10 questions that will blow your mind and leave you speechless

1. WHY?

   In the long, long history of questions, has there ever been a question as astonishing, as astounding, as simple and as breath-taking, as 'why'? Why? Just Why? Ask yourself that. The answer might surprise you.

2. WHO?

   When our early ancestors first asked this question, they never knew what they were unleashing on the world. Just the sound of this question is enough to make you stop whatever you're doing and launch into an extensive period of intense introspection and self-scrutiny. 'Who?' you ask, again and again. 'Who'?. But is that silence - or is it the sound of the abyss telling us what we fear most?

3. WHERE?

   When Christopher Columbus uttered these infamous words when he discovered the sun in 1066 BC, who could possibly have guessed the same question would be echoing endlessly in the halls of history? This question - a solid 6th on our list - will probably be asked by our children and our children's children.

4. WHEN?

   Holy crap, just let that sink in. When. WHEN. Wheeeeeeeeeeeeen. When. After a while, it stops sounding like a word that even exists. How can you answer a question that doesn't exist?

5. WHICH?

   Seriously, this question gets us every time. It doesn't matter if someone is asking us to pick between two equally delicious breakfast cereals or seeking clarity as to whether a black-dressed broomstick-saddling woman is a spell-casting harlot belonging to the Dark Lord and Damned Soul-eater Satan and his black shadowy cabal of wicked deceivers testing the faithful and pure. 'Which', now matter the context, is one of the most powerful questions you can ask.

6. WHAT?

   This question, just, wow. We can't even. 'Can't what?' you ask? Exactly, bro. Exactly.

7. CAN YOU EVEN FUCKING COUNT?

   We don't know about the rest of you, but this one really left us gobsmacked. We're not sure if it was the creeping, disturbing realisation that there's an obvious contradiction between the title of this article and its content, the niggling feeling that we've made little numeracy errors in the body of text, or even the dawning horror that even an expensive university education leaves you prone to embarrassing mistakes that not even a child would make, but this question is nonetheless a haunting, haunting quandry.

8. HOW?

   Like, HOW, though? How? Let that sink in for a second. Let us know when you have an answer in the comments below - or we'll be flabbergasted for the remainder of our lives.

9. WHY IS MATTHEW WRITING THIS CLICKBAIT CRAP?

   When Matthew asked himself this, it left him quiet and mopping in his room for ten minutes. Try it for yourself. Just remember that we tried to warn you.

Ubisoft announce upcoming release of “actually finished, playable” game

Ubisoft is taking a massive U-turn from their established business model, after this morning’s announcement that they’ll be making a game that actually works when you put it in your computer or console.

“We know our customers are just used to a certain ethos and experience when they see our swirling logo,” said CEO for the company, “but I think it’s about time we acknowledged the world’s clamouring for change.”

As such, Ubisoft has announced that they cancelling their original plans for their next release This is Literally Just a Corn-flecked Shit We Took In A Game Case, and are now in the process of developing an original IP that isn’t Assassin’s Creed or Far Cry and will actually work and not have hundreds of dollars of microtransactions embedded into the core gameplay.

Ubisoft's most recent release has been scrapped in
favour "of something actually worth buying"

“We know we’ve become the villians,” admitted the French publishing giant in a lengthy statement. “We’re a bunch of fucking cynical money-hungry pieces of shit who aren’t content with just some of the money but who have to ravage our customers’ wallets for every last dime like rapacious, dollar-devouring vultures by putting a price tag on what is actually content that should really just be in the original game or unlocked to reward normal game progression. We’re a bunch of soulless stains on humanity with our desire to control and stifle our trusting and naïve loyal customers by abusing the system of review embargoes. Some might even say we’re a collective of detestable, low-life, scum-eating bastards because we don’t even release a game that works without extensive patches and updates, or that we're even cowardly, irresponsible and abusive rectal worms because we still refuse to have a working returns policy that compliments legislation aimed at protecting customers from harmful business practices or inferior products. It’s about time we change this.”

Ubisoft now say this massive shift in organisational ethos is the product of long periods of existential introspection and meditation.

