Bicyclopse Now — from a Skewer Debate
by erica dreisbach
In March 2018, our diaper King announced that John Bolton, a murdering criminal who thrives on blood, will become the next National Security Advisor. At the same time, Republican megadonors and openly fascist monsters the Mercers ramped up a long-standing campaign of theirs to convince the public that nuclear radiation and fallout actually wouldn’t be that bad. It’s clear that we’re going to live in Nuke Hell sooner than later.
my opponent argued that nukes’ forced cord-cutting is a positive step toward simpler, more mindful lives.
i argued that we will be able to express our true selves more freely than ever before by forming colorfully themed biker gangs.
Back in the ancient days of 2012 when lonely did i wander the bleak world of online dating, i would wishfully answer cute matchmaking questions on a website called Ok Cupid, a name which happens to rhyme with, “no date, stupid!”
i don’t remember any of the questions now, save one. It was: “on a certain level, wouldn’t nuclear war be exciting?”
It’s a question that dares you to answer, “mmmmm you know what yeahhhh it would kinda!” The question assumes you, too, are shallow and feckless and callow, that you have lived a life insulated from daily violence and food shortage, that you throw your recyclables directly into the garbage. Or worse! that you litter! That you love “Family Guy” and vaping and saying things like, “dude I might be high, but on a certain level wouldn’t nuclear war be exciting?”
i am not shallow. i am full of feck. Nuclear war can only be exciting in the abstract. i believe that the madmen in power, namely, John-boy Bolton and Donald John-boy Drump — who are on public record as loving war provided that their feeble bodies are not on the line — for them, nuclear war is not an abstraction. It’s the game plan.
They are barely able to keep their weird dicks in their pants today, that’s how hard their pre-emptive nuclear strike boners are pushing at the fraying half-open flies of their chinos, their boners turning and pointing in the direction of the nuclear football whenever it’s in the room, as moray eels follow prey.
i think nuclear war will be terrible, like cancer. “On a certain level though, wouldn’t cancer be exciting?” No.
i think it will be the worst thing that has happened to humans, ever.
And it will be very stressful. You know how petty office politics bring out your lowest self already? GUESS HU-WAT my sweet chickens? Nuclear war is going to be much worse!
Feel overwhelmed by complication now? How about when you have to choose between cutting off your own leg to feed your found family of feral children and miscreants versus selling yourself into slavery for three cans of beans?
A post-nuclear world won’t be simple or fun like watching a Mad Max movie. It’ll be like when you see news clips of bombing in Syria and think, “I am glad I am not in Aleppo.” Guess what my exquisite dumplings? In nuclear war, Aleppo comes to you!
There will be no yoga. There will be no meditative contemplation. There will be no redemption. And when resource hyper-scarcity begins and the radiation sickness sets in, we will long for the sweet release of death. We will wish it were come before the mushroom boom. That’s how we’ll talk, in heavy-leaded rhyme. We won’t have the energy for polysyllables.
But i hold out a lone hope that maybe, just maybe, there could be an upside to nuclear war. Not that i could become a better simpler person as my opponent would have you believe. i’m complex. That’s something i like about myself! i’m already great. i’m not humble. But i am great! And so are you! i know you! You’re great!
Why should we change? Why should we waste precious, dwindling energy on becoming quote “better people” according to the rules of a decaying mutant world?
So i don’t want to be more mindful. But i would like more time to ride my bicycle.
i don’t like motorcycles. And i don’t intend to overcome that dislike in the case of the coming nuclear disaster. So i willfully interpret the word “biker” to mean “one who rides a bike-cycle.” That’s me.
Oh, and who’s that standing behind me in intimidating formation? That’s my gang: the Vuvalini.
We divide amongst us the anti-radiation pills that my husband and i bought the day after the 2016 election in preparation for nuclear war — a real thing we actually did. We wrap our fists and forearms in bicycle chain that we can then use to whip our enemies or deliver a crushing punch that will send teeth flying. We forge machete from broken cars and we ride east to Washington DC. And then my biker gang will exact vengeance on they that burnt the world.
Wouldn’t you love to don some leathers and join us? Kill men all day, make love to women all night? We’ll share what we have as an anarcho-syndicalist collective and soup up our rides into wheeled chariots of vengeance.
We won’t be enlightened. No. We’ll be on fire. We will be free.
Namaste, bitches.
* * * * * * * *
erica dreisbach is an artist, writer, and computer programmer in Chicago. She’s been a featured performer at The Green Mill’s world famous Uptown Poetry Slam, The Paper Machete, Write Club, and The Moth Grand Slam. She’s the co-producer of The Skewer, a monthly satirical live news revue first Wednesdays at Cafe Mustache. She has three chapbooks: emotions, LOGIC, and Unpopular Marriage Advice. You probably can’t tell from this dry bio, but she is very funny. Learn more at ericaricardo.com.
