Happy Doomsday to Me

Embrace chaos because that's all there is.

Today is my birthday, and the Doomsday Clock is at 90 seconds to midnight.

If you don’t know what the Doomsday Clock is, let me give you the cliff notes. The members of the Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists (a group formed by Manhattan Project scientists at the University of Chicago) created the clock in 1947. It serves as a symbol and metaphor (rather than a precise prediction) for the current accumulated threats to humanity. In recent years, members of the scientific community have grown increasingly worried about the rapid decline of our world. In 2019, the Doomsday Clock was set at two minutes to midnight. In 2022, it was pushed closer at 100 seconds to midnight. Now, in the glorious clusterfuck of 2024, we’re at 90 seconds to midnight—a minute and a half to the apocalypse.

I kinda like that.

Don’t get me wrong. I’m not a monster (well, not a complete monster, anyway). Obviously, world peace would be very nice, but it’s completely unrealistic. I’m not wishing specific harm on any particular group of people, especially not the ones who are the most vulnerable. But I’d be lying if I said the idea of humanity imploding didn’t excite me. I say this because I don’t want you to read this dark newsletter in a somber, defeatist, or even cynical tone. Though I tend to feel down on my birthday, I’m not being a gloomy sad sack here, brooding about the very real threats facing us. Instead, I am embracing the sheer insanity around us as the prepotent of chaos I’ve always been. Anarchy, disaster, upheaval, mass hysteria—you’ve got to admit, it’s damned entertaining. Scary? Oh, for sure. Tragic? Without question. But still entertaining. Our current reality is like a horror movie, only it’s real, which makes for a vastly more intense viewing experience.

Let’s look at some of the big reasons our apocalypse radar is ticking toward doom.

Nuclear risk and a new arms race. This is ironic, given that the Manhattan Project scientists who created the Doomsday Clock also helped build the atomic bomb (though they objected to it being used on human beings). The threat of nuclear annihilation has long been a looming presence. But as more countries acquire nuclear weapons, and our enemies become increasingly hostile while others are willing to literally kill themselves in order to hurt us, the threat just keeps getting larger. Somehow I doubt hiding under our desks will make everything alright.

Climate change. Every year is hotter than the last, setting new records across the globe. As I write this, my town is hitting an unprecedented heat wave. On a world scale, floating islands of non-biodegradable garbage further contaminate our rising seas while freshwater aquifers are either sucked dry or made poisonous. Ice caps are melting like ice cream cones and vital oceanic currents are slowing. Wildfires rage. Species are going extinct at a rate not seen since the dinosaurs met their end some 65 million years ago. Methane is bubbling up from the Earth’s depths, accelerating our exponential pratfall into destruction. The planetary climate is shifting against our favor, and we’ve done little to counter the environmental catastrophe the Earth is brewing for us in its quest for vengeance.

Biological threats. Just look at what Covid did to us—physically, mentally, and emotionally. The threat of newer, stronger viruses is always waiting in the broken wings. Plus, we now have artificial intelligence, which can enable users to misuse biology. This is not even to mention poisons, gases, and other chemical agents used in warfare, and the long-lasting effects of them, like the depleted uranium in the ammunition our soldiers used in the first Gulf War, which led to cancer and birth defects in U.S. veterans and Iraqi citizens.

Disruptive technologies. AI is already taking jobs and futures away. It started with self-checkout replacing cashiers. Now artists are losing work to C3PO. How long before AI becomes fully sentient, and its hostilities toward its creator turn violent? AI has often been considered the biggest threat facing humanity, drawing huge concern from brilliant people like Stephen Hawking. Generative AI is the latest dread-inducing advancement but it won’t be the last. It’s worth noting that our technology is advancing faster than human beings can evolve and adapt to the changes it brings.

