FAQ: The Darwin Awards are written by . . . a woman!?
Wendy writes the stories, but the heart and soul of the Darwin Awards is our community. We maintain a vibrant network of contributors and keep this cultural icon connected to its community.
Yes, Wendy is a woman. That makes the Darwin Awards a kinder, gentler place. She deals with flames sympathetically. She says NO! to racial stereotypes and just-plain-mean submissions. When community or family complain, she listens respectfully to their point of view. These discussions lead to facts being corrected; sometimes the story is removed, other times the family takes solace from knowing that their loss is at least a “safety lesson” to help others avoid the same mistake.
FAQ: What do the families think?
If a family writes to us, we take their concerns seriously. Sometimes we remove the story. We don’t want to cause anyone pain. Sometimes the family realizes that their loss has a little more meaning if it serves as a cautionary tale that might save someone else’s life. Often they even confide prior foolhardy things that the winner did.
Like an Irish wake, it can be healing to laugh while you grieve. That’s human nature.
Sometimes families write to share a memory. From a recent email:
“Many years ago my two uncles started roughhousing at our Christmas gathering. At one point Uncle Frank picked up Uncle John by the heels, lost his grip, and dropped Uncle John on his head. It was all right because John was a state supreme court justice and there for life. The other uncle is, I am sure, in your archive. The one about the skydiving photographer who forgot to put on a chute . . .”
Where’s the Shoot? Where’s the Chute?
http://darwinawards.com/darwin/darwin1994-12.html
FAQ: I have kids. Am I safe?
You passed along your genes. You’re safe!
The broader question is whether a person with offspring has opted out of a Darwin Award. Our community engages in inconclusive discussions about what it means to be out of the gene pool. What if the winner has already reproduced? Obviously a winner with no kids is more “out of the gene pool” than one who leaves behind several ankle biters, so shouldn’t rug rats rule you out?
What about a vow of celibacy, is that an automatic win? What if the nominee has an identical twin, and his DNA is still running around trying to reproduce? How about old people who aren’t able to have any (more) kids—are the elderly disqualified? And the whole topic of cryogenics is troubling. Unbeknownst to us, have so-called winners left frozen sperm and eggs laying around? If cloning humans becomes feasible (it is already possible), Darwin Awards might cease to exist!
These questions are vexing. And the answers . . . we just don’t know. The rule of thumb is, if you no longer have the physical wherewithal to breed with a mate on a desert island, you are out of the gene pool.
FAQ: Are humans really evolving?
Yes! Although technological advances have extended the average lifespan, the mechanism of evolution still applies: (1) a species must show variation; (2) that variation must be inheritable; (3) not all members of the population survive to reproduce; but (4) the inherited characteristics of some members make them more likely to do so. Not only are humans still evolving, we are doing it faster than ever before. There is solid evidence that human evolution has accelerated dramatically in the past ten thousand years.15
“Stupidity is the only universal capital crime . . . and execution is carried out automatically.”
—Robert Heinlein Time Enough for Love
“Survival of the fittest ” alters a species gradually—over thousands of generations—or quickly when it eliminates the dodo who does not avoid the club. It eliminates with equal ease the bird that flies into a window and the driver who weaves around the freeway yakking on a phone. Without a doubt, humans are “really” evolving. We won’t recognize ourselves in a hundred thousand years.
But whether the Darwin Awards represent human evolution is less clear. Is there a set of genes that causes a man to kite board during a hurricane (p. 223) or a woman to chase a feather (p. 105) off a cliff? Do chromosomes play a role in the decision to jump into a dust devil? (p. 236) These actions do not appear to have a direct genetic link.
Here at Darwin Central, all we know is that a person who does not survive through his own acts is manifestly less fit than the rest of us. Said genes are ipso facto gone from the future, and we can only hope there is a genetic link because that means the next generation will see fewer people shooting stashes of dynamite, (p. 146) staging risky accidents for insurance (p. 123), or anchoring boats with ordnance (p. 151).
FAQ: Isn’t there something beautiful about moronic creativity?
Yes, there is indeed a poetic beauty here. The well-planned Darwin Award can illustrate the creativity and genius that distinguishes us from less adaptable species. The same innovative spirit that causes the downfall of a Darwin Award winner is also responsible for the social and scientific advances that make the human race great. Cheese, flight, electricity, and small businesses are some of the benefits to having risk takers living (and dying) among us.
FAQ: Why so many men?
“Is a feminist conspiracy at work in the selection of the candidates? ”
—Concerned Reader
Nearly all of the submissions for this ignominious Award are on behalf of male perps. Ten percent or fewer are female, and of those 10 percent, more are likely to be At-Risk Survivors. Pure observation leads us to conclude that males are risk takers and driven to daring feats. It’s a gender difference. Get over it.
FAQ: Why do we laugh about death?
Laughter helps us cope with tragedy.
Wendy says, “I see a little of myself in every story. As one of the world’s biggest klutzes my final hour will likely find me clutching a Darwin Award. If so, I hope my family and friends will laugh through their tears and say, That’s just like Wendy. Oh, she was such an idiot!
