“Emotions. There oughta be a law against them.”

– Judge Dredd

Growing up my favorite comic book series was Judge Dredd. The stories were a perfect mixture of satire and violence with none of the soap opera antics that more mainstream comics frequently employ. Characters aged in real time, people died and never came back, and conflicts were resolved with bullets rather than lengthy debates about morality.

Recently I decided to pick up some of my old Judge Dredd comics. What I found surprised me.

The fictional far future setting that the stories take place in is a lot closer to our reality than most of us realize.

Giant dinosaurs, sewer mutants, and undead horrors aside there’s a lot of “out there” content that’s started to become a reality. Here are just a few things that I’ve begun to notice:

Fat acceptance

There’s an older story where the obese citizens of Dredd’s city start protesting that they are oppressed. The story is meant to be satire and was published before This Is Thin Privilege was ever a thing. The “fatties,” as they’re called in the comics, have been around for decades. As one fan explained:

“Mega-City 1 is home to a wide variety of weirdos. Perhaps the most conspicuous are the “Fatties,” a subculture of people who pride themselves on being enormously obese. In fact, they are so large, they walk around with little unicycles to support their flabby bellies.”

Unemployment

In the Judge Dredd universe something like 80 percent of the population is unemployed. Automation combined with corporate greed have put the vast majority of people out of work. Because no one has “real jobs” people spend their days making art, practicing hobbies, and committing crime. Basically stuff you’d see if you visited a third world city.

Additionally, meme type culture is huge. While fads have always existed in the real world, they seem to have become a lot more prevalent in the past few years. The Harlem Shake, Gangnam Style, horse hats, gallon smashing, the knockout game and thousands of other meme activities have become huge in post great recession America. Since most of the country’s younger population is unemployed or underemployed these types of activities have been able to flourish.

All powerful legal system

 

In Judge Dredd all the lawmen, including Dredd himself, are fascists. The series reads like the thought police from 1984 fighting various monsters and crime syndicates. Police drones, electronic surveillance systems, and unquestionable lawmen were all in the series since the early 1970’s.

Long before the news was reporting on PRISM, cops shooting pet dogs, or Chris Dorner similar events were taking place within the pages of Judge Dredd. At the time they were all considered far fetched, something reserved just for science fiction stories.

Looking through my old collection of comics was really interesting. A lot of the content that was meant to be outlandish satire, thought never to occur in a sane society, has become real. Fat privilege, staggering unemployment, meme culture, and draconian police forces were the stuff of fiction. Now they’re starting to become facets of everyday life.

“A society made up of individuals who were all capable of original thought would probably be unendurable.”

– H. L. Mencken

Over the weekend I decided to compile a short list of things that average people do and don’t do. If you’d like to be like them simply follow this guide to being mediocre:

Do not develop a hobby.

Spend all your free time watching television and playing video games. Learning how to do something like make fishing lures, fix a car, write a novel, or play the guitar take up way too much time. Between working and sleeping you barely have time to squeeze in your 40 hours of weekly TV viewing. Spending an hour a day on a new skill would be way too difficult.

Do not read books.

Books are expensive and boring. They take up way too much of your time and there are no funny beer commercials in between chapters. Also you already read enough at work.

Identify with a group

Instead of doing some research and formulating your own opinions you should immediately latch onto an existing organization. Join the Republican party, side with the Democrats, go to Greenpeace rallies, do whatever requires the least amount of thinking on your part. Forming an identity is hard, it’s better to merely adapt someone else’s dogma.

Do not go to the gym.

The gym is for dim witted meat heads. They’re really stupid and probably compensating for their latent homosexuality. If you do decide to exercise, make sure to go to a fitness center that doesn’t allow scary weightlifters. Planet Fitness recently installed a special alarm for people who feel threatened by anyone in better shape than them.

Do not start a business.

Making money is hard. Anyone who runs a business inherited it from their parents or was born rich. Despite there being thousands of books and free videos on entrepreneurship, you shouldn’t bother with any of them. Even simple stuff like writing articles is way too difficult for you to learn.

Do not save money.

Dave Ramsey is a religious quack. Budgeting only works for rich people who don’t have all the expenses that normal people do. Between the $70 you spend on your normal cable package, the $40 a month exclusive cable sports pass, $215 in fast food, and $100 for Starbucks you hardly have anything left to put into savings.

Do not eat healthy.

Cooking is a lot of work and really expensive. It’s not like there’s anyone who can eat healthy on a tiny budget.  Also health food tastes awful. Your better off eating out all the time or buying frozen dinners. Lean Cuisine is probably good for you since it has “lean” in the name, right?

Do not respect yourself.

The other day I saw a post on Reddit where a guy got into an argument with his girlfriend so she sent naked pictures of herself to his friends.* While I was expecting the post to conclude with a story about how the boyfriend kicked the girl out and went on a road trip to Las Vegas, things ended a lot differently. Instead the guy whined about how the whole ordeal was his fault.

If you don’t have your own business you aren’t going to be able to tell your boss off when he asks you to come in on Saturday. If you aren’t in shape and confident you aren’t going to be able to dump “the love of your life” when she sends nude pictures to someone else because you didn’t take the garbage out immediately.

* I wasn’t entirely clear on who the recipient was, but it was another man and he knew the couple.

“I moved to a country where I have to pay for healthcare and I’m too tightfisted to do so, so I haven’t been to the doctor or dentist since I came here.”

– Redditor bragging about his frugality

There’s a stupid phenomenon where people discover that you can live overseas cheaply and they quit their jobs to fly to Thailand. I used to only see this online, but recently I’ve noticed it being documented in the mainstream media. While I was eating lunch the other day I turned on the television. There was some show about living abroad. The couple who were being featured were talking about how they had saved up $20,000, moved to Colombia, and were now planning to learn how to make artisan jewelry to sell at a local market.

