Wednesday, January 9, 2008

Stopping the problem before it starts

Its time to kick off the new year and semester with a much anticipated new update. And as a little bonus, I'm introducing a new recurring feature called "When I'm King..." in which I will let you all know in advance of some of the changes you'll have to get used to once I am the all powerful and unquestionable lord and master of everything everywhere. Fasten your seatbelts, here we go.

When I'm King, there will be no unwanted teen pregnancies. There will be no starving children in Ethiopia. And we will finally stop feeling guilty every time we see those "for the price of a cup of coffee, you can help this little girl get an education" commercials. Why? Because none of those will exist anymore. How? Mandatory birth control. Let me elaborate.

Its sometimes painfully clear that some people just should not have children. Ever. I'm talking primarily about families or parents that are either abusive or do not have the means of adequately supporting a child. Thats where my knights and I step in. Every couple that wants to have children must be approved to do so by passing a series of evaluations. These evaluations examine the couple's income, living situation, extended family, substance abuse history, mental state, and general wellbeing among other things. If we decide that the couple is capable of raising a child in a reasonably non-threatening atmosphere, then they will be a approved. I should make it clear now that it would be by no means hard to pass the test. This is simply to keep the obvious people from having children. People like 13 year old girls, heroin addicts, people who can't even afford to feed themselves, pedophiles, physically or verbally or sexually abusive assholes, and others. This is by no means a campaign to cleanse the world of the impure (man that felt weird to type), its about protecting those who can't protect themselves. The kids.

The only question is how to do it. There needs to be someway to ensure that the only way to get pregnant is to take some pill or shot or something that only the administrators have. For most of their lives, the rest of the population (just one gender I suppose) would be completely sterile. Free to have as much sex as they want without ever worrying about the worst STD of all.

6 comments:

Anonymous said...

If Jimmy had inadequate parents would this picture be on top of his video cabnet instead?

Anonymous said...

Well, your highness, as your Royal Advisor (I'm starting this tradition as well), I have a few points. My main point is to consider the possible ramifications of your potential actions. I'm not going to argue at all about the practicality, as I find that less important and more someone else's department.

-I'm assuming you are compaing in the end, unwanted pregnacy with 'the worst STD.' I think people who have STD's would find that offensive and inconsiderate of their symptoms, particulary AIDS were death can result. We can only joke that having a child is worse.

-Second, if one gender is made sterile, thing of the repercussions. It would be like a more wild version of the 60's combined with the "Why Must I, A Crustacean, be in Love?" episode of Futurama. I think having some fear and insecurities are good at helping us keep our animal instincts in check, so that we don't breed like rabbits.

-If you attempt to solve this by doing the selection process, here are the problems: If it's very easy, as you say, it won't stop the mating-fest. If it's very difficult, then sex without a purpose (other than self or mutual pleasure) becomes the norm, making sex more like kissing, petting, or a massage.I think many people would be very frustrated by this as well, your right to control essentially all life.

Lastly, I have a problem with not allowing poor people to have children. Why? Let's look at some poor children who grew up:
-Vincent Van Gough, H.G. Wells, Marco Polo, Harriet Beecher Stowe, etc. Beethoven had a really messed up childhood, but in ur system, he would not be allowed to be born.
Parents and environment do play a large part in a child's growth, but they aren't everything, which history shows us.

"Whenever you try to do the work of the master carpenter, you can't help cutting your fingers."

Xtian said...

-Im not really trying to say that pregnancy is an STD per se, that was a quote from South Park that I thought Jimmy might enjoy.

-If one gender is made sterile, there probably would be an increase in the number of people having sex. But whats the problem with that? Its not like theyre going to get pregnant. It all comes down to personal choice. You could argue that it would devalue such a time honored act of love, but thats a personal value. Waiting for that special someone is an admirable quality, but not everyone does or needs to.

-Advocates against drug legalization have a similar argument. If drugs are legal then suddenly every 10 year old in country will be shooting up during recess. While thats possible, its up to the parents to lead a good example and make sure their kids know all the facts.

-There are always exceptions to every rule. Sure you get your Rockafellers, Van Goughs, and others would rise from poor backgrounds. But for every one of them that does make it, millions of others children never do. Most either turn to drugs, gangs, crime, or just die. And when I say poor, I mean really poor. Not someone who actually has a job but is living paycheck to paycheck. But a parent that cant afford to feed their child needs to shape up first.

Anonymous said...

The Royal Advisor has more to say, and hopes he does not displease his highness in being too disagreeable.