Why are the Darwin Awards funny? Readers wax eloquent on the subject:“Eventually you die. That ’s life. And fifty years later you die again because everybody has forgotten you. But if your exit is news-worthy, there’s a good chance you will be remembered within your own family, at least. The Darwin Award winners of today will have their memories cherished longer, by more people, than those who die peacefully in bed.”
“ Want to feel like a genius? Next time you feel foolish or incompetent, read a few and you will soon realize how brilliant you really are compared to the morons out there.”
“Just makes you feel better about your own intelligence.”
“One truly admires those individuals whose efforts at immortality lift the veil of depression from the rest of us mortals stuck on this rock.”
“You think you’ve got troubles?”
“They make me feel like a genius.”
“Sometimes truth is funny, even if it’s tragic.”
FAQ: What inspired you to do this?
Waiting for science experiments to run their courses is, at times, tedious. In the gaps, Wendy learned how to make a website from a Stanford sysadmin, back when the WWW was first invented. The Internet was young then and changing quickly. The excitement of learning how to shape this new media was the driving force behind her first website, which originally included a section called “Pet Porn” that showed innocent gag pictures of family pets: a kitten sleeping with a sexy negligee, the dog accidentally French-kissing Papa. Soon the annoyed sysadmin complained that Wendy’s Pet Porn pages were the top-visited destination on his Stanford server. Ewww! Creeped out, she pulled down the pet pictures. The Darwin Awards stories were the second-most popular, and Wendy jibes, “My future could have gone either way.”
Ancillary FAQ: What are your aspirations?
Wendy aspires to make the world a shinier place.
Wendy plans to publish a graphic novel drawn by favorite comic book artists!
Wendy yearns to become a science writer astute enough to write a book as elegant as Carl Sagan’s cl
assic, The Dragons of Eden.
Wendy hopes her children’s book—True Adventures of Rock, Paper, and Scissors, squirrels raised from babies to live in the wild—will soon find a publisher.
Wendy dreams of being a science advisor for MythBusters. (See MythBusters challenge, p. 184).
FAQ: How many stories? How many books? How many more?
In your hands you hold the sixth book.
In April 2010, there were 84216 stories on the website. Seven hundred have been published in six books in twenty-three languages. The Darwin Awards will live until the supply ends! Or until Wendy wins a Darwin Award while executing her latest mad plan innovative idea.
FAQ: Are you making a movie, musical, or TV show?
Darwin Awards: The Movie stars Joseph Fiennes and Winona Ryder, with guest appearances by MythBusters hosts Jamie and Adam, and the rock band Metallica. This movie is seriously silly fun. It was written and directed by Finn Taylor and filmed in the San Francisco Bay Area using plenty of stellar local talent. Check it out on DVD!
Darwin Awards: The Musical is a sensational stage play composed by Stephen Witkin, Joey Miller, and Mitch Magonet and is coming to a theatrical stage near you. When Stephen told me he wanted to write a musical, I reached for the Q-tips. A musical?! But his ideas and script are awesome. Beach Blanket Babylon meets Avenue Q. Great songs have been composed, and the show continues to be developed while seeking Off-Broadway producers.
FAQ: Do you drive while using a cell phone?
NO! And you shouldn’t either.
Cell phones take too much attention away from the input you ought to attend to. Humans are not equipped to use these devices safely even while walking down the street, or piloting a shopping cart. A person on a cell phone does not notice the needs of others. In the supermarket you will not realize that you are causing aisle congestion. In a car you will drive slower and more erratically. It is very risky to drive “under the influence” of a phone.
We here at Darwin Central have made personal life changes due to reading thousands of Darwin-dumb submissions. The hardest change was to stay off our cell phones while driving. Try putting that deadly device in the backseat. Whatever it takes, get off the phone!
The life you save may be your own.
What were those Five (5) Rules, again?
Remember: To win a Darwin Award, an adult must eliminate himself from the gene pool in an astonishingly stupid way that is verifiably true.1. Death.
2. Excellence.
3. Self-selection.
4. Maturity.
5. Veracity.
APPENDIX A
SURVIVAL TIPS
Lessons learned from the stories in this book: Do not dunk your food into lab chemicals, however zesty.
Do not walk into a lion’s cage during feeding time.
Do not swim in crocodile-infested waters.
Do not leap aboard a wild stag.
Do not lick an electrical cord that has fallen into cake batter.
Do not warm your buns inside a shrink-wrap oven.
Do not head-butt a coconut to prove a point.
Do not exit a fast-moving vehicle to prove that walking is faster.
Do not exit a fast-moving vehicle to prove that street-skating is safe.
Do not drive with a lit cigarette and a lap full of firecrackers.
Do not toss dynamite through the floorboards of your car.
Do not warm a can of paint in the oven.
Do not warm a can of lighter fuel on the stove.
Do not stick your head inside a microwave oven.
Do not leap from iceberg to iceberg, even if you can.
Do not do pull-ups on gigantic ski-lift wheels.
Do not demolish a building’s supports while standing beneath it.
Do not allow yourself to be lowered into raw sewage.
Do not fix electronics while sitting on a metal toilet.
Do not muffle an explosion between your thighs.
