It's all over. St. Louis' charade as a city on the rise has been exposed as fraud by the revelation that Saint Louis Bread Company slices its bagels like bread loaves, in defiance of God's will and all that is decent.

Our ongoing national shame was exposed by a Tweet, of course — Alek Krautmann, whose Facebook page lists him as a Webster Groves native, posted a photo Monday morning with the caption, "Today I introduced my coworkers to the St Louis secret of ordering bagels bread sliced. It was a hit!"


It was not a hit. Rather, the collective minds of America came together and lost their bagel-loving shit.


Some took the sliced bagel as a direct referendum on St. Louis, condemning our fair city for the perceived atrocities committed by Panera, as Saint Louis Bread Co. is known in cities where bagels are sliced properly. Others, themselves St. Louisans, claimed never to have heard of the practice. (Gotta feign normalcy to the eyes of the outside world, right?)




Some St. Louisans weighed in, not to defend the practice, but rather to express their shock at the horror living in their midst.

Of course, there was denial. 


Even Panera itself stepped into the ring — not to defend itself, but to acknowledge the division that its slicing style had created. Even our own Bread Co., it seems, could not stare into the abyss of its creation without asking itself, "What horrors have we wrought?"


Hey, there is some good news here: For his trouble, Krautmann is getting free bagels from Panera, "sliced however you'd like." To which we say: Alek, for the love of all that is good, spare your coworkers and slice them like a human. Our national reputation depends on it.


Follow Danny Wicentowski on Twitter at @D_Towski. E-mail the author at Danny.Wicentowski@RiverfrontTimes.com

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