“Remember our last over-bloated, super-hyped piece-of-shit that didn’t deliver on its promises? No, not Unity, we’re talking about the other one, Watch_Dogs. We’ve learnt our lesson. You can’t just take disparate and singular elements and hype them into a ground-breaking gamechanger only to have it all too apparent that said element is just a shallow and unimaginative context-specific gimmick to peddle more copies.”

Ubisoft also apologised for their other flaws.

“We spend millions of dollars on breath-taking graphics and realistic settings which no one can appreciate because the framerate and resolution is locked or limited or sinks to levels seen only in the biopic penny arcades in the early 1900s,” they said. “It’s about time we stopped making the same game again and again – you know, even peppering our new IPs with done and cliché elements like towers you have to visit to unlock portions of the game or map? – and ceased this brainless obsession with graphics and ‘an immersive, cinematic experience’ and just made a simple, awesome game with great mechanics and moving storytelling. Did you even understand what the hell is going on in our last game? DNA, memories, something something, Templars, New World Order? Who even knows, bro?”

This is not the first time Ubisoft has teken a responsible decision – earlier this year they announced they didn’t want to “oppress and insult women by putting them in a game as shit as Unity.”

“Woman have it bad enough,” said an executive at the controversial press conference, “why would we want to degrade the further by including them as playable characters in an inexcusable piece of shit like this?”

However, the company was shrewd about details for the upcoming game.

“Why do you even care what kind of game it is?” the said. “I mean, you’re going to buy it anyway.”

The game, which has already scored a perfect 10/10 from IGN, will go on sale for $60 in Q4 of 2015.

Note: at the time of going to press, God had not responded to prayers that The Division be good, please, just be good.

Pic (my edit) from AJC1

New SA Zoo popularity soars

A new zoo has hit the South African big-time, after video footage of a savage battle between the different members of this private enclosure went viral online.

“This zoo has been around forever,” said media analyst Wile D’animo, “but recently its popularity has soared through the roof – all because of a massive and fierce fight between the various specimens in this small space. There was howling. There was yammering. There was hissing and roaring. It was true primal savagery, the likes of which we have never seen before - even in the far calmer, far less bloodthirsty Kruger [National Park].”

Though many experts are baffled by the sudden interest in this beastly, chaotic slice of nature’s true ugliness and disorder, some believe it is due to the sudden remarketing of a brand fraught with misguided preconceptions.

“This particular enclosure is only one of many similar hundreds across the world,” said one zoological specialist. “However, where most iterations of this zoo in other countries are boring, calm, quiet and peaceful zones where battles between the various species inside its walls are short and almost cordial, this one broke the mould. It was chaos. Like staring into the black, abyssal heart of Mother Nature’s dark side.”

The zoo, which is maintained by tax payers’ dollars and is known only as the PoRSA, has captured the public's attention with its wild spats and blood-thirsty struggles between opposing beasts.

"Where else in the animal kingdom can you see the mighty Ayencius Phumelele Stone Sizani locked in mortal struggle against its archnemisis Deeyayus Mmusi Maimane, or embroiled in a life-or-death brawl with Iyeffeffius Malemia Julius?" asked one Youtube commentator who differed from the rest in that they didn't use the footage as the basis for a lengthy thesis arguing smugly in favour of white supremacy. "There is just something about watching these animals fighting over the rotting and slowly festering remains of that favoured prey, Kountree Southus Africensis, the you just can't look away from. It's like nature's car crash."

Other media analysts, however, say that the popularity will be short lived.

“Really, they’ve ravaged all the best parts of what is left of the lifeless, devoured carcass, and now they’re locked in a tooth and claw battle over the last few bones,” said Johnathan von Johnathanson. "It's only a matter of time until something gives."

And though visitors can hope for a sighting of the rare and reclusive Ayencius Zumus Jacob, zoological experts says they shouldn’t get their hopes up.

“There have been many pleas and calls by thousands of visitors and fans of the zoo to have this animal finally make an appearance, you know, actually be visible in this enclosure,” they said, “but they shouldn’t get their hopes up. The King of the Beasts rarely ventures out of his large Private Enclosure, and prefers to remains in his preferred natural habitat of gold and green".

