Sex with robots! What would George Jetson say?
I have just one question for 2016: What took you so long? This year has been so bat-doodoo insane that for months I’ve been longing for Donald Trump to fix the camera with a steely gaze during one of the Republican debates and bark, “2015, you’re fired!”
Of course, Trump — who kicked off his campaign by getting into a Twitter war with a murderous Mexican drug lord and capped it with derisive remarks about Hillary Clinton’s bladder — has been a major contributor to the exquisite weirdness of 2015.
Eventually even the voters themselves caught it: A December poll showed that 30 percent of Republican voters and 19 percent of Democrats favored bombing Agrabah, the fictional nation of the 1992 cartoon Aladdin. Oz and Never-Never Land, you’re next.
So 2016 can’t come soon enough. But be careful at New Year’s Eve parties, especially if they’re being held on a college campus, where the PC police will be out in force to administer swift and stern justice to anybody over-imbibing in fun.
The University of Tennessee at Knoxville earlier this month issued a stern warning that teachers and students must “ensure your holiday party is not a Christmas party in disguise.” The State University of New York at Geneseo sent out a list of five campus officials to be called in case of emergency sightings of inappropriate Halloween costumes. (At Wesleyan, where they take these things more seriously, a similar list had six administrators’ names.) And Japanese students at Oberlin complained that the campus dining hall was “disrespectfully” serving undercooked rice with their sushi.
Other (hopefully) moments that made 2015 a year best suited for a straitjacket:
From each according to his ability. To each according to her tiara.
Seniors at Cotton Classical Preparatory School in Albuquerque, New Mexico, voted to make communism the theme of their spring prom.
Are you happy to see me, or is that a hard drive in your pocket?
British psychologist Helen Driscoll predicted that as motion-sensing technology improves over the next few years, sex between humans and robots will become so common that boinking another human will seem “primitive.”
Are you sure it wasn’t the robots?
A senior Iranian cleric said promiscuous women in short skirts are the reason his country has so many earthquakes. “Many women who do not dress modestly … lead young men astray, corrupt their chastity and spread adultery in society, which increases earthquakes,” Hojatoleslam Kazem Sedighi told reporters.
OK, it’s gotta be the robots.
If a man thinks of another woman while making love to his wife, their child will be gay, said Iran Ayatollah Hossein Dehnavi during his regular television show on marriage and child-rearing. And, he added a fashion tip: “Women incorrectly wearing the hijab leads to homosexuality among men.”
President Christie announces first Ouija board summit
During one of the Republican presidential debates, New Jersey Gov. Chris Christie said he’ll defeat the Islamic State by enlisting allies across the world. “When I stand across from King Hussein of Jordan, and I say to him, ‘You have a friend again, sir, who will stand with you to fight this fight,’ he’ll change his mind,” Christie promised. Hussein, who died in 1999, could not be reached for comment.
Fido and the king of Siam
A Thai military court charged a factory worker with making a “sarcastic” Internet post about the king’s dog. Conviction carries a prison sentence of up to the 37 years.
The majesty of the law
After freeing a man who spent 42 days in jail for a rape that DNA tests proved he didn’t commit, the Miami-Dade State Attorney’s Office wondered what all the fuss was about. “This happens all the time,” explained prosecutor Kathleen Hoague. “You know, OK? This is not the first time this has happened and it won’t be the last.”
When magic rings are outlawed …
An elementary school in Kermit, Texas, suspended 9-year-old Aiden Steward, who, after watching one of the Lord of the Rings movies, tried to make a classmate disappear with a magic ring. A hard-bitten repeat offender, Aiden had already been suspended earlier in the year for showing up at school with The Big Book of Knowledge.
We warned you that Sharia law was coming
From the police briefs in the June 1 issue of the the Daily Hampshire Gazette in Northhampton, Massachusetts: “Lord Jesus Christ, 55, of 41 Everett Ave., Apartment C-28, was arrested at 9:19 a.m. June 1 at a Belchertown home on a charge of violating a restraining order.”
This story was originally published December 28, 2015 at 8:14 PM with the headline "Sex with robots! What would George Jetson say?."