The Voluntary Extinction Movement have it all wrong. Why should everyone on the planet commit suicide to ensure the continuation of Earth? I’ve always thought wrist-sawing and gas-hose guzzling would be a rather uncomfortable way to save the planet. There are plenty of things that I still haven’t achieved in my life yet, like appear on The Simpsons or run naked through town covered in bubblewrap. However, what about old people? They do nothing, they moan, they frequent talkback every night when the rest of us are drugged up on P, and they expect scones and tea at Chilean cafés. I’m advocating a solution to deal with old people, a final one. When Dylan Thomas says rage, rage against the dying of the light. Just don’t.
There’s nothing worse than walking around and noticing the malodourous stench of old people. It’s kind of like when you leave chicken in the fridge for too long and it starts dripping everywhere. Not kinda like, exactly like. They also are a telling reminder of our own mortality, and people don’t like seeing that. It’s the reason why barely anyone’s heard of the Fassbinder movie Ali: Fear Eats the Soul. No-one wants to see old people do anything, least of all a young person. No matter how much plastic surgery you get, you’ll still look old and ugly. Old people are also like leaving mushrooms in the fridge for too long. They shrivel up and their taste becomes dry and stringy. And when they fall over, they can’t get up.
You take a look at the modern world and what do you see? Old people clogging up hospitals with “blocked arteries” and “Alzheimers”. Just leave them in the middle of the motorway, I say. If they do make it out alive, they won’t remember it. When they do finally die, people make a big hue and cry and lament how the good die young. When you look at the sky all you can see is big carbon clouds massing like Alexander the Great’s army (now, he had the common sense to die young). Who caused the pollution? Old people. Who started cutting down the rainforests? Old people. Who started the wars? Old people. Who fought in those wars for freedom of thought, then told people that they couldn’t be Communist and then, started a war in Vietnam because they were Communists? Old people.
Some overrated group once sang, “I hope I die before I get old.” Now there’s a group singing something that speaks common sense. Unfortunately despite half their band dying, the remaining two still cavort around stage in their sixties and charge hundreds of dollars for gigs. I suppose if you can getaway with looking at kiddie porn by saying “I was doing research”, you can pretty much do anything.
What makes it worse is that it’s these old people calling for tax cuts and superannuation funds that will help old people out, but will leave us fucked in a few decades. Get rid of old people now, so we can enjoy this earth in peace and love. Another thing which annoys me greatly about old people is that they own all the land, and then they complain when people like Robert Mugabe come and reclaim land for young people. It might be just because he’s black and old people are racist Don Brashvoting NRA rifle-toting chlamydia-sharing while resthome oldfolking ‘cos they don’t need to use condoms.
Now, Africa’s got it right. They’ve got the voluntary AIDS system helping them out there. Thanks to money hungry capitalist drug companies, we’ve got a good way of killing people. It’s cost-effective: you do nothing, they have sex – it’s win win! Which leads me to consider the best ways to cull our old people.
We can give prizes for the best kill. We can unleash a bunch of old people Battle-Royale-style on an island and give them a bunch of weapons they created. Like depleted uranium bombs, bi-planes, Ray Romano, iPods and howitzers. We can have a contest where they have to jump off cliffs and then execute pikes, half-pikes and somersaults onto the rocks below. We can give posthumous awards to them too for biggest blood splat, best belly-flop and the long-jump. Does anyone remember that computer game called Lemmings? Why can’t old people fall into fiery pits? I don’t care if hell will sort them out, I want to see frying now! There’s nothing like the smell of singed flesh to make you hungry.
So what’s the cut-off date for old people to die? 90? 80? 70? 60? 40? An artificial cut-off date may not work, as what age is mature? Clearly old people don’t think eighteen is. I think the test should be if you poke someone and feel mush, that should do. Of course, young fat people may be collateral damage, but they’ll consume too many resources by the time they reach a specified age anyway.
We must open our ideas and cast off our false consciousness towards the senile! Otherwise, today in this crazy modern world, it seems to be providential that fate should have chosen old people to die, and take the rest of us down with them.