Gather ’round, my children, for it is time to speak of The Age That Was. Before this fallen world, in which we huddle for warmth near the burning fires of discarded Nintendo Switches we scavenge for fuel, and the glow of melting plastic controllers illuminates the walls of our caves, there was a different planet. Generations ago, it was a brighter world, one where food was available at the touch of a screen, delivered right to your brick- or metal-carved dwellings. (“Air BnBs,” we believe they were called.) Children would attend centers of learning as opposed to working 14 hours a day on the moon farms owned by Musk Inc. And humanity lived in relative peace, rather than in constant fear of the 750-foot-high air-breathing octopus that was once the internet.
But in the decaying years of the Trumptation era, when nihilism was ascendent and people were looking to something—anything—to give their lives meaning, the eyes of a worried population began landing upon the seductive imagery of a new soothsayer, promising redemption in the form of a symbol—a “staple.” These mighty tools were slices of a hard material that could literally fuse together the beliefs and stories written down for preservation, collating them into a singular entity. Such power may seem beyond our imagining now, but these “staples” served as the unifying force for the scattered scribblings of an anxious society. Small wonder, then, that the beguiling power of such an item would be the basis for a new death cult, one intent of transforming every aspect of our lives. Come, join me in a circle around the last remaining Samsung Galaxy, and let us watch anew the herald of our demise:
Watch as the sycophants of the New World Order stand enthralled before a travel through a wormhole, until the name of their new deity is literally raining down upon them. But whereas before the icon of their worship was bent, signifying its subservience to the enlightenment values that structured the best humanity had to offer, watch as it takes center stage! Tremble as it straightens itself out, no longer content to function as the humble servant of humankind, but rather its leader! Behold the explosion as a new iteration of this mighty dictator assumes its place atop the food chain of civilization! So this is how liberty dies: with thunderous applause.
“Here’s what I love about it,” the chief apostle of the new religion testifies following its unveiling, speaking for all present. “The staple icon is simply representing who are are…it represents so much of who we are, and who we will be to our customers. We hope you love it, too.” And in that time of rapacious capitalism, when indeed all people were customers before they were individuals, the followers of the Staple gradually stopped hoping others would love it, and began commanding others to do so. Cities fell. Governments cowered. Electrical grids failed. And the world was plunged into this, The Great Stapling, where we have been compressed together, placed under the iron fist of its rule, and slammed together into united subjugation.
Now let us break our fast by consuming some life-giving Clif Bars. Come, we shall recite the prayer of, “This tastes like spackle.”