaps. One notorious friend with an uncontrollable temper, started biting everybody. The younger twin, tried to intervene and restore peace. He too fell to the ground with one cheek larger than the other.
Rumors started spreading among the friend group regarding the two boxes. Somebody suggested that the twins used only the yellow colored blocks when they played with friends, for it was cheaper and of low quality. The red colored blocks were costly and of good quality. Hence reserved, only for private play. Very soon, the entire group believed that red colored blocks were superior to yellow. This added a new dimension to their quarrels.
Very soon, the fights escalated to such an extent, that the father had to intervene and mitigate the conflict, taking his share of punches in the process. That night, the younger twin walked up to his father, with bruises all over his face and asked him why he had instructed them not to mix the blocks together. The father simply smiled and said that if the blocks were used separately, it would be easier to put them back after playing.
The younger twin felt ashamed listening to this. Had he clarified this earlier, several conflicts could have been avoided. Many of his friends would have still been part of the group. What was suggested for the sake of convenience became a convention, causing conflicts of a catastrophic kind.