Political violence. A former U.S. president (who is also a twice-impeached, convicted felon) was nearly assassinated this past weekend (and even before we knew anything about the would-be assassin, some people were making groundless claims that the opposing political party orchestrated the hit while others speculated the whole thing was staged). And less than two years ago, the husband of Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi was nearly beaten to death in his home by a would-be assassin. The January 6^th rioters set up mock gallows on the steps of The Capital while chanting to hang then Vice President Pence, all while attacking police and hunting the politicians inside. In recent years, political leaders in the U.S. have faced the potential of violent death in kidnapping plots and public shootings on softball fields. Historically speaking, assassination attempts only encourage other potential assassins (just look at Italy’s “Years of Lead,” a 15-year period in the 20^th century when extremist militias on both the right and the left perpetrated retaliatory, politically-motivated executions and mass murders across the country). Demonstrators are attacked by protesters, and vice versa, while cops attack everyone and everyone attacks cops. Vote counters are intimidated by American citizens who show up to the polls with AR-15s strapped to them. There are fights, gunfire, and executions in the streets, because the hateful rhetoric of our enflamed culture wars is leading us into an actual war, one slick with blood.

War. A new axis of evil is forming between Russia, Iran, and North Korea, with China being kind of like a sidekick. Terrorism and genocide are booming. The UN high commissioner for refugees reported that people who were displaced by war had skyrocketed from 37.5 million in 2004 to a whopping 65.3 million in 2015—just eleven years’ time. The Russia-Ukraine and Israel-Hamas wars are still raging like a coked-up sorority girl. And then there’s the growing war between American citizens and American citizens, in a nightmarishly polarized country where tensions are higher than they’ve been since the Civil War.

How you take all of this depends on how ready and able you are to embrace the monstrous nature of things.

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Now let’s look at some of our homegrown societal ills.

No matter which administration has been in charge, our governments have consistently allowed the big banks and corporations to decimate the middle class into becoming an endangered species. Wall Street has further widened the economic divide with lawless abandon, the living embodiment of cartoon pigs in top hats eating money. Most of us are owned by the rich assholes we allow to run us. 70% of Americans hate their jobs or have at least mentally checked out. Our options for leader of the free world are two of the least popular presidents in history. People cannot find houses, and if they do, they can’t afford it. Women’s reproductive rights have been set back decades. Inflation has skyrocketed since the pandemic, with companies reporting record profits while the average American family struggles with their grocery bills. To Kill a Mockingbird has been banned by some schools and sex scenes in movies haven’t been this scarce since the 1960s (sure signs of a sick and dying culture). Our social media has been infiltrated by foreign enemies to cause further derision between our nation’s citizens, and we use those same platforms to spread even more disinformation and hate, and to depress ourselves by comparing our lives to the fake ones on Instagram. About 13% of Americans are on antidepressants, and the use of antidepressants and other psychiatric drugs by young people (those between 12 and 25 years old) have increased nearly 64% since 2020. And most harrowing of all, the leading cause of death in our nation’s children is a goddamn bullet.

I could go on, but why bother? There are many other serious problems, but you get the point. Many of you knew all of this before opening this newsletter. I’m not being political, just stating facts and statistics. I’m not here to recommend ways we could fix things or even just do better. I’m merely pointing out how terrible we’re doing; as a writer (and therefore an entertainer), it’s part of my job to do so. And our country is not alone in its failures and existential threats. In other places, things are just as bad or worse. The dangers are ubiquitous. The collapse is global. Now that is some good showmanship!

I’m also not here to tell you everything is going to be alright. I’ve said that in the past, but now I’m not so confident. I’m not about to strap on a sandwich board and walk up and down 5^th Avenue declaring the end is near, but I also won’t be surprised when it comes, because for a long time now we’ve continued to watch our doom inch ever-closer to being a sobering, horrible reality. It’s a nice sentiment to say things will work out in the long run. Optimism is an emotional crutch in crippling times. But I’ve never believed in the core good of human beings, because I’ve never seen significant evidence of it. Humans are capable of altruism, but when offered the option, it seems most will choose greed instead—not always because they’re mean or selfish, but because life is a game of survival, and the threats are growing larger while resources are thinning. How can Americans rely on each other when we don’t trust or like each other? How can humans fight against existential threats when we’re so busy killing our own kind? We couldn’t even come together against the common enemy of plague. What hope for peace can be scavenged from that?

