Population Control

01 Feb 2008 10:38 by Mark

I'm a complex person. I care for people (not openly, of course) and the planet we're on and, at the same time, I would like nothing more than to rule over everyone with an iron fist in a glove made from something even harder than iron: pasta on the inside of a saucepan the day after, for instance. While I'm pleased with how evolution is working out I've got no qualms about tinkering with it in the slightest: genetic manipulation, cyborgy implants, and eugenics just light up the "AWESOME" sign in my head.

This is why when I think of the growing environmental problems in the world - climate change, fossil fuels, the mushroom people - I don't grasp at straws labelled "renewable energy" or "more recycling". Instead I reach for the suction tube with the glowing legend "population control".

Carbon emissions are a result of people. Usage of fossil fuels is a result of people. Tolerance of the mushroom people is a result of people. It doesn't take a genius to work out that by reducing the number of people we can combat the Earth's environmental concerns and, at the same time, address hunger, house prices, and personal space issues on public transport.

It then becomes a matter of deciding on the best method of population control. There are many to choose from but here are some of my favoured options.

War
Nothing culls a population and generates urban renewal quite like encouraging or goading an enemy state to wage war on your soil. Civilians, military, innocent, and mushroom people collaborators alike will all be caught up in street fighting, indiscriminate shelling, and diseases spread by foreigners not washing their hands properly afterwards. War is recommended by hero of the environment Saddam Hussein and you could ask him about it yourself if he hadn't masterfully coordinated a kangaroo court trial and arranged a verdict designed to control his personal population right down to the ground.

The Rhythm Method
I know what you're thinking: if the rhythm method worked then Catholic families would be smaller. Not true. The rhythm method does work but you need the right music.

Wrong: Ah the toe-tapping beat of Michael Flatley and friends ... diddly-eye-dee, diddly-eye-dee, diddly-eye-dee ... sorry love, I've cum inside.

Right: I've got my Akon and Mika mix CD ready and ... no, that's it, I'm going out for a walk now. Sort yourself out love.

Fungicide
Wipe out mushrooms and the mushroom people will have nowhere to hide but the houses of their human collaborators. As prolonged contact with a shroomian causes sterility in men and excessive nostril hair in women there will be a severe drop-off in procreational successes and it will be easy to identify shroom sympathisers since everyone will know "that hairy-nosed woman down the road" making surgical firebombing simple.

Reality TV
People are generally morons and those who appear on reality television programmes are the sorts of morons who walk face first into the bottom rung of the moron ladder repeatedly. Suggestions for population control-based reality television programmes include:

• World's Best Lemming Impressionist
• Strychnine or Marmite?
• Crash Test Dummy Apprentice
• Man Versus Shark
• Living With Gary Busey
• Children Just Love Train Tracks
• America's Next Top Immolator