Lagumbay.com Reflections on Love, Rage, and Fear

I shall bluntly state my point: the notion that computers are an aid to mankind is an absolute lie. These demonic contraptions have enslaved millions through their complexities and counter-intuitiveness. Such a collection of wires and circuit boards have continually frustrated elite thinkers like myself and have caused so much unnecessary grief throughout the world. Understanding that only a computer literate person would be deemed credible to prove such a point, I took it upon myself to document my experiences. By doing so, I shall present absolute proof that computers, software, the Internet, computer technical support, and all their advocates are nothing short of unacceptable and intolerable menaces to human existence.

It was a cloudy morning and a foreboding gloom lurked directly over my desk as I pulled my chair back to have a seat. My office wore its usual morning decorations, piles of paperwork, a few books, some pictures, and a great power-horse of a computer, all alluding to the fact that I am brilliant, charming, and very important. The day promised to be long with arduous tasks and critical phone conversations awaiting my participation. It was critical that I got started as soon as possible. Among the things to do were to draft a letter, check and respond to email, and to research the Internet on various important topics.

I decided that my first task would be to draft a letter. After cracking my knuckles and gently resting my fingers on the keyboard in the suggested ergonomic position, I began to type. After a few keystrokes, I realized that none of my typing was appearing on the screen. At that point, I knew my monitor was dead. Worse yet, my computer had been murdered. Someone must have masterminded this. Computers cannot die on their own.

Five minutes after contacting technical support, my computer was up and running properly with its low hum and soft glow. I began to suspect that the people at technical support sabotaged my computer. Nobody would have known to turn the computer on. I could have sworn my computer powered up automatically before. It could not change settings on its own like that. I didn’t do anything to it! Whoever altered my computer settings must have been an evil genius.

Frustration slowly building, I went back to the task at hand. At that point, the computer was asking for a password and I was more than happy to type it in. Now, I KNOW my password but for some reason, my login could not be authenticated. I tried a few more times without success. It was clear that the network was not functioning properly because it was by no means my fault, I did nothing to my computer. Only after reminding the network custodians how lousy they were doing their jobs did they supply me with an answer. A different user name was on my computer. I needed to type my user name in with my password. I never had to do that before. Such cunning deception could not have been the work of one man. It started to look like a conspiracy.

The plot seemed to grow thicker around me. People walking past my office kept looking through the glass pane that separated me from them. Their false smiles may have fooled everyone else but they failed to fool me. I knew there were conspirators and it was only a matter of time before I found out who they were. In the meantime, I had finally finished typing my letter and it was time to print. After clicking the print icon, nothing came out of the printer. Obviously, the idiot computer had not detected the fact that I wanted to print and with pure intuition and ingenuity, I clicked on the icon repeatedly hoping that the crude contraption would register my command. Nothing but dead silence filled the room. Slowly I stood up and crept up to my printer, wary of anything that may ambush me along my path. Remembering the previous attempts of trickery, I checked for power only to find a green light that negated my theory. The conspiracy was going too far and becoming much too unpredictable. These people were going to pay dearly for their treachery.

Again I called the network custodian, this time with greater suspicion than before. As if to mock me, the custodian checked if the machine was turned on. Obviously, he was trying to mislead me, not knowing I was clever enough to check for that. He must have sensed that I knew he was one of them for he tried to confuse me with complex computer jargon. Something about queues and buffers and the loader being out of paper. “Impossible,” I said with great objection. I had printed something the day before and everything was just fine.

I came to the realization that I had three suspected conspirators all in my room, the computer, the printer, and the computer custodian. They must have all been sharing what they thought was my moment of defeat. I was given paper to feed my printer and immediately after craftily installing the new 8 1/2 x 11 in the intricate machine, it started to hum. It kept humming and humming and humming, printing eleven copies of my letter when I only wanted one. Not only are computers stupid, they are environmentally unfriendly as well. I screamed at the custodian about the unnecessary waste of a rainforest and he tried to pin the blame on me by saying I must have pressed the print button eleven times. If the computer had done what I wanted the first time I pressed the button, I wouldn’t have needed to press it another ten times! What was worse was that I began to imagine my conspirators grinning mischievously as my frustration heightened to the point of rage. I knew I was either being victimized by conspiracy or merely by the incompetence of the people around me. There are no excuses for idiocy.

A cloud of anger positioned itself atop my head and I began to throw objects around the room. Nobody makes a fool out of me. Shredded paper rained down the room for a few minutes until I decided to relieve my rage by destroying my ultimate nemesis. With a tight grasp, I held the monitor and CPU in my arms and hurled it out the door, watching the box dent and the monitor shatter, breaking my back in the process. Thus it is in my current bedridden state that I present my case against computers.

The world must realize the dangers this vicious technology enshrouds mankind with. Only then can we put into action the movement towards eliminating any and all things computer-related. The abuse and ridicule will never cease until we are free from their clutches. Spread the word through typewriters and pens, the evil demon exists and must be destroyed.