Originally published January 20, 1995, in Comics Buyer’s Guide #1105
A short week this week, what with the various holidays, the kids home, and such. So this column will be two short things:
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Upon recently taking 3-year-old Ariel to the re-release of The Lion King, it finally occurred to me who the young Simba reminded me of during his big number, “I Just Can’t Wait to Be King.”
With the combination of the ears and the attitude, he comes across a lot like Prince Charles. Which started me thinking.
(And U.K.-based Comics International, which publishes reprints of this column, is just going to love this one. About a year ago I did a Hulk story wherein Prince Charles was kidnapped by the villainous Madman and dangled off the top of the Big Ben clock tower. London newspapers picked it up, and British artist Gary Frank gained a bit of notoriety, at least among his own family members. I wonder what the British press would make of this):
Charles:
I’m gonna be a mighty king,
The greatest king in years.
Queen:
Well, I’ve never seen a king or queen
With such outlandish ears.
Charles:
I’m gonna be the reigning champ.
The press will fall in line.
No tabloid sheets or gossip rags—
The kingdom will be mine.
Queen:
That has a rather self-deluded ring.
Charles:
Oh, I just can’t wait to be king:
No one saying, “Be nice,”
No one saying, “I said,”
No one saying, “Think twice,”
No one saying, “Get wed,”
Free to pony-ride all day,
Free to do it up Chuck’s way!
Queen:
I think we need reality
To crown that head of his.
Charles:
Kings don’t need advice from
Little women name of Liz.
Queen:
If he thinks all his whining’s going to
Help him, he’s dead wrong.
Out of Windsor, out of Buckingham:
That’s where he will belong.
This prince’s pea-brained
Mattress popped a spring.
Charles:
Oh, I just can’t wait to be king!
Read about my mean dad.
Read about my rough wife.
Read my book; it’s so sad.
Read about my tough life.
Queen:
Get bent.
Chorus:
So save the Wales
And tap your phones and sing.
Camilla’s Chuck
Will have his greatest fling.
Curl up and Di,
‘Cause we can’t do a thing!
Charles:
Oh, I just can’t wait to be king!
Oh, I just can’t wait to be king!
Oh, I just can’t wait to be king!
********
In last week’s column, I made mention of stupid or self-evident instructions which seem to be adding to the impression of America as a country of fools, a place where the legendary oxymoron “military intelligence” has been replaced by the far more basic self-contradictory term “common sense.”
Right after that column ran, I saw a package of disposable diapers. On the package was the incredibly helpful caveat, “It is always a good idea to keep babies away from open flames.”
One tries to picture the scenario in which someone might possibly come to the opposite conclusion:
“Honey, there’s such a load in this diaper, I can’t see clearly to wipe. Bring your butane lighter right up to his little ying yang, wouldja?”
Or:
“Fire’s goin’ down, Pa. Better toss another baby on for kindling.”
Or:
“Honey, should we let the baby go play in the neighbor’s funeral pyre?”
“Sure, sounds like a perfectly fine—no, wait! Says here on this diaper package that doing such a thing would not be a good idea! Whew! That was close! There’s so much for new parents to remember. Tell ya what—tie some meat on the baby and let him play with the pit bull instead.”
I can’t stand it any more. I feel it growing, bursting from within me… Yes! It’s here! It’s—another But I Digress contest!
I want to see just how stupid manufacturers think the American public is.
Send me instructions, either original or photocopies: anything from anywhere that is phrased in a manner making it clear the reader is considered to be an idiot.
Or specific citations of things from everyday life that simply make no sense, such as my pointing out last week that an announcer saying, “This program is close-captioned for the hearing impaired,” at the beginning of a show is inherently stupid, since people who would care that a show is close-captioned won’t be able to hear the announcer. If it’s not immediately evident why the instruction is stupid, feel free to spell it out.
The verdict will be rendered by an impartial board of IBIDs (Intrepid But I Digress Staffers). We’ll give out a variety of prizes (basically ’cause I got a lot of stuff lying around the house), including a boxed set of the Sachs & Violens trading cards; an autographed copy of Q-Squared; and assorted signed comics. Send entries to: Stupid Instructions, c/o To Be Continued, Inc., PO Box 239, Bayport, NY 11705. (Editor’s Note: Please do not send in entries. This contest has long since expired).
The following instructions for the “Stupid Instructions” contest are necessitated by the fact that, in the past, people have neglected some or all of these:
1) Put your name and address (and phone number, if you’re so inclined) on the entry—not just on the envelope; on the entry itself.