Pics (edited): Hyena by Joanne Goldby, Vulture by Jerry Pank, Lion from Rochkind, and Olive Baboon from Nevit Dilmen

Gun debate sees massive changes to US schooling

As the gun debate heats up in the United States of America, teachers, principals and students are seeing a huge set of sweeping changes aimed at securing their educational spaces and lessening the chance of future tragedies.

“It’s been a while since the last mass shooting,” said principal of Bay High in Utah, Luke Hanlode. “Really, when you look at the historical statistical data, we’re about three months overdue for the next senseless slaughter of preschool, highschool or university students and their teachers. We must act now.”

And while principals and gun lobbyists agree that banning the sale of fully-automatic firearms and increasing the depth, number and frequency of background checks and firearm safety and proficiency tests would do “absolutely nothing” to lower the likelihood of an incident, they say there is much that schools can do to prevent being the next iteration of World-wide breaking news.

“We already care about our children’s safety, which is why we have things like drug awareness campaigns, road safety classes and self defense courses like Karate and Judo,” said one teacher, “but we need to step it up. We need gun classes in school. Our kids don’t need a blackbelt. They need a bandolier and holster. We could make it fun: just think, Trigger-nometry.”

Publishers and book houses are already hard at work 'remastering' much-beloved classics to teach kids the necessary skills every school-going American child needs.

This is not all, they said.

“The answer is counterintuitive but simple: more guns,” said a spokesperson for the National Rifle Association. “Armed guards in the hallways. Teachers with concealed carry permits. Snipers in the football lights. Automated sentry guns on the CCTV cameras. We need to think of our children’s safety. If we weren’t wasting money on unnecessary Public Health and Obamacare, we would be able to reallocate funds into our always-cut Military Defense budget and arm every child.”

Though teachers have commented on the possible risk of actually being the one who blows all their students away because that little shit Billy in Grade 6 Maths won’t Shut The Fuck Up for ten seconds and never hands in any homework, they agree that it’s a risk they’re willing to take.

“We need to put their interests first,” said Maths teacher. “Even if teaching sometimes makes me think, ‘these psychopaths may have had a point.’”

Companies across the country have jumped on the bandwagon, and are now offering protection aimed at young Jane or Jimmy.

“With our new line of bulletproof children’s clothing and Kevlar-lined sunhats, as well as fun and exciting rebranding on our most popular lines of firearms, not only will you be protecting little Timmy from brain-destroying high-velocity fragmentation, low-caliber projectiles and the deadly Ultra-violet rays of the sun,” said a company statement by military supplier Arma Inc, "but you'll also be bringing yourself just that little bit more peace and comfort."

"Machine-washable and stain resistant, the fibre is a breeze to clean, and its breathable material means your child won’t feel hot and bothered any time, whether he is kicking a ball around with his friends or running for his life through the blood-soaked halls of his once innocent schoolgrounds.”

Only one thing remains certain, however: this debate is not one that has any easy fixes.

“Some people think that just banning guns will sort out the problem, but guns don’t kill people. People do," said one resident, who said that that argument doesn't equally apply to poison or Class 5 illegal narcotics or Biological and Chemical weapons. "You want to ban guns? Well, just look at godless hellholes like Australia and Britain. Do we want to go down that same, socialist road?"

He shook his head and pumped another depleted-uranium pyrophoric armour-piercing high-velocity explosive-tipped thermobaric anti-tank round into his fully automatic shotgun. "I'd rather die. Or, in this particular case, that my children die."

Pic (my edit) composed of Public Domain images and Ak47 by Burnyburnout and Rebel (inserted) from Al Jazeera Creative Commons

Students are ultimate doomsday preppers - Study

The Apocalypse no longer means the definite end of days, after a study has found that the majority of university students would “easily survive any massive, society-altering catastrophe” simply because their living conditions are similar to, if not worse than, those that any Act of God could wreak on Earth.

"When we think of any global catastrophe – a giant meteor strike, for example, or a widespread meltdown of the current unsustainable system of Free-market capitalism – and how it would result in huge cuts to electricity, quantity and quality of water supply, cramped and post-apocalyptic living conditions, and a severely reduced food supply, we can immediately see how many thousands of students would be able to survive or even totally not notice such an event, only because these kinds of conditions are prevalent in this demographic,” said chair of the study’s research organisation, Cathy Strophie. “Hell, some of them might even find it to be a period of hedonistic excess.”

