Boston Bombings: Beware the Assholes

Nothing inspires me to write quite like anger. And nothing makes me angrier than assholes.

As we all know, assholes are a particular breed of human being that lack empathy, decency, and any semblance of social consciousness. The narcissistic, self-centered nature of an asshole allows him to make decisions based solely on how the outcome will affect him, other people be damned.

There is a broad spectrum of assholes that populate the planet, ranging from the least harmful (but still annoying) to the genuinely heartless. Unfortunately, the latter were on full display this past Monday. And in the wake of the tragic terrorist bombing that took place at the Boston Marathon, American citizens are searching for answers. They want to know how someone could carry out such unspeakable acts. How can things like this happen?

Things like this happen because of assholes.

Another tragedy caused by another asshole.

When the cowards responsible for the bloodshed and loss of life in Boston are eventually apprehended, I’m quite sure they will justify their actions by associating themselves with some righteous cause. They will probably reveal their inspiration to be a religious text or some badly written manifesto. But make no mistake about it: no matter what world view they subscribe to, these people are not soldiers or martyrs or prophets. They are not revolutionaries or agents of socio-political change. They are simply assholes.

People have used the term “evil” to describe the douchebags responsible for this crime. I don’t particularly care for this adjective because it comes across as otherworldly. It calls to mind some powerfully disturbed genius, manically twisting his mustache like a villain in a Disney movie. It implies, in some mythical sense, that the souls of these dickwads were preordained at birth to bestow death and misery upon the innocent masses. But we know in our heart of hearts that this is not the case. These jackasses were not born with a singular, wicked destiny. They had choices just like the rest of us. And at some point, they made a conscious choice to be an asshole. And not just any asshole, but that very special variety of asshole that thinks it’s okay to kill people.

At least the world has non-assholes, like NFL lineman Joe Andruzzi.

Unfortunately, we cannot rid the world of assholes, no matter how hard we try. Assholes have been screwing things up since the dawn of human history and they will continue to wreak havoc until the end of time. This is what they do. And they will never stop.

The best we can hope for is to outshine them whenever we can. This goodness was on full display in the immediate aftermath of the Boston Marathon bombing; decent human beings instinctively acting in ways that were the polar opposite of the radical douchebaggery that led to the tragedy. People aided the wounded, sheltered those with no place to go, and volunteered to give blood. Those not in the immediate vicinity sent their thoughts and prayers from hundreds of miles away and continue to show their love and support in any way they can.

We will never win a decisive victory in the global war on assholes, but we can continue to be better than them. And in the end, I suppose that’s pretty damn good.

IKEA: One Hell of a Store

I do not believe in hell. As far as I’m concerned, it does not exist. It’s simply a mythical place dreamt up centuries ago by the righteously religious to control the sheepish masses.

Righteously Religious: “Hey, you people. Do what we say or your soul will rot in eternal damnation.”
Sheepish Masses: “Really? Okay, if you say so. Thanks for the heads up.”

However, if I did believe in a metaphysical location where the souls of the damned went to face everlasting anguish, I’m quite sure it would look like the inside of an IKEA. Now don’t get me wrong, I like IKEA and their fine collection of home furnishings available at remarkably reasonable prices, but the layout of their gigantic stores gives me the creeps.

There’s a mysteriously monotonous quality to this brightly lit, maze-like commercial space that seems to hypnotize me and dull my senses. At any point during a typical IKEA visit if you were to approach me and ask how long I’ve been in the store, or how many departments I’ve walked through, I probably wouldn’t be able to answer. In fact, there’s a good chance I might not even remember my name or what day it is. Within ten minutes of entering the IKEA labyrinth, I lose all sense of time, geography and self.

So it’s no great leap for me to imagine a torturous perdition that consisted of walking a continuous IKEA maze that slowly and methodically weaved its way through the rest of eternity. To make matters worse, the damned would be forced to wander aimlessly around this brightly lit hell while being followed by a large, church-going, suburbanite family whose piety is only outweighed by their kids’ desire to run their cart into you. And, of course, every time you stopped at the in-store food court, they’d be out of their famously delicious meatballs, but would have more than enough Najad salmon to go around.

The idea of an IKEA store being hell seems so legitimately frightening, I would strongly suggest Christian clergy adopt this model of Hades as part of their dogma. No one is afraid of the old fire and brimstone model of hell because the idea of a pointy-tailed devil poking you as you boil in a cauldron of molten sulfur is too far beyond our reality. However, every middle class American can relate to the wretched ordeal that is a prolonged Saturday afternoon in an IKEA store.

I may not subscribe to Christianity’s views on sin and punishment, but I do believe that if you’re going to do something, you should do it right. So I’m offering my interpretation of eternal damnation to the righteous to use, free of charge. Adopt IKEA hell as our own and threaten the sheepish masses with it. It might actually be the end of sin as we know it.

You’re welcome. Amen.