The Tumblr at the End of the World
by Sady Doyle
The planet Earth, source-point of the human race, ended in fire and flood and catastrophic nuclear-weapons automation mishap in 2012. Strangely, the entire human race appears to have been aware of the impending nuclear-weapons malfunction some eleven months in advance, but no means of preventing it were discovered. Nevertheless, approximately one hundred people survived, traveling to Mars in terraforming vehicles containing supplies and selected genetic samples. There, they began the colonies which would become the basis of our Empire. But only those deemed most crucial to the survival of the human race, by dint of talent, accomplishment, authority, or adorability, were chosen.
Some activists chose to protest what they saw as an unfair selection method and strategy, using what was then being touted as the best possible tool for social justice activism, a primitive entertainment network known as the “Internet.” And now, thanks to exploration and recovery missions, we have records of their struggle. They are elliptical, and still incomplete; the reader may wonder at their omissions. How, for example, can the activist quoted here have failed to mention the apocalypse’s chief author, Evil Count von Kanye West? (Indeed, almost none of the historical records cleared by the Central Council contain reference to the dread von Kanye. And yet, we know for fact that he almost single-handedly destroyed a planet, using what were apparently high-access security codes. How was he able to operate in secret for so long, considering his royal status, which was, explicitly, “Evil Count?”) And yet, these words — in this case, the words of one woman, a marginal yet prolific figure of whom contemporaries were often heard to remark, “you mean her? The one who puked? Yeah” — shed much light on the day-to-day activities of the dissident typing movement. This is the story of those left behind.
— R. MARK FLEBELSON, Taylor Swift Institute of Higher Learning, Women’s Studies Department, 10/4/2314
2/23/2011, E-mail, sender: Sady Doyle, subject line: “WTF????”
I can’t fucking BELIEVE this shit. The world is ENDING and Beth STILL made me want to shoot myself with that fucking post. “Staying vegan is still important??” REALLY????? Well then I guess I’ll just carve myself a ship out of a giant block of tofu, get in it, and SAIL AWAY. Did the world really have to stay around for long enough that she could write this??? DID IT????? DID IT WHYYY.
3/17/2011, E-mail, sender: Sady Doyle, subject line: “Oh, my God, I am so sorry.”
I totally didn’t realize you were copied on that e-mail, Beth. I mean, I guess you know that. But… let me know if there’s anything I can do to help. I thought your point about available food supply diminishing and meat running out was really good.
4/1/2011, Google searches: Apology, how to apologize, networking, spaceships, spaceship pilot, Community pilot, Community space episode screen caps, Community screen caps, Donald Glover, Donald Glover no shirt
5/26/2011, Tumblr, byline: Sadypocalypto, headline: “Welcome to my Apocalypse Blog! I Guess!”
So, like, with six months left to avert this nuclear weapon thing, they’re still building spaceships. SPACESHIPS! Guess who doesn’t get a spaceship? Well, you. But also, according to the overwhelmingly white, all-male panel running this thing for whatever reason even though we didn’t have an election for them, people who have “demonstrated skills at maintaining social cohesion and significant value to society as a whole.” I don’t know what that means, but I think it means you only get out if they like you.
The shock is so great that the fact we can APPARENTLY BUILD STARLINERS NOW falls right by the wayside.
Anyway, my guess? We’re not getting out. Feminists, activists, queer folks, trans folks, poor folks: None of us are going to be deemed worth saving. My guess is, they’re probably only putting one woman on those spaceships. And, given how nice and popular and sweet and universally beloved that one woman will have to be, it’s going to be Taylor freaking Swift.
7/24/2011, Tumblr, byline: Sadypocalypto, headline: “TAYLOR SWIFT?????????”
OH MY GOD I WAS KIDDING WHAT THE FUCK HOW DID NONE OF THE OBAMAS GET ON.
9/15/2011, Twitter: @Beth2012 I started Sadypocalypto “to get a book deal??!?”
9/15/2011, Twitter: @Beth2012 How the fuck am I “selling out the movement??”
9/15/2011, Twitter: @Beth2012 There’ll be NO BOOKS 4 months from now!
9/16/2011, Twitter: @Beth2012 Eat your calm-down tofu
10/1/2011, Twitter: @Beth2012 Congrats on yr book deal! Drinks soon?
11/11/11, Google searches: Tofu, cook tofu so not squishy, cook tofu so not gross, miso soup recipe, lentil soup recipe, The Soup clips, Joel McHale no shirt
12/5/2011, Tumblr, byline: Sadypocalypto, headline: “The colonists leave today. And the thing is:”
They’re saying that every colonist — every survivor, every human, in whatever future we manage to have — has to have “demonstrated skill at maintaining social cohesion.” Basically, they have to be nice. They have to be polite. They have to be bland, inoffensive, okay by everyone: Taylor Swift isn’t the only woman they’re sending. That would be ridiculous. They had to make room for Oprah, after all (although even she couldn’t get the Obamas on board). But Taylor Swift is the only musician.
And, you know? Maybe they have their reasons. Spaceships are tiny. Space is tough. Colonies are hard to start: It would be easier, no doubt, if everyone got along.
But what if I don’t want to maintain social cohesion? What if that’s not a good idea? What if every major advance, in the history of humanity, has come about as the result of someone, somewhere, doing something that caused society to just plain uncohere — to lose part of its form, and create a gooey mess, a tear in the world, a gap for something new and necessary to exist? Society coheres around the new thing (democracy, heliocentrism, the printing press, the First Amendment, women’s suffrage, civil rights, married gays in the milit… OH WAIT) eventually. It always does. Society is very good at re-cohering. But sooner or later, things are going to become unsatisfactory, and someone — some descendant of the monkeys who stood up too straight, and spent too much time on the ground rather than in the trees, and were like, “you know what we’re fond of using? Tools,” the monkeys who started to do weird, unmonkeylike, un-monkey-coherent shit and made us human — I mean to say, some member of this disruptive, unusual, massively unlikely species is going to have to stand up and go, “you know what? This shit isn’t working.” And they’re going to have to stop caring whether that starts a fight. They’re going to have to value people more than “social cohesion.”
What happens when those people aren’t around any more? Because we’re not going to be. In a few days, I’ll be gone. And so will you, most likely. All of us disruptive types, us kickers and screamers and protesters and shit-stirrers: We’re dying.
I hope you miss us. And I hope you’re more like us than you think. Because you need us out there, whether you know it or not.
12/31/2011, Tumblr, byline: Sadypocalypto, post title: “Fuck It.”
At least I’m taking you all down with me.
1/1/2012, Twitter: Wait. Is everyone else still alive this morning? Or is it just me?
1/1/2012, Twitter: HOLY SHIT WE MADE IT. HOLY SHIT OH MY GOD.
1/1/2012, Twitter: YES YES YES YES YES.
1/3/2012, e-mail, sender: Sady Doyle, subject line: “Hi, Mom”
Sorry I’m so late in responding to your e-ma
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