Citing months-long diets of PnP No Name two-minute noodles or Residence Dining Hall food, the intermittent and shoddy Municipal water supply, extensive power cuts and load-shedding, and the usual living conditions in student digs, many students have wholeheartedly welcomed the study’s findings.

“Many people live in fear that the sun could blow up, or that a massive dormant supervolcano could erupt at any moment and end our way of life as we know it,” said one student at Rhodes University, “but honestly, I wreak that kind of havoc on my own life at least once a month with the dangerous combination of my bank’s half-month fees and charges and my overzealous attitude towards to the money I get on the first of the month. Seriously, I watched Viggo Mortensen in The Road and I was like, ‘damn, this guy has it good. Look at all that tinned food!’”

Pictured (left to right): Thabo Mbeki, Jacob Zuma, Bheki Cele and Angie Motshekga

Many other students have agreed.

“If you’re looking for the world’s best Doomsday Preppers, you don’t have to turn to those crappy programs on Discovery Channel,” said another. “Just last night I made a delicious and nutritious soup out of just dust, an old t shirt and some old leaves I found outside on the lawn. The End of the World and the End of the Month are actually synonymous terms.”

Even the resulting global shortage of alcohol – an immediate red flag – wouldn’t be a tragedy.

“Have you ever been to UCT?” said one civil engineer in an anorak on upper campus. “Half of us brew our own beer. Come on, Apocalypse. You can do better than that.”

The research team has since found that the only people more prepared that students for the apocalypse are “most Zimbabweans” – and they agree.

“We survived Meteorite Mugabe and Megastorm Zanu. Frankly, I hear South African xenophobes call us ‘cockroaches’ and I’m flattered because it’s proof we’ll outlive all those bigoted arseholes,” said Harare resident Tendai Mutenga. “When the Four Horsemen arrive and destroy civil society as we know it, Zim probably welcome the massive upgrades with a national celebration and public holiday.”

Members of the Zanu-PF government have, however, said that Zimbabwe will not enter the Apocalypse any time soon.

"People mustn't think the Apocalypse is coming," said PR manager for the political party. "We simply aren't in a position to enact those kinds of upgrades to law, infrastructure and general society right now - we'd have to wait until 'elections' at the very least."

Pics: Creative Commons

Mass media Christmas comes early

The global mass media are singing in jubilation today, after a religiously and racially motivated suicide bombing carried out by two interracial handicapped Ebola-infected pregnant lesbians killed 253 people in a mall during a hurricane last weekend.

Current death estimates now include at least 182 white people, three famous premiere league footballers, eighteen children with adorable family photos and one middling pop star.

“This really is the story of a lifetime,” said Chief News Editor for SkyNews Miss Leigh Dzew. “Just look at it: it ticks all the boxes – sex, death, religion, race, football, pop culture and the weather? I mean, we would have been just happy with such a death toll of white faces – especially when they’re children – but we also get dealt a hand that includes themes of gun control, terrorism, sex and football stars AND celebrities? It’s almost too good to be true!”

“The space for news coverage here is infinite, endless,” said the CEO of SkyNews while trying to hide an enormous money-erection. “We can have on-air debates between violently disagreeing sides. We can open up comments sections. We can cover minute details of each of the victims’ lives. We can go on a no-holds-barred in-depth expose of the killers’ histories, childhoods, favourite brand of breakfast cereal, everything. This is billions of pageviews. It’s innumerable online comments, reaction blogs and reader flamewars. It’s thousands of hours of television. God, just think how much advertising revenue that is!”

Many editors have welcomed the news with huge smiles, saying what it a relief has been – particularly in light of the news dry season they’ve been suffering.

“We’ve had a bit of a tough time these past few weeks,” said editor of the Sunday Times, Tabby Loids. “Sure, we’ve had Boko Haram, Ebola, shooting sprees and Russian missile strikes to keep us busy cranking the arm of our fear machine, but what with Mandela’s death naught but a distant memory and Oscar’s trial now having a reached a premature end, we’ve been grasping at straws. I mean, we have been coping – you know, derailing focus from massive scientific achievements and simultaneously throwing a smoke bomb over the real, invisible issues of an entire scientific industry by having pages-long coverage of an ugly shirt – but it’s been hard.”

