A short history of what man covets most - STUFF

The curse of the Tokenistas

It might be wise to take a rest from our headlong rush through the history of stuff and examine a serious mutation that arose in the human genome. As a direct result of collecting tokens, a critical mass of the human race became totally disabled.

They lost their old skills of foraging, agriculture and making-do. Their poor dear hands turned into impotent appendages, only useful for endlessly counting stuff. They became little more than heads on wheels. Their iron-lungs were called automobiles and they couldn't even defecate in the forest without the aid of appliances.

With the weakening of the body came the atrophying of the brain. They could no longer think logically, but were compelled to receive wisdom through a Tell-A-Vision, which saved them the trouble of finding out stuff for themselves.

To hide their inadequacy, the disabled invented a force called "fashion". This allowed them to be admired, even though they hadn't actually done anything. Thanks to suits and ties, the disabled could recognise one another across a crowded boardroom.

In the end, the suits and ties found that they could conduct business without the need for humanity to animate them, which left many humans without a job to do - even if it was only filling up a suit. The suits and ties went on alone to become the world’s first artificial life-form.

So the human race entered the 21st century with a very serious mental and physical health problem on its hands.

The Telephone-to-Heaven

Do you remember those people who didn't do their science homework? I mentioned them in passing, back there in the dialogue. Not to be outdone, they earn a place in our story.

The humans who wanted to get all their stuff wholesale from the bearded entity, set off in search of the central warehouse. They knew that the bearded entity was last seen hanging out in the Middle East, so they decided to settle over there. They all wanted to put in a call to the mysterious force, and in the Middle East, the Telephone-to-Heaven was charged out at local rates - or so they thought.

They selected a small piece of land that didn't have much stuff to begin with. Those settlers wanted lots of stuff, so space became a big problem. There was so much stuff to deal with, that it became necessary to displace millions of natives who didn't need much stuff, to make room for all the settler's stuff.

Just to drive the point home, the settlers made a wall of stuff to go right around their territory. Like a thick outline, it defined the boundary between lots of stuff and not very much stuff at all.

Then the settlers set out to wait for the bearded entity who, according to legend, was going to deliver them from the burden of all their stuff.

Many humans were struck by the irony of this. Middle Eastern natives had inherited the cure for the curse of stuff. All the settlers had to do was to ask them for it, but they didn't.