#4 Be More Stunningly Beautiful
Apr 12th, 2008 by doing better
When was the last time you saw a Stunningly Beautiful person? Probably not today, probably not yesterday, probably not last week. If you live in certain states, chances are you’ve never seen a Stunningly Beautiful person in your whole life. But judging from the behavior of millions of Americans, who follow the every move of befuddled but photogenic celebrities through television, magazines, and internet gossip sites, Stunningly Beautiful people are what we crave above all else on this earth. We don’t lie awake at night worrying about world peace or the health of the planet; we just desperately want to surround ourselves with beautiful, shiny people.
The problem is, there aren’t enough beautiful people to go around right now. We can’t all move to Hollywood, and even if we did, the Stunningly Beautiful people would barricade themselves in their fortresses and refuse to mingle with the ungorgeous hordes. Can you blame them?
Celebrity magazines and TV will never be enough to satisfy our cravings. The deadly combination of magazine and mirror fills us with self-loathing. If we can’t become more Stunningly Beautiful ourselves, there is no hope for society. We are doomed to live in perpetual longing, basking in gloomy self-loathing, a state which cannot be satisfactory to anyone who has recovered from being a teenager.
Here are a few suggestions for improvement:
1. Mass cosmetic surgery. (It has been tried in certain areas, with mixed results)
2. Culling of the non-stunning so that only the stunning may breed. (Not recommended by the United Nations.)
3. Genetic engineering. (Even if it worked, it would take at least fifteen or twenty years to make a visible difference.)
4. Masks. (Carnival all year round!)
5. Changed priorities. (We could try to keep our minds on spiritual goals and appreciate inner beauty. I’m not sure that’s so widespread, either. It’s just less easy to photograph.)
What do I recommend?
As a matter of fact, I see only one way out of this mess. Some may say my ideas are extreme, but I believe we will never be happy until we have personal contact with Stunningly Beautiful people. In the Middle Ages, people made long, hazardous journeys to worship at the shrines of their favorite saints and make personal contact with the saints’ relics. I believe every American community needs a shrine. We must encourage our Stunningly Beautiful citizens to sacrifice their personal lives for the good of the nation. If they won’t do it voluntarily, they will be nationalized.
Here’s how it will work. Every Stunningly Beautiful person will report to a town or neighborhood. At night he or she will be housed in a secure public facility such as a jail or state hospital. During the day, he or she will be escorted around the neighborhood, through public areas such as boulevards, shopping malls, playgrounds, zoos, gardens and tourist attractions. Members of the community will be free to photograph, talk to, shake hands with, hug, and stare at the Stunningly Beautiful person to their hearts’ content. The Stunningly Beautiful community representative will be available for anniversary dinners, barbecues, weddings, school fundraisers, Fourth of July parades, church bazaars, library picnics, high school car washes, fishing trips, prisoner entertainment, summer camp fun, and amateur dramatic productions.
This should satisfy the communal desire to unite with the Stunningly Beautiful. See, we don’t actually have to kill them and eat them in order to possess their essence. We can just make them our pets.
Should the Stunningly Beautiful person become overwhelmed or depressed by the magnitude of the role, we shall explain that he or she is rather like the Queen of England on her incessant travels around Britain, opening hospitals, libraries, and railway stations, bringing comfort and joy to the hearts of her subjects everywhere she goes.
When a community has worn out its Stunningly Beautiful person, it may apply to receive a new one after a specified period of time. No community (except perhaps those in certain states with lower standards for personal appearance and hygiene) will be expected to tolerate a Stunning female over the age of forty (a contradiction in terms, perhaps) or a Stunning male over forty-five.
Its Stunningly Beautiful cravings satisfied, the community can turn off the television, put away the celebrity magazines and direct its energies into more socially-useful activities such as improving literacy rates and fixing the roads.
It should work.