Many other news editors agree.

“This is more than we could have dreamed of,” said another. “I mean, I was crossing my fingers for a school bus full of children to be kidnapped or their school shot up by a psychopathic madman, or maybe for a corrupt oil company to cause a massive spill that utterly devastates hundreds of miles of pristine coast line and drives an entire species of marine birdlife into extinction, but this… we’d never thought it would come like this. This is Christmas, Easter, Hanukkah, Eid, Thanksgiving, Martin Luther King Day and all of our birthdays wrapped in one beautiful, rare package.”

Editors’ only fears, they now say, is that they have too much on their plate.

“We are an industry of capable of creating a planetwide system of unnecessary panic and baseless fear around a disease 99.999% of all humans will never get (we do this every few years, even though you’re more likely to die choking on this blogsite),” said Loids. “So how are we supposed to deal with such extensive and rich subject matter?”

News analysts now say that this coming coverage could potentially cause mass riots, copycat attacks and global hysteria by perhaps as early as next Friday – a prospect that has editors on the edge of their seats.

“We have to be very careful with this story,” said Lee. “One word out of place, one misplaced fact, one incorrect quotation… and we could miss out on what may be the news event we’ve all been waiting for.”

Pic: Public Domain, from US National Archives (524396 NARA National Archives and Records Administration)

Government begins campaign to improve graffiti

Bad graffiti and the defacement of public property has long been a stain on our society, but finally the Department of Education is striking back. Today, the Minister of Education has announced a much-needed injection of almost 3 billion Rand into South African schools, aimed at improving students’ grammar and punctuation so that, “at the very least, our schools will be vandalised and defaced in an educated and correctly-spelled manner.”

“Have you seen some of our students’ tags and ‘art’?” asked the Minister at a press conference in Pretoria. “I mean, Jake waz heer? Blu Klan Gang 4 lyf? Have we so failed our children that they can’t even deface public property in a respectable, grammatically sound way? They say ‘fuk da police’, but why? We hope that this new boost will enable our children to at least have an empirically-based and nuanced critique of our problematic police force and why, exactly, we should ‘fuk’ them.”

The cash boost follows on the heels of a damning study commissioned by the Institute of Public Art, which recently found that a “made-up but very high” percentage of gang-affiliated graffiti contained innumerable spelling, grammar and punctuation errors.

“While this widespread creativity and love of art is a sign of promise in the next generation,” said the sixty-page report, “their inability to differentiate between ‘to’, ‘too’ and ‘two’, or ‘your’ and ‘you’re’, or even ‘were’, ‘we’re’ and ‘where’, is something that needs to be immediately addressed.”

This isn't the first time South African education has been drastically altered to suit contemporary trends, and despite government officials remaining obstinate that "a Matric isn't easy", teachers have embraced the new introductions.

“The system of basic education is failing many thousands of little obnoxious shits I’m legally obliged to call ‘students’,” said a High School maths teacher in Kwazulu-Natal. “If we don’t do something now, we’ll forever be doomed to see ‘fuck’ spelt without the ‘c’ on our trains, buildings and public spaces.”

The new educational fund is also aimed at improving students’ limited or incorrect knowledge of human anatomy as depicted in erroneous and crude tags.

“Most graffiti pictures of genitalia are not anatomically correct,” said one biology teacher. “For example, most crudely sprayed penises on industrial buildings disregard the usual kinks, bends and demographically relevant size proportions of the average male; the same can be said for roughly painted breasts or hastily tagged vaginas. They are just in no way indicative of real breasts, and don’t convey even half the complexity or sophisticated anatomical structures of the female reproductive organs.”

Government opinion remains divided on the matter, with some claiming that "education is not in a crisis in South Africa" and others admitting that education in South Africa would be "a terrible idea", but at the end of the day, the decision has excited great number of school kids.

“I’ve already been working on a new series of tags,” said a grade-ten learner. “I think it’s gonna blow people away.”

Artists depiction: before education program.

Artist's depiction: after education program.

Pics: Grafitti, Matthew de Klerk. Wall (both edits): Creative Commons.