This is one of the dumbest ideas ever.

First off, I’ll address the obvious. Everyone in the third world is an artisan jewelry maker. When I was on a bus in Central America there was at least one person at every stop who would board the bus and try selling necklaces and bracelets. To call the market over saturated would be an understatement.

Secondly, making your whole financial strategy revolve around not spending money is a very bad idea.

The case against saving money

While I’m all for the conservation of money, I think it’s stupid to cut your spending back to the point that it’s actually detrimental to you. Eating Ramen Noodles three times a day, living in a tent, or only showering twice a week aren’t going to help you in the long run. With the time that you spend trying to cut corners you could be making actual money.

If you make $50,000 a year and spend 100% of your free time trying to preserve it, you’ll still never have more than $50,000. Even after repurposing a potato sack into dress pants and riding your bike 90 minutes to work, you still won’t have made more than your $50,000. You’d be better off spending a reasonable amount of money while putting your energies into starting side hustles.

A man who makes $50,000, lives within his means, and puts his focus on generating more money can still attend happy hours, go on dates, and take vacations. If our figurative character earns $50,000 and saves 30%, he’ll end up with $15,000 in savings. If he invests a few hours a night on a side hustle he could easily make an extra $1,500 a month, that’s basically $50 a day. Saving all his side money will net him $18,000 a year. Combine with his $15,000 he’ll have saved up $33,000 in one year. He still got to buy clothes, live in a decent apartment, and go out.

A frugal man who’s obsessed with not spending will dedicate his time to studying charts, breaking down his budget, cutting coupons, and eliminating amenities. If he makes $50,000 and moves into an RV, rides a bicycle, refuses to go out, and eats peanut butter and jelly sandwiches three times a day he might be able to save 60% of his income. At the end of the year he will have saved $30,000. The guy who spent money on “unnecessary” expenses like a gym membership and occasional concert will have actually saved more money than him.

Where is my expertise

Around this time last year I was the frugal guy. While I wasn’t extreme about it, I did place too much focus on saving money. I’d put way more time into finding ways not to pay for things than I would figuring out how to earn money. At the end of the month I’d get depressed because of all the opportunities I’d missed out on. To add insult to injury my bank balance would never have even increased by much.

Once I changed my mindset and started focusing on making money, my quality of life and savings account both skyrocketed. In the month of October I rarely showed up for work, went on three vacations, and still managed to double the balance in my savings account.

Right now I’m reading a great book called Bachelor Pad Economics. In it the author brings up a very interesting point, time is the only resource that matters. The richest man in the world has the same life expectancy as a janitor. This means that how you spend your time is actually more important than money itself.

You can make back what you spend on your gym membership, or your night out, or your new video game. You can never get back the time that you spent being miserable sitting in a one room shack and eating baked beans because it would save you $1,000 a year.

P.S. I left taxes out of my calculation because they vary from location to location.

“I’ve failed over and over and over again in my life and that is why I succeed.”

– Micheal Jordan

I had scheduled dates with two different girls. Things looked promising. I was going to have a Saturday afternoon that I could brag about for weeks to come.

Both girls flaked.

Now I’m sitting here writing an improvised post.

I’m actually still pretty happy.

While I’m not going to carry out a sexual caper worthy of re-telling to my grand kids, I still managed to get blown off by two girls in one day. There are thousands of dudes who’ll never be able to hold that claim. Two years ago I’d have never imagined myself doing something like that. Now it doesn’t even seem like a huge deal. I’ll stay in and read a book. It will still be enjoyable.

There are dozens of activities that I’ve failed at, none of which have really upset me. When I started lifting I could barely bench a single plate. I didn’t get mad about it, I knew things would get better. Even if I sucked, I was still trying my best. That’s all that counted.

My first business foray was a disaster. I tried buying things on Amazon and then reviewing them. I wasn’t particularly good at it and I lost money on everything I tried to sell. 4% commissions on a $25 item are hard to profit off. While I got frustrated, I still laughed about it. I learned from my mistakes and rethought my strategy.

If you’re on your grind you will stumble. It’s going to happen at some point. Even the greats falter. There’s no professional athlete with a perfect record, there’s no business mogul who hasn’t blotched a deal, and there’s no musician who hasn’t released at least one horrible song.

Failing is natural. Learn from it and move on.

“There’s no such thing as a free lunch.”

– Old saying

In the 1800’s saloons would often offer a free lunch special. If a customer was willing to purchase one drink they could have a meal “on the house.” The foods served were always high in salt, forcing the customer to buy more drinks in order to quench his thirst. The saloon always made its money back.

I ended up getting some Christmas money. Initially I was planning on blowing it all. I wanted new clothes, some vinyls for my Hi-Fi, and a million other impulse purchases. Everything on Amazon looked like I should own it.

On paper all the things I wanted sounded like fine purchases. I hadn’t worked for the money so it was free for luxury items. I was getting ready to blow all of it until I decided to sit down and think about my decision.

In roughly one month I’m moving. It’s doubtful that I’ll be bring a Hi-Fi, mountains of cloths, artwork, or anything else that I was considering getting. All my stuff is going to have to fit on a plane, there’s no room extra. I’d also rather have some rainy day money than own a bunch of superficial items. There’s no telling when I’ll get hit with a slow month, I’d rather live comfortably than have to worry while surrounded by all my stuff.

Instead of buying something I’ll probably never need I’ve decided to use my money strategically. It’s going in the bank in case I actually have to use it.