Doug Explains Pennies

by Douglas Slayton


The penny has long been a mystery. The penny's original purpose has nearly been forgotten. These days, they are more closely associated with self defense and pigeon control than their original purpose: currency. Long gone are the days of candies, movies, cars, spaghetti and all the other daily necessities that would be paid for with pennies. The penny, once the basic unit of cost for all things, is now disgraced due to smear campaigns by reality television personalities and talking vacuums. But even with all of this hate, the stalwart copper piece bearing the likeness of some old white guy with a beard¹ because of one secret that no one will talk about anymore.

President Fred Breining

Pennies are alive.

I am putting myself at great personal risk for speaking these words aloud to the person I have hired to type everything I say for my eventual memoir,² but change will not come until someone speaks up. Pennies are not made of copper; they are single celled organisms bred in a secret compound in Rhode Island.

Pennies have been on Earth longer than humans, shaping history for their own purposes. Secretly desiring a "society" in which they were the focus of all things, they shepherded humanity—the only creatures with thumbs who were self important enough to think anything they created has value—to "dominance". Most of the world rejected their siren song, because fuck Pennies. They are stupid and taste awful. But the European settlers who found the Penny breeding pools when they landed on what would eventually be the United State really fucking fell for it, because they were dumb as shit.

These humans were not in control of their own destinies—mostly because they were hella dumb and wanted to impress these tiny fucks who wouldn't shut the hell up. Humans are inherently selfish and irresponsible. They have done many terrible, awful things: war, dance, television, Jell-O, furniture, space exploration. But humans are lead largely by the tiny sounds that emanate from their pockets. These are the Pennies leading us to a society where they are all that matter. But like all science experiments,³ humanity grew too out of control for the Pennies to retain their position of prominence.

Thomas Edison, history's greatest monster, created a series of objects that added low level humming into the daily lives of humans. That humming cancelled out sound of the Pennies, and most people have forgotten the tiny sounds they made. The breeding pits in Rhode Island still exist because we have no idea how to stop their breeding. Several attempts have been made to cover them up with concrete but the darkness only makes them grow faster.

Pennies remain as a reminder that we are dumb dumbs and are all going to die because we can’t control our own lives without some shitty living coin telling us what to do.

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1 Your uncle? I don’t remember his name. If you do, please write to your local congressperson. Waste someone elses time for once, you ingrates.^↩ 2 Bury Me Where I Stand Because I Can’t Stand Myself: a Life Unlived.^↩ 3 Space exploration, am I right?^↩

Douglas Slayton is Professor Editor-in-Chief of Uncanny Valley Magazine.

Doug explains El Nino

by Douglas Slayton


When you meet some person with whom you have nothing to talk about, invariably you will talk about the weather. When you talk about the weather lately all anyone ever wants to talk about is El Nino—partly because the media is telling you that it is important and partly because no one knows what it is. Lucky for you on both counts that you clicked some anonymous link that someone has shared with you for this piece because I will now explain El Nino. And maybe that stranger will think you are cool and call you back and maybe someday you will tell your children about how you met their other parent because you read a super informative article on a blog that otherwise actively repulsed you because of its continued lack of editorial direction.

Haha. Just kidding, no one will ever love you. Let’s get to the real reason you are here though: El Nino.

We live in an exciting time. The news, like your depressed friend you keeps messaging you on Facebook when you are trying to sleep in preparation for your big quarterly financial meeting in the morning, never sleeps. Because it never sleeps, there has to be a constant stream of content. But most of the time there is not much worthy of reportage. The news wants you to think that we live in exciting times, but really we do not. Everything is boring. You really should spend less time reading things on the internet and just live your life.¹ In order to support the new 24 hour news cycle, the big wigs in New York sell all that advertising time so that you will know about the latest toothpaste breakthroughs. In order to fill this space between commercials, news anchors are trained to improvise breaking “facts”. It has lead to recent trending topics like the “election”. Easily, the biggest story to come from this practice is El Nino. It began as a simple weather broadcast in upstate New York, but spun out of control when a different weather reporter from Boston saw the broadcast while eating a burrito and said, “I can do better than that!” And did he ever. This oneupsmanship has lead to a rash of news broadcasts warning the coasts of a storm, the likes of which have not been seen in several decades (two, two decades).