Nazis protest 'grammar Nazis'

Facebook users and English literature students came under a scathing attack from notorious underground political group the New Nationalist Fascist Party this morning, with group organisers releasing a strongly-worded document against these people, saying their actions as so-called “Grammar Nazis” was giving real Nazis a bad name.

“It’s bad enough that everyone thinks we’re a bunch of bigoted, supremacist jerks,” said NNFP leader Seig Heyel, “but now we have to contend with the world thinking that we’re such small-minded literary snobs that we’ll correct your individual grammar and spelling errors whenever you post something at us on Facebook.”

The group now says that it is taking a stand.

“We just don’t get it,” said Heyel. “Why would you deride and despise someone for something as trivial and skin-deep as their ability to spell ‘you’re’ with an apostrophe and an extra ‘e’, or know the difference between ‘two’, ‘to’, and ‘too’? There are plenty of other perfectly acceptable and literally skin-deep reasons to hate people.”

The secret, he says, is to forget and forgive.

”We all know it’s spelt ‘lynch’ and ‘supremacist’, and that ‘black bastards’ is spelt with no ‘e’s,” he said, “but at the end of the day it’s the message, and not the material, that matters.”

In spite of this sudden counter to keyboard warriors across the internet, not all separatist political factions agree with this sentiment.

“We can totally see where these Grammar Nazis are coming from, but really we shouldn’t be so forgiving,” said Olly Impas of the Photography Stalinists. “Whenever I see someone shooting with the wrong settings, not correctly applying the rule of thirds, or cutting off arms, hands, heads and feet in their shot framing, it makes me want to shoot them, or cut off their arms, hands, heads and feet – just not with my camera.

He added that he would use a gun or a machete.

“Some of these illiterate pricks out there don’t even know what an ironic play on words is .

Others, too, have reacted harshly to the NNFP’s attack.

“These facebook users are totally justified,” said one student. “I mean, if you’re going to hurl bigoted invective and racial slurs you have to be presentable and sound like you know what you’re talking about. Otherwise, why should we take your arguments in favour of a Fourth Reich seriously?

Star-soul: your horoscopes 2014

• Capricorn - as the months past and your zodiac aligns with the ancient Grecian constellations of yore, you’ll have a birthday, turning yet another yet older. This will potentially be followed (or in some rare cases, preceded) by Christmas and then by an Easter, a St Patrick’s Day, and three or four bank holidays. But I mean, what were you expecting? Your star-sign is a goat. If you were something more badass, like maybe a dragon, or a cheetah, or even a honeybadger or something, then maybe it would be a different story. But you're not, and so it isn't. Enjoy the mediocrity, goatboy.

  

• Aries – As the moon wanes away from its strongest position in your zodiac, you’ll be suddenly struck with jealousy that you’re not a badass Taurus or a Virgo, whose monthly horoscopes are always way, way better than yours. As they move into financial success and romantic endeavours, you’ll stay at home and brood on what a lonely, lonely existence you lead, and how suicide, quite frankly, is looking evermore enticing at this point in time.

  

• Virgo - You’ll be told three lies and one truth by a writer. You’ll also have great business success, amazing sex, and a swathe of fantastic opportunities to travel to new and exciting places. You’ll also breathe air.

  

• Cancer – This is not your horoscope. I know you. You’re another star sign, like a Capricorn or something, and you’re going through these, maybe seeing how your friends’ or ex-girlfriends’ starsigns are this month. I mean, are you so mean-spiritedly myopic that you really think your ex's life is hell because a bunch of stars say so? Just read your own starsign, okay? Stop being so shallow.

  

• Gemini – With your strongest star in retrograde, you’ll probably die.

  

• Taurus – A mystery appears. You’ll eat some food, and drink some water, and maybe even work up the effort to go down to the gym and do something on the treadmill, maybe some bench presses. I dunno. This month isn’t too special, bro. I wouldn’t count on being blown away.

  

• Scorpio – As Mercury enters the third house, and your zodiac constellation crosses over the dominant chi and energy lines in the sky, you’ll be struck with the realisation of what a bunch of BS this horoscope stuff really is. As you zodiac shifts across other celestial bodies, new knowledge - in the form of finally being aware of how little confidence you have in your own decisions and life that you need a back-pat from a 100-word bit of encouraging text on page 13 of a 45c tabloid - will be gifted to you.

