Smoking is bad for you, sure. Drinking is bad for you, I guess. It can be. Except for those times when it’s good for you. Eating too much is terrible for you, but not eating enough is just as bad, if not worse. And the food itself is laced with enough fat, transfat, cholesterol, corn syrup and chemicals that it’s killing us whether we eat it or just occupy the same room it’s in. Everything we own is killing us – our cell phones, our microwaves, our cleaning supplies and our asbestos.
Know those things doctors use to see if we’re dying inside? Yeah, X-rays. Those kill us. And you know that thing doctors do to actually go inside of us to stop us from dying? Surgery? That can kill us too.
Spending too much time in the sun can kill you, but so can spending too much time in the lightning.
Sex is actually good for you, unless you do it too vigorously, in which case it can give you a heart attack, sexually transmitted diseases or an alien baby that will spring forth from your chest without the proper vaccine.
But you knew all this already. So what the hell is killing us now, you ask? The very thing you’re doing now, as a matter of fact. No, not reading, although I can’t see how that’s possibly good for you either. I mean the other thing – sitting.
Now granted, just sitting all day, every day isn’t good for anyone. You’ll get fat and your arteries will clog and it’ll lead to the same thing vigorous sex leads to – chest-popping alien babies. We all need to exercise. But the headline of the article, in case you are one of these pathological sitters who is so lazy you can’t even click to it, clearly says “Sitting Will Kill You, Even If You Exercise.”
Well that is fucking fantastic.
Why don’t we all start stabbing ourselves near vital organs because what the hell else can we do? Combatting occasional sitting with exercise isn’t enough? Are we supposed to constantly exercise? Like, 16 hours a day, nonstop? We literally cannot stop running, skipping and jump-jacking everywhere we go?
How are we supposed to get to work? Should we all move to the city and walk? No more driving or taking the subway or even biking to the office, I guess. Nothing that involves a seat, right? And what do we do when we get there? We all supposed to become personal trainers, training each other every waking hour of the day? Even professional athletes should quit athleting because at some point they all sit on the bench, even if it’s just for a few minutes. No one will be watching the games anyway, given all the seatless arenas and plummeting couch sales.
And no more enjoying a meal, I guess. The good news is restaurants will be able to cram in a lot more people without all those pesky tables in the way.
No more traveling to far away lands to explore new and exciting cultures because we have to sit inside some kind of vessel in order to get there. OR, let’s get rid of seats on airplanes! The passengers can all get in a line and leap-frog each other for the entire duration of the flight!
Giving up sitting means giving up something else too. Something fairly necessary. Crucial, even. Think about it.
That’s right. No more sitting means no more shitting.
And while sitting might be hazardous to your health, I’m pretty sure NOT SHITTING will have its own ill effects. You gonna scratch bowel movements off your daily routine?
So let’s all agree to stop this. The fact is anything and everything can kill us. Living leads to dying. Granted, some enjoyable activities should be avoided for the sake of our health, and we can avoid them while still living satisfying lives, but does every God forsaken thing that brings us even a modicum of pleasure have to be abandoned so we might live a couple more agonizing, joyless, exhausting, pathetic years?
Unless it’s something we’d all be happy to give up, like finding out its fatal to listen to jazz or to reference someone’s tweet during a newscast, can we stop with all the “studies” that find out things we already know and are designed simply to alarm the general public?
“Too much stress can kill you. Are you feeling stressed? Really? Well stop. Stop being stressed. Did you hear me? Stop it! You’re stressing out! STOP STRESSING OUT!”
Seriously, though. You know what’s good for stress? Cigarettes. Well, cigarettes and turning off all loud noises and other stimuli while taking deep breaths in a relaxed, seated position.
Damnit!