Where it is undeniable that this is a BIG storm, it is smaller than the secret storms that the media has been ignoring for centuries (two, two centuries). As much as I would like to discuss the media ignoring the real issues, like other big storms and littering, I can simply say this is a case of the media bias towards certain stories over others.

This leads into why no one knows anything about El Nino: because it is a fabrication. It is a series of loosely connected storms the media is wanting to be a bigger deal than it is, so they can charge more for the advertising during the reporting.

This is a clear cut case of the media using its power to fill their pockets with gold.

Douglas Slayton is Professor Editor-in-Chief of Uncanny Valley Magazine.

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1 Editor's note: this is not true. Your life is incredibly boring and the internet is infinitely more interesting. Fuck you if you think you're too good for the internet. -CA^↩

Doug Explains Why Marco Rubio is NOT a Robot

by Douglas Slayton

 

As we discussed last time, the run-up-to-the-election-deciding-pie-eating contest is getting very fierce. Names are being called, feelings are being hurt, and only one can leave with the rose. While the Democrats only have two real options (sorry Steven Spielberg), the Republicans have at least thirty six candidates—and very possibly exponentially more because new candidates keep bursting out of the chest of noted Hollywood actor Ronald Reagan like the popular 1979 sci-fi-horror film Alien, but with a healthy dose of xenophobia. In the upper echelon of these smiling, vacant eyed homunculi is Marco Rubio, just behind the rubber puppet that is Donald Trump and Ted Cruz, who is probably that neighbor you have who is really nice but is actually the Zodiac Killer.

Chief within the name calling amongst the contestants is the accusation that Marco Rubio is a robot; this could be not be further from the truth. This criticism likely comes from his steely complexion and and dry, angular handshake. While these are characteristics of robotism, they are nothing without the true underlying causes.

Robotism is a condition that is contracted at birth when people, instead of being birthed from cellular entanglement of two warm blooded humans who don’t really care for each other but due to their fear of their slowly approaching demise feel that having a fraction of their dna survive another thirty to one hundred and twenty years is preferable to happiness, are constructed from metal bits under sweatshop conditions in the South Pacific. So not much different from human birth, but different enough. Those who have robotism live very different lives than meat people: the aging process is quicker as every year they are simply re-equipped with whatever technological advancements may have been developed in the past twelve months. But those with robotism also live virtually forever. Meat people only live thirty to one hundred twenty years—no less no more.

There are many reasons we can speculate that Rubio has these row-boatian characteristics. He could have been infected with some kind techno virus, but this is unlikely as he never wears raver clothes and has yet to ever mention Jamiroquai in public. He could be one of the silver men: a cult who worship those with robotism as both spiritually and sexually superior to the meats. The silver men theory is popular because there have been instances noted where a silver spray-painted gentleman who resembles Rubio has jumped out of a fake bush scaring people at Fisherman’s Wharf in San Francisco. This, we know, is a popular tradition for the silver men to cull meats from the robotians. Though the most likely explanation, according to my expertise, is that he may have been hit very hard in the head with a steel pipe, contracting wererobotism. Wererobotism is a very rare and serious disease wherein a meaty begins to think they are a robot, so they start eating only industrial metal shavings ¹ and only move in jagged forty-five degree movements.² Wererobotism—I am trying to say—is not a real thing; it is a thing robotists use as an excuse for when they start taking on those qualities.

The long and short of it is that Marco Rubio is not cool and should come out and apologize to the robot community rather than taking on robotist stereotypes in order to try and pander for their votes. Robots can’t vote anyway, but that is mostly because of claustrophobia.

Douglas Slayton is Professor Editor-in-Chief of Uncanny Valley Magazine.