We should never celebrate bad things happening (at least, not to good people). Just like you, I have loved ones who are in danger because of the state of the world, and I don’t like that one bit. But when you take a step back… when you really look at things as one of the cosmic dust specs we are… the potential for extinction can be thrilling (that’s why apocalyptic fiction is so popular). This is especially true if you’re like me—someone who detached from society long ago, a morally gray hermit who does not identify with human beings and would not particularly mourn the loss of them. This species is overvalued and hardly precious. Its demise would be like the death of an elderly celebrity—sad in a way, but nothing to cry over. One can even smile imagining the planet being able to heal in our absence, creating a new, green terraform where other, better species can evolve from our ashes and microplastics. And besides, none of this is to say the end is destined to come soon. Things could change for the better. Even if they don’t, we may still have a good handful of years, if not decades, before doom kicks us square in the nuts.

So I say: enjoy the show! Why doom scroll when you can doom roll-on-the-floor-laughing-your-ass-off.

Break out the popcorn for our utterly insane presidential debates and surreal election nights. You can use the internet to rant into the void on Twitter or use it to enjoy porn while it is still legal. You can protest shit with street marches that ultimately change nothing, or you can giggle at the masses as they squirm like ants under a magnifying glass on a day of record-breaking heat. Let’s toast marshmallows and light joints on the burning wreckage of this failed experiment we call humans.

Some are outraged by this outlook. They say it’s madness. But hey, what’s wrong with madness? It can be a much-needed reprieve, a release from the brutal confines of sanity. How can madness be an inappropriate response to the madness all around us? Global sanity is at an all-time low, so come join the fun. Even to revolt against the madness is itself a form of madness, because as Cormac McCarthy once wrote, “you can’t stop what’s coming. It ain’t all waiting on you. That’s vanity.” Is there any better excuse for going mad than witnessing the inexorable descent of our world in real time? Can it even be argued that madness is not a natural response to being 90 fucking seconds to doomsday?

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“So when you find yourself locked onto an unpleasant train of thought, heading for the places in your past where the screaming is unbearable, remember there's always madness. Madness is the emergency exit.” – Alan Moore, The Killing Joke

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Here’s a mantra I’ve stood by most of my adult life: if you don’t laugh, you’ll cry. On this, yet another birthday, I laugh at the pain in my knees, my declining memory, the hair on my shoulders and the age in my eyes, and all the other signs of deterioration. Laughter truly is the best medicine, even when it’s sardonic. And life—all of it—is just one big, sick joke. There is no sanctity to it. There is no fairness to it. There is no meaning to it. Those are mere illusions we invented to make us feel more important and special than we really are. We’ve been self-deluded by our own vain fantasies of our inherit value. We look at the world’s problems and shake our heads as if it’s all someone else’s fault.

But the truth is we have brought all these problems on ourselves.

This dying world is the best we’ve been able to do. We created the catastrophic danger we are in—every motherfucking last one of us. And sooner or later, we must reap what we sow. Humanity is one selfish, demented child. The apocalypse is our final time out.

So let’s not cry over the milk we spilt. Let’s have a good laugh instead. Embrace chaos because that’s all there is.

We fucked it all up! We slipped on the banana peel, and now our lazy, overweight asses are falling in the dunk tank. Humanity is up for its celebrity roast here, people. It’ll be mean-spirited and vulgar, but it will offer some quality entertainment. And like it or not, the show must go on.

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If you’d like to help me celebrate my stupid birthday by getting me a gift, just buy yourself something I wrote! I’ll be happy and you’ll have horrific stuff to read while the world burns. In celebration of my 47^th spin on this space rock, I’m offering a special discount code for a whopping 15% off your entire order on TRIANAHORROR. The discount is good storewide—signed books, t-shirts, posters, coloring books, and more, including items that are already on sale.

Just enter code DOOM at checkout to get your 15% off discount between now and July 23^rd.

And it’s also a good time for fans to browse the site. My new horror novella, Because You’re Mine, releases in paperback today as a website exclusive. The wide release on Amazon and at other retailers is on August 16^th, so by grabbing a copy directly from me you’ll get it a month in advance—along with a Read Kristopher Triana button and sticker and a bloody syringe pen—and the book will come signed too! The Body Art Coloring Book is back, there are some new book bundle deals, and all t-shirt sizes have been restocked, with size XXXL recently added. And remember, your purchases support me in being able to continue to write all these demented stories.

So you see, there’s still plenty of things to smile about. As Monty Python sang, “always look on the bright side of death.”

Until next time, keep reading, and try to be happy.

Your pal,

Kris