I'll work backwards starting from your last point, regarding parents' need to "shape up." It is obviously easily arguable that your 1 good egg in a million theory would probably vary in real life statistics, though it also wouldn't necessarily be in the favor of my view either. But I find this statitical view of humanity to be...how shall I put it..inhuman? I'm the Royal Advisor, not ONLY human #379547215.
I guess this comes around to the abortion debate, with very similar pro's and con's. But whenever I consider myself the child, call me selfish or greedy, but I always desire the right to live.

Important side note: Parents or single parents who can barely survive on their own might not HAVE the opportunity to "shape up" due to war or extreme poverty or disability, etc. Here's a problem too: As members of the middle-upper class all of our lives, we don't know what's it like to live in the bottom, and likewise they don't know what it's like to live like us. Crossing the gap, especially from bottom to top..is made almost impossible.

My suggestion: Eliminate poverty and disease before limiting the population or increasing pleasure options. See what that does to affect crime. And according to the Royal funds, we have enough to do this if we eliminate BBQ friday's in the castle.

Regarding your comparison to drug legalization, a few key differences: sex=free (anyone brave enough to argue this one and face the shame, may go ahead), drugs=costs money (sure u can borrow some from a friend, but it still costs to produce it), sex=typically good for health, pontential to create life (and isn't that, afterall, not just of sentimental value, but one of the greatest powers/gifts we possess as creatures on this Earth?) drugs=typically not good for health, can shorten life or create illusionary life only experienced by the individual during a "trip".

I agree that making something legal doesn't directly point to more usage. However, you're not legalizing sex...you're simply making it more accessible. Like a heroin 7/11 or meth free giveaways or cocaine drivethru's. My other point, is that, like Episode 15 "I Dated a Robot" of Futurama, if a human or animal is presented with free, hasslefree and unlimited sex, they will go after it and often not know when to stop...like Al Roker at a buffet except with a crushed pelvis. From a mechanical point of view, is this productive? From a human point of view, is this meaningful?

I'll leave you with that haunting image of Al Roker...

J - Beezie said...

Sorry it took so long to post this but I have been moving and hardly at my computer. And, thank you for the SP referrence.

So...where to begin.
As your other crazier, more outgoing, shameless, and more twisted royal advisor, I advise you to look at the bigger picture. Why just limit people from having kids. Lets just terminate the poor, stupid, and weak. That way we don't even have to bother with all this sterilization jargon.

Your other advisor spoke of eliminating poverty and hunger by sacrificing BBQ fridays and I say "Hell to the No". I love my BBQ fridays and I'll be damned if that gets thrown in with the budget cuts. Mass genocide is a perfect solution to poverty. If you kill them, they are not there. It's the American way, similarly to just shoving your toys under the bed when mother tells you to clean your room.

It will all be really simple. You still have them take the test, but the outcome is not a decision regarding whether or not they can procreate, it's a decision of whether they get to live, or be goo-i-fied into food for the other poor whom we haven't had a chance to deport from life (it's win win). Now you can't tell me that's not economical. And maybe since this is a test that decides life (essentially I'll be...YOU'LL be God (that is until I overthrow you ahahahahahahahahahaha ahahahahahahahahahahah ahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahahaha ahahahahahahahah ahahahahahahahahahahaha ahahahaha hahahahahah)) we can offer a 2nd chance to pass the test depending on how we are feeling that particular day. That expression of mercy should be enough to keep the hippie whistleblowers content until we can get around to ending their existance too.

As for the poor person success stories (oh whooptie fucking doo I can paint so everyone has to honor me...fucking ungrateful jackasses), I say, who needs them. You, your majesty, is all the inspiration in the sciences and the arts that we need pay attention to.

So let's get down to the details about how we are going to physically carry out stopping failers from breathing. I propose to you a mixture of electricution and exploding as I know his majesty loves his cartoons to be demonstrated in real life. We need to study the work of Itchy and Scratchy and go off of that. Hmmm if we catch people cheating on the test we should rig something up that forces them to kill each other while they watch. For that we should consult one of the "Saw" type movies.

I know this is a lot to take in, that's why I'm sending you a "blog-on-tape" so you can listen and not waste time reading. Reading is a thing of the past anyways. Soon enough we'll have robots to read for us.

-Your General,
Rahkim Jimmy Gaffney The Thrizzle

(I'm just assuming my hate for whitey will consume me by the time you are the unquestioned leader of the world, so I have changed my future name to Rahkim and changed the third to thrizzle to get in touch with my roots)

J - Beezie said...

Hmmm...

Can I have the title:

"Minister of Cruel and Unusually Awesome Punishments" along with being one of your Generals?

-Rahkim