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1 A robotist notion suggests that robots only eat industrial metal shavings, but this is perpetuated by the fact that robots are systematically forced to live in industrial areas because of economic hardships due to years of oppression. Industrial metal shavings are heavily marketed in these areas at bodegas in with bullet proof glass around the counters.^↩
2 This is another robotist notion because of a three year period from ‘79 to ‘82 where the popular joints for robots were clicking joints that would stop every forty five degrees creating the illusion of quick jerky motions^↩

Doug Explains the Iowa Caucus

by Douglas Slayton

Editor's Note: this is the first in a new series of articles whereby Uncanny Valley Magazine Professor Editor-in-Chief Douglas Slayton explains important, newsworthy topics. If you would like to read Doug's explanation of a particular topic, please send us an e-mail at uncannyvalleymagazine@gmail.com.

In the run up to the crowning of the new President some of you have walked up to me on the street
and yelled indignantly, "What is Iowa?!" and one even was like, "What is a Caucus?" to which I probably responded by crying or running in the opposite direction, because I thought you said something else. I am sorry for the misunderstanding. In order to make this up to you I will now explain what the Iowa Caucus is.

Firstly, Iowa, contrary to popular belief, is not in fact a state. Iowa is a governing body responsible for transportation and farming regulations. Iowa is actually an acronym, but no one remembers what it stands for because James Garfield possessed the only documents outlying its meaning at the time of his death and everyone forgot he had them until after he had been shot into to space. Coincidentally, that is why we have a space program: to recover these documents from his frozen corpse. As the need to govern both transit and farming grew, the department of Iowa grew to the size of a state after purchasing land from the states surrounding it so the officials and their family would not have to commute in from the coasts any longer. As more people began to occupy the compound, it became necessary to create more civilized infrastructure to support this new population, which led to the current misconception of its statehood.

A popular dictionary defines Caucus as "not what you think it is you perverted little fuck, put the book back on the shelf and go to class." This does not clarify the situation. Throughout the course of the "election cycle" half of what are considered "states" hold Causcuses. They are an ancient and brutal ritual where the supporters of each party must battle each other to prove that the candidate they support leads the strongest warriors and will better protect us from roving clans of geese that Canada uses to oppress the United States.

While all of this is common knowledge, it is important background for the current dispute that is the topic du jour for the media. This past week, this election season's Causcuses began with an especially brutal bout among the Democrats, leaving thousands dead and ten times as many homeless in the rampage across the non-state of Iowa, with the front runners' (Hillary Clinton and Bernard Sanders) supporters being some of the most vicious and entitled Caucusers¹ of all time. Clinton's were mostly armed with money from rich people and Sanders's was composed mostly of those who were young and had nothing to lose. I don't actually know the results; as a noted apolitical and perpetual presidential write-in candidate myself, I am not legally allowed to follow any coverage until there is an official, final announcement.

I would like to take a moment and ask why I haven't been invited to any debates. Is it my unpopular stance on outlawing chicken wire headwear? Anyway...

On the Republican side, some stuff happened too, I am sure. Like, look at them: they obviously did some shit. Although, traditionally, Republicans are less brutal because they are all related and think that fighting within the family is inappropriate.

Now someone just yelled at me from across the bus asking what the difference between a Causcus and a Primary is. This is a good question.

Primaries are what the younger states use to decide the candidates. As such, they are less brutal and more civilized. The constituency all casts double blind ballots for their choice. As the ballots are double blind, the voter does not actually know what they are voting for, so it is basically luck based. Traditionally, the candidate listed on the right side of the ballot has done better because of the right handed dominance in our culture. In the last decade, though, officials finally noticed the trend and have started randomizing the ballots. But usually it ends up with useless results for "other" and comes down to whichever candidate has not been battered into submission from the press and public.

It is important to stay informed on these issues and political events, so when a estranged relative or potential sexual partner (haha, yeah right) asks about who it is you voted for or who you think might pull it out in the end, you can flippantly say something like, "Oh the brutality of it all is too much for my poor heart to take. Please, please let me die already." To which they will respond with a tearful assertion that life and politics have meaning and you will simply shake your head endlessly until they leave, confused.

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1 Or, as they are commonly known, Caucasians.

 Douglas Slayton is Professor Editor-in-Chief of Uncanny Valley Magazine.