Suicide Cube: a digression

This purported plaything—this "Old Brand Magic Square"—is an artifact of a world on the brink.

When suicidefoodist symbolism is so prevalent, so commonplace, so expected that it turns up on the plasticrap from China's tireless pollution spigots, something has gone very wrong.

Is this how they see us? Is this what we've become?

When they were nailing down the details of this specimen of pre-landfill detritus, how did the discussion go?

"What graphics should we put on this thing?"

"Something Americans like."

"So, maybe a beach scene? People in sunglasses, lounging on towels?"

"No, no. You know, something all-American."

"What, like a baseball player?"

"That's good, but it's just not there. We want something that'll make any American consumer respond, you know?"

"Pig working a barbecue?"

"That's gold!"

"We're on it."

What does it say about us that we are so intimately associated with this bizarre fetish—this craving for animals whose suicidal participation is meant to provide our atonement? (Or worse, whose participation is interpreted as a humorous nullification of our responsibilities?)

That a pig tending a presumably pig-cooking barbecue is now a generic image suitable for the crummy jetsam of our dying world is almost more than we can bear.