Bureau of Fallen Empires

January 29, 1998
New ones Monday through Friday

Extinct is Forever

By Cameron Geiser

As if there weren't enough reasons to stay out of Africa, one of the continent's only stable countries is melting down in an ethnic acid bath. By now, Kenya is accustomed to devastating baths, having spent the last month or so enduring floods that are worse than biblical - they're caused by El Nino. Those lucky Kenyans sufficiently buoyant to float down the street to safety can look forward to the usual outbreak of afflictions residing in the petri dish of the Dark Continent: cholera, malaria, Rift Valley fever, and, of course, swollen testicles. How any member of the species Homo Sapiens survives in the cradle of humanity is a mystery to me.

And it's one mystery I don't intend to solve. Here in what, with a nod to our neighbors to the north, I will term North America, the riskiest prospect for most of us is a leaky toilet. Everybody's seen the Darwin Awards, probably complete with 200 lines of forwarded header info and several lines of ">>>". This occasionally entertaining and always false celebration of that individual "who through single-minded self-sacrifice, has done the most to remove undesirable elements from the human gene pool" often takes us to exotic lands (the six Egyptians who drown trying to save the chicken is a particular favorite); but it reflects the specifically American notion that the only way to face death is to actively pursue it. Right now we're all enjoying the spectacle of another of Slick Willie's attempted political suicides [We should add, however, that this cry for help seems to have been brushed aside like all the others; the story has reached such a saturation level that last night's Prime Time was already asking "Why are the American People unhappy with the media frenzy?" The more pressing question - "How much do the American People want to see Sam Donaldson fucked to death by a pack of insane hippopotami?" - was pointedly left unasked. - ed.].

But killing yourself is yesterday's news. North Americans in general continue to develop better and more obscure ways to cull from the herd. We might take an evolutionary long view and say that this is a logical development, but I find it hard to get happy about new advances in suicide. And being a red-blooded 'Merican, I feel that there is always someone to blame for pretty much any circumstance which I do not want to take credit for myself. And who better to blame (for anything, really) than those silly buffoons, the British.

Recently, after forcing myself through both halves of Lawrence of Arabia, and with Tomorrow Never Dies fresh in memory, I dreamt contentedly of the Great British Gentleman Adventurer. What keen memories we have of him - James Bond escaping by ski/parachute, Lawrence defiantly refusing water from his Bedouin guide - "I drink when you drink!", Tarzan training the entire African jungle (as only a true English Gentleman could). It all seems like a lot of limey hot air. But the reality behind the legend sits right there at the bar with Mr. Bond. A small band of British soldiers really did hold off more than 4,000 Zulu warriors at Rorke's Drift after suffering a massive defeat in Isandhlwana, as portrayed in the movie Zulu. When anxious commanding officers during the British campaign against Sindh waited for a response to "does Napier have Sindh?" Sir Charles Napier replied, "Peccavi" (I have sinned). Ah, the good old days - when even the hardest fighting men had the time - not to mention the brains - to rattle off a Latin bon mot. If I could find 5 internet content providers so well-read I wouldn't be languishing here at simpleton - but that's another article.

The exploits of the English Gentleman Explorers of the late 19th and early 20th Centuries are widely published (if unread), and largely true. Indeed there was a lot of adventure to be had back then - any half-witted self-described anthropologist with steamer fare to the South Pacific could go live with the cannibals. Nowadays you can get a Royale with Cheese in the process, and the only danger you'll face is mad cow disease in the beef (caused oddly enough, by the practice of turning cows into cannibals). An article on the Age of Adventure wouldn't be complete without some mention of the Opium Wars and the potato genocide, so here it is. Now let's get back to the swashbuckling English of yore, and their fearless subjugation of a planet. Consider this description, from T.E. Lawrence: They were a strange contrast: Feisal, large-eyed, colourless and worn, like a fine dagger; Allenby, gigantic and red and merry, fit representative of the Power which had thrown a girdle of humour and strong dealing round the world. You can find the same spectacular contrasts today. In fact, you can travel the entire length of the British Empire, and encounter the full range of its nationalities, without ever leaving England. With only the island left, there isn't much room for Adventure these days. Trying to get the Pakistanis who live upstairs to turn down their music might be a challenge, but it's no adventure. None of which would be a problem, if not for the Gentleman Adventurer's reincarnation in the farce of false achievements. Right now, we have two Brits flying a lawnmower around the world, Branson continuing to hold the spotlight as biggest jerkoff on the planet, and those crazy Americans sending a probe to the moon. Leave aside that we used to send people up there - will there be anything on the dark side of Phoebe that compares with the wealth of the White Nile? We should have seen this sideshow coming as soon as people began doing increasingly ludicrous "inas" - around the world in a powered hang glider, across the Pacific in a sculling shell, first gay and lesbian crossing of the South Atlantic in a gyrocopter, traveling the New Jersey Turnpike in a car with the windows rolled down (only for the extremely adventurous and suicidal). Sooner or later (we hope sooner) some schmuck is going to win the mad dash to be the first balloonist to travel the world nonstop. Meanwhile, the effort is leading to one costly, overhyped disaster after another, but so far, no fatalities. And while I don't wish any ill luck on any particular balloonist (OK, on Branson), it's important to note that we're seeing the refutation of the Darwin Awards' central premise - that stupidity causes death. If it did, Evil Knevil and "Old" Elvis (who broke as many cardiac arteries sitting on the john as Kvevil ever did on a jump) should have set off the alarms. I guess everyone was just too distracted trying to cope with the 70s to notice. And who could blame them - if the Pill had been around in Victorian london, all of those Lord Jim adventurers would have had better things to do than conquering the world. And so a moment of silence please, as we eagerly await the open-water landing of Keith Reynolds and Brian Milton, and Branson's slow and hopefully painful demise in some inauspicious circumstance. Perhaps after crash landing in the wild tiger exhibit of some crowded zoo with a cheering crowd gathered round. We should mourn yet another extinction caused by white folks just going a little too far.

Cheat death with the author.

Readers disappointed in simpleton's silence on Monicagate are invited to enjoy our take on Richard Nixon's own Monica in today's Suck.