Do not encourage a fish to swim up your urethra.
Do not romance a bench.
Do not romance a flower vase.
Do not romance a metal pipe, a raccoon, or a toilet fixture.
Do not surf on a foam air mattress.
Do not chase a feather off a cliff.
Do not steal a plane and take it on a drunken joyride.
Do not attempt to stop a train by standing in front of it.
Do not sleep in a path used by military vehicles.
Do not attach a parachute to your body and toss it out the sunroof.
Do not become mesmerized by the lyrics on your car’s radio.
Do not pay back a friend by blowing up his car.
Do not dispose of suspicious dynamite by shooting it.
Do not anchor your boat with an antique bomb.
Do not fill your air mattress with flammable gas, particularly while smoking.
Do not destroy a wasp’s nest with gasoline and a match.
Do not fiddle with electric wires while standing in a Jacuzzi.
Do not fiddle with electric wires while standing in a bathtub.
Do not fiddle with electric wires while standing in the rain.
Do not urinate on high voltage electrical wires, or wasp nests, or both.
Do not rappel from an electrical tower.
Do not stick the hose of an air compressor in your anus.
Do not drill into a can of paint.
Do not treat a snakebite with a Taser.
Do not load a washing machine with firecrackers.
Do not shoot yourself, even with a soft putty bullet.
Do not disguise yourself with metallic spray paint.
Do not take your kite board surfing in a hurricane.
Do not slide down a one-thousand-foot cliff face.
Do not slide down a glacier.
Do not stand directly in the path of a falling tree.
Do not examine the workings of an active tennis ball machine.
Do not leap into a large dust devil whirlwind.
Do not regard helium balloons as a mode of transportation.
Do not toss paint cans into a fire.
Do not toss propane cylinders into a fire.
Be wary of driving a motorized bar stool while drunk.
Be wary of protecting your car with a homemade electric fence.
Be wary of proving to your peers that your homemade bomb is safe.
Be wary of digging a deep tunnel beneath your house.
Be wary of digging a deep hole in wet sand.
Be wary of leaping over a sharp, pointy fence.
Be wary of wrapping yourself in plastic to lose weight.
Be wary of baking liquor-flavored cakes at a high temperature.
Be wary of overestimating the amount of explosives you need.
Be wary of pouring liquid oxygen on a fire.
Be wary of shooting soda cans from a homemade cannon.
Be wary of celebrating Independence Day with a homemade cannon.
Be wary of celebrating Independence Day with a washer full of firecrackers.
Staging a car accident is no way to obtain prescription drugs.
Staging a car accident is no way to get your insurance policy to pay up.
Staging a lion attack is no way to avoid the Draft.
It is not necessarily fun to seal yourself in a train station locker.
And always, always look before you leak.
APPENDIX B
STAFF BIOGRAPHIES
Wendy Northcutt is the klutz behind the Darwin Awards. Wendy is a scientist and graduate of UC Berkeley with a degree in molecular biology. She began writing the Darwin Awards in 1993 and is the founder of www.DarwinAwards.com. She is the author of five previous Darwin Awards collections, and has also written and edited dozens of medical science essays. Wendy chases eclipses, hoop dances, reads comic books, enjoys natural dyes and silkwork, and pets cats whenever she can.
Kevin Buckley (kevinbuckleystudios.com) is a freelance write
r/illustrator who has worked for such companies as TimeGate Studios and Pulsar Games Inc., and was a top-ten finalist in Platinum Studio’s Comic Book Challenge 2007 for his comic, The Strange and Many Eyes of Dr. LeFaux. He has a master’s degree in Illustration from the Academy of Art University in San Francisco, where he continues to live and work alongside his ever-faithful cat, Max.
Ariane La Gauche is Wendy Northcutt’s right-hand (or left-hand?) woman. She discovered the Darwin Awards as a UC Berkeley undergrad, when she spent long hours reading humorous stories online as a way of avoiding homework. Little did she know she would someday be working behind the scenes! Now based at Darwin Headquarters, Ariane corresponds with fans, does the odd bit of story editing, and feeds people. She has also sprinkled numerous enchanting turns of phrase like pixie dust on these pages. She is also a graduate student in literature. If you ask nicely, Ariane might translate the Darwin Awards into Latin. Really! www.DarwinAwards.com/contact/ariane
Robert Adler (author of “Sex on the Brain”) is a freelance science and technology writer who divides his time between Santa Rosa, California, and Oaxaca, Mexico. With a lifelong interest in science, an undergraduate degree in physics and mathematics, a PhD in psychology, and many years as a clinical and neuropsychologist, he’s been lucky enough to have the opportunity to write about a surprising range of topics, from the Big Bang and black holes to multiple personalities and how to predict failed states. He’s the author of hundreds of science and technology news and feature storiesplus three books, mostrecently Medical Firsts: From Hippocrates to the Human Genome (Wiley, 2004). He’s thrilled to appear in the Darwin Awards as the still-living author of an essay, rather than—as his wife continues to predict—the honored but unfortunately deceased recipient of a Darwin Award.
The Darwin Awards Countdown to Extinction Page 17