  

• Libra As your sign enters its strongest house, you’ll be met by a string of good fortune and favour, with financial success, romantic prospects and opportunities for self-improvement abounding. We're not kidding, we looked this stuff up. The science is sound. It's gonna be a great month.

  

• Pisces - As your sign enters its strongest house, you’ll be met by a string of good fortune and favour, with financial success, romantic prospects and opportunities for self-improvement abounding. This is not the same as the last one, we promise. Totally different sign to the one above, bro. We swear. Scout’s honour.

  

• Leo - the fearsome lion, Leo is most comfortable with calming quiet energies. Unless you aren't. In which case this month will bring a rush of adrenaline unlike any other. Fast cars, drugs, women - it's all yours, just reach out and take it. Unless you're the other kind of Leo, in which case quiet your mind and let the universe take control. This is your life, yes, but you don't have to be responsible for every minute detail. Inhale. Exhale. Live. Be at peace. Unless you're the other kind of Leo, in which case take another line of cocaine and stretch life's ass over the table of adolescent zeal and give it a ride it will never forget. Live young, love freely. The future isn't now, and old age is a train that runs us all down. Be loud. Be proud. Unless, you know, you're the other kind of Leo.

  

• Aquarius - As you read this, you'll realise that you're a 23-year-old man who is making fun of horoscopes by actually writing pretty reasonable horoscopes that many might not realise are satire. Suddenly struck by how exhausting it is to produce this kind of work and have it misunderstand, you'll slowly succumb to fatigue, and probably won't even have the energy to finish this sent

  

• Sagittarius - God, there are twelve of these to write. How do horoscope writers not repeat themselves? I mean, it should be very easy to write universally-applicable descriptions of very people who are all incredibly different, but it isn't. I mean, do you know how much of a creative liar you have to be when you make these? You have to constantly cross-reference yourself to see that you haven't said the same garbage in earlier signs. It's like a 12-sided Rubik's cube. I don't even know what to say. You'll make money, or something.

  

Pics: Wikimedia Commons.

“Some Races Better Than Others” – Institute of Race Studies

“We have to face the uncomfortable truth” –Lead Director IIRS

Controversy ruled today, after a panel of scientists and researchers at the International Institute for Race Studies confirmed a very controversial belief: that some races are inherently superior to others.

“For many years, the uncomfortable notion has been hanging around in the air, and we don’t want to stir the pot,” said Lead Researcher for the IIRS, Kay Kakay. “But when you look at the data, certain patterns begin to emerge that confirm this unpopular belief: that some races are just vastly inferior when compared to others. This isn’t just skin-deep any more. It’s fact.”

Kakay said that the decades-old liberal view – that all races were created equal and are equal in society – is just outmoded and wrong. He outlined the damning data that they had uncovered in their fact-finding mission.

“First of all, some races are shorter than others. While this isn’t the deal-breaker, it is certainly something to be cognisant of as we move forward,” he said, pointing at graphs, charts and Latin words that confirmed what he was reading was Pure Science. “Next, if we look into statistical surveys conducted with people in each of these races, they admit to certain character flaws that prop up what some consider a very ‘backward’ belief."

"For example, people in one kind of race often tend to be lazier or not as hard working as the more committed, dedicated and hard-working people in another. And in some races, even the most highly respected members of the community are eventually revealed to be nothing but a bunch of drug-addicted cheats and contemptible liars. It’s disgusting.”

The disconcerting evidence has been widely supported, at least in the South African community.

“Finally!” said a man holding braai tongs. “All this blerrie PC pussy-footing of okes too scared to not skirt around the truth. I’ve always thought some races was just utterly pointless, stupid and a waste of time, and now I know that I’ve always been right. Some races are obviously superior and deserve to be encouraged and supported.”

With all this scientific data, scientists and sociologists now admit that it is “totally permissible and indeed factually correct” to hate certain races, or prefer some races over others.

“Personally, I can’t stand those lazy bastards in the Two Oceans,” said one Johannesburg-based man. “The Comrades Marathon and the Tour de France are simply far, far superior.”

Pic: National Cancer Insititute and wikimedia commons