Now, when Al Gore invented the Internet, I doubt that he thought it would be the median for unmitigated crap that it is now. Really, he shouldn't be surprised -- just look at what the human race has done to the rain forests, the ocean and the original Star Wars films. I guess it's just human nature to see something beautiful, admire it, drink it in and then blast the living crap out of it. But that's beyond the point.
The point is that the Internet has become a cesspool of information posted by people whose genes the species would be just as well-off without. Seriously, more lucid thoughts have come out of Chinese opium dens.
And then there's savetoby.com.
I found this one last year, and I thought it was a little shelter of honesty. Not to say that the site is wholesome in any way, but the corruption was so blatant that the authors didn't even bother to hide it.
What these scions of peace have done is make a Web site dedicated to a rabbit named Toby. The opening article says that the author has saved this poor woodland creature from near death, nursed him back to health and now keeps him as a pet. However, Toby is going to die, and only you can help.
Toby is going to die because the authors -- upon research, I found that there were two -- are going to eat him. They don't want to, but unless they receive fifty grand from donations and merchandise sales, little Toby will be made into any number of recipes that they include on the site.
Whip out the American flags and sparklers -- kids, I hope you have taken notes -- because this is the American dream. It's completely legal, and no one from congressmen to PETA can touch them.
See, it's not illegal to keep a rabbit for a pet before eating him, no more than it is illegal to fatten up a cow before sending it to a butcher. It's also not illegal to ask for donations to help a cause. It's the sickest Jerry Lewis telethon you can imagine.
Personally, I find this site tasteless, amoral, shocking ... and hilarious. They've held a gun to the head of human decency with a wild look in their eyes and, damn, I wish I'd thought of it first. The thing that makes this site so refreshingly dishonest is that the authors operate anonymously. No one knows exactly who they are, where they live or if there's even a rabbit. But I stumbled across a problem.
When I first found the site, there was a deadline, and it was June 30. That deadline has come and gone. On that date, I visited the site with a malicious grin to see what fate beheld Toby -- but the little freaks pushed back the date. The new deadline is Nov. 6, 2006, and the authors lost all the integrity they didn't have to begin with. It was like being told that Santa Claus doesn't exist all over again.
These people have climbed the ladder to the high dive, only to cry at the top like a seven-year-old; they should be forced to jump on principle.
I know that making money was the point all along, but now they've become Hans Gruber -- bad guy in Die Hard -- genius at first, common thief in the end. They deserve a good one liner before a bullet rips through their brains. They leave me asking myself: "Whatever happened to honesty among thieves?"
Write to Drew at
aldavis2@bsu.edu
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