1. Aliens aren't real.
2. They need something from the trash heap this planet has become.
3. They find our slapstick bumbling hilarious.
4. They pity our pathetic existence.
Fortunately for us, number one is the most likely.
If they were real, we'd be in serious danger, because we're stupid, wasteful, greedy jerks to our host planet. Off the top of my head, I can think of five things that would make aliens say, "WTF?" and then whip out their laser guns and just go to town on the human race (or at least, America).
1. Phone Books.
Phone books are probably the biggest waste of time, money and paper in modern history. Every so often, some mystery person leaves a new phone book on my porch. Probably in the middle of the night so I won't catch him or her and tell them not to drop that piece of plastic wrapped piece of dog poop on my porch.
You might say what? Mindy, you can't be serious; aliens would not vaporize us just because we still have phone books.
Before you give me that SE grin, think about it.
Every year, an estimated 650,000 TONS of phone books are delivered to over 100 million American homes.
Out of those, the EPA estimates that only 117,000 tons of those phone books are recycled each year. The Product Stewardship Institute estimates the cost to recycle them is around $60 million a year. Sixty million dollars just to get rid of something nobody even wanted in the first place!
And that's just the financial side of equation. If aliens aren't real sticklers about money and the wasteful spending of it, they might think differently about the environment.
1,474,000 metric tons of CO2-equivalents of greenhouse gas emissions are created every year from producing those terrible "books." And who's the genius that started calling them "books?" There are no whimsical illustrations, no paragraphs, no delightful dialogue between witty protagonists, and no discernible plot, unless you call their very existence a plot hatched by our government to kill the planet as quickly as possible.
There are other impacts of producing 650,000 tons of paper, like the 44.2 billion liters of water required, and other harder to quantify impacts like the loss of forests and the eutrification of rivers.
 |
| Just so you can have your effing phone book. |
So, phone books are stupid and may get us killed by angry aliens.
2. The American Penny.
A couple years ago, there was a lot of hullabaloney about the US Mint announcing they would cease production of the one cent coin. It made sense--not cents, ha ha--to eliminate production of a coin worth one cent yet cost 1.4 cents to make (as of 2015). And that's just the cost of making them. Transporting the 9,155,000 million pennies made in 2015 to banks and ultimately to somewhere between your couch cushions is extremely expensive.
 |
| She looks way too happy for the approximately 36 cents she just found. |
Not only were pennies expensive to mint, but mining the metals required to make them are hazardous to the environment. Pennies are about 3% virgin copper and 97% virgin zinc. Zinc mines are terrible. There's a giant one in Alaska called the Red Dog Mine who made the news a few years back as being the EPA's #1 Polluter. Although it seems like the Red Dog Mine has somewhat cleaned up their act, they're still responsible for lots and lots of pollution so Americans can cuddle with their little circles of worthless nostalgia.
Knowing aliens, they'll probably vaporize every single penny and make us watch before they melt the flesh off our bodies.
3. The History Channel.
God forbid aliens land on Earth, check in to the nearest Hilton, and turn on the TV. Flipping through the channels, they might be initially delighted to find a channel called "History." I can imagine their horror while they gape slack jawed at an episode of "Swamp People." I can also imagine them laughing their a$$es off through an episode of "Ancient Aliens." And I can imagine them finally deciding we're really too stupid to live as bumbling rednecks stumble through an episode of "Bigfoot Captured."
If this channel defines our "history," we are truly doomed to die by alien intervention. I love the way Cracked.com charted out History's offerings.
4. Donald Trump even being considered for President.
 |
| That;s deep. |
I won't go into this too much so as not to ruffle political feathers, but trust me, the aliens would kill us for this.
5. Our Utter Mismanagement of Our Planet
It would take about three nanoseconds for a superior alien race to realize we have bungled up life as God intended for us. We are a culture of excess and waste, and we've destroyed or are in the process of destroying things vital to the survival of our planet. Like honeybees, and water, and breathable air.
Even Stephen Hawking said, "If aliens ever visit us, I think the outcome would be much as when Christopher Columbus first landed in America, which didn't turn out very well for the Native Americans,"
But there's a difference between those Native Americans and the Americans of today. Those Native Americans were doing things right, and Chris Columbus and his goons were worse than jerks and bullies, they were rapists, thieves and murderers.
If aliens came to our planet today, they'd pretty much have a just cause to wipe us out.
So, aliens, if you're reading this, please don't wipe us out before finding those of us who really care.
Take us with you.
#Trump2016