The Paper Gardens

Look, I get it.

I get that Ponies is a dark allegory about peer pressure, the loss of innocence, and the lengths people go to in order to belong. It's a touch heavy-handed, but I still enjoyed every horribly dark second of the story. The ending was so incredibly cruel. It was wonderful.

...but I got distracted very early on in the story.

This is the way it’s always been, as long as there have been Ponies.

I started unconsciously picking holes in the story's logic.

If, as the narrative says, "this is the way it's always been", then why is the catch in the cutting out such a surprise to the main character and her Pony? There had to have been signs about what would happen. Did they just completely ignore the fact that any Pony post-cutting out was silent? Did they just never see the scars?

How did they never notice something that huge?

For the first time, Barbara sees that there is a scar shaped like a smile...

Yeah. Barbara's not very observant.

I'll admit that it's me reading too much into the story. I mean, those are valid plot holes. But the point of this story isn't the story itself - it's the message of the story.