2) Put a stamp on the envelope.
3) Put enough stamps on the envelope. Don’t send stuff postage due.
4) Write legibly. Type, if possible.
5) Don’t write in crayon.
6) Write in English.
7) If sending a photocopy, make sure it’s a legible photocopy.
Deadline. Hmmm. Let’s give this one a little time, since this contest may require research. Deadline will be March 15, 1995. I’ll run a reminder around mid-February. But you needn’t delay, since multiple entries are permitted. (That is, if you send an entry in late January and then discover something really stupid in mid-February, you can send it without disqualifying the first entry.)
That’s it. Good luck. And think stupidly. Who know? If you think stupidly enough, a promising career in the entertainment field or the legislature may await you.
(Peter David, writer of stuff, thanks Arne Starr for the neat illo.)
• 
Of course the contest is long over… but I still think the reigning champ is the airline packages of peanuts with the warning “Contains peanuts.” If someone with a peanut allergy is eating peanuts because they don’t know peanuts contain peanuts… um, shouldn’t we want ’em out of the breeding pool anyway?
I’ve seen the same warning on Peanut Butter.
I hadn’t read Eric’s post when I saw yours, so I thought it was still talking about fire and I thought “AAAARGH! Exploding peanut butter!! Napalm and jelly!!”
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Yeah, but that actually makes sense when you look at the legal end of it. When they passed the bill that made it a requirement for companies to list certain food allergens on the packaging, it was a hëll of a lot more efficient (and less confusing) to just blanket the regulation. Yeah, peanuts are — duh — in packages of peanuts and peanut butter. But how would you write the legalese without getting goofy complicated?
.
You would think that a simple rule would be that you don’t put a warning on the product if the name of the allergen is actually in the product name. Yeah, that certainly sounds sensible. Milk obviously has milk in it, shellfish obviously has shellfish in it and peanut butter obviously has peanuts in it. But what if you come across a product on the shelf with the name “Chocolate Almond Milk” and it’s in the same area that the regular milk is in? Does it have no warning because — duh — it tells you that it’s milk right there in the name or does it carry no warning because it’s not a milk product? It’s not by the way. It’s an almond based product being sold as a milk substitute for people that have allergies to milk so it would carry no warning.
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That sounds like a stretch as an example, but it’s not. Having seen some of this stuff get argued out in real time (for weeks on end) and having seen how stupid and long the various versions of such things can get before everyone decides that it’s getting stupidly complicated and long even by political standards… Much easier to avoid issues and shenanigans to just blanket regulate the requirement. If a product contains the allergen, the label carries the warning in the larger print.
It always pushes my buttons to see the warning sign for people with fish and shellfish allergies on the wall at a Long John Silver’s restaurant. Even if it’s one of those “combo” locations, with two franchises’ menus in the same restaurant, it’s a no-brainer that fish/shellfish and other, non-allergen foods will likely come into contact one way or another, even if they’re just being prepared on the same surface….and depending on the severity of one’s allergy, even a tiny amount of contact with the prohibited substance can be dangerous.
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And I fully agree with your reasoning, Eric–I absolutely DON’T want people that foolish to reproduce. To quote Denis Leary, “It’s called ‘natural selection’, it’s the bottom of the >expletive deleted< food chain."
What if I’m an anthropomorphic representation of an action planning to kill myself, and I need to burn away the mortal part of the baby so that the immortal part will be suitable for transformation into my next incarnation?
Does it chill anyone else to realize that if we took all the stupid people out of the gene pool, the human race would completely become extinct?
See “Idiocracy” for the bizzaro version of this.
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TAC
Peter:
So, how did Comics International react to this BID?
Too bad the contest is over, because I believe most sunscreen comes with the instruction/warning “For external use only.”
Meanwhile, sun shields come with the warning “do not drive with shield in place.”
I knoow it is not exactly an instruction, but I once recieved a small fish tank as a gift. Printed as nice as could be on the box was the follow: Does not contain fish or water.
No worse, I suppose, than the Superman Halloween costume, whose cape famously includes a tag reading, “CAUTION: Cape does not enable user to fly.”
Which is just silly.
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I mean, everyone *knows* it’s not Superman’s cape that allows him to fly. It’s his superpowers.
It seems more appropriate for a Doctor Strange costume.
The closed caption message is meant for me– and me alone. If I have my hearing aids on, I can hear and if I’m in the living room late at night– I can turn the captioning on and everyone in the house can sleep while I watch. Duh!
What I want to know is who is the intended audience for the Braille instructions on drive-thru ATMs.