"Red Lip: Demistifying the Ideals of the Founding Fathers"

Brautigan's vignette "Red Lip" debunks the American myth of the land of freedom and paints a grim picture of what it is like to not adhere to the same ideologies predominate in this country. The symbolism employed in this brief chapter suggests the grimness and finality of the country's stagnant state. For example, the sheriff's notice is "nailed like a funeral wreath to the front door" proclaiming no trespassing. This notice portrays the bleakness of the law, which dictates to citizens what they can and cannot do. "No trespassing" suggests the criminality of the authorities claiming certain land as a site in which people may not wander, which seems to the narrator an incredible folly. In addition, the fact that the notice states "4/17 of a Haiku" emphasizes the absurdity of the contents of the note.
"Red Lip" serves to deconstruct the notion of the American myth founded upon life, liberty, and freedom. The narrator, a wanderer, is completely alienated and marginalized in society. The narrator claims that "No one would stop and pick me up even though I was carrying fishing tackle. People usually stop and pick up a fisherman. I had to wait three hours for a ride." The unwillingness of American citizens to pick up a fisherman hitchhiking suggests the narrator's minority status in society. His choice of foregoing a car in lieu of a free-floating lifestyle is not widely accepted in a society boasting life, liberty, and freedom. This is further depicted in the passage describing an old couple in their car, that "almost swerved off the road and into the river...The car went around the corner with both of them looking back at me." The narrator, a non conformist drifter, is a minority in a society in which the majority are in pursuit of the American dream, purchasing cars, leading a workaday life, and such. The narrator, belonging to a minority, experiences prejudice from his fellow American citizens, who drive past him.
In addition, the outhouse functions as a symbol illuminating the grim self-interest and detestation of humanity in America. The narrator contends that the "inside of the outhouse was exposed like a human face," a simile indicative of the disgust he finds in people's true characters. Furthermore, in a hallucinatory sequence, the outhouse proclaims its builder, who was a "good guy [and] built [the outhouse] with loving care...[left the outhouse as] a monument." Here, Brautigan alludes to the capitalist drive, spurred by self-interest, as the primary motivation in our society. Striving for wealth and recognition, the outhouse builder finds a personal monument in his creation. However, the fact that his product is an outhouse denotes the wastefulness and utter disgust that results from capitalist-driven greed and egotism. Finally, the outhouse's rejection of the narrator and its command to crap in the bushes "like the deer" reaffirms the narrator's status as a misfit and worthlessness due to his refusal of not fitting in as a cog in the machine of society.