The fax machine whirs into life but before you get a chance to read the sheet that spools out your cellphone goes.

It's me. I can't talk for long...I'm in great danger...

It's Steve.

I think someone's following me. Did you get the fax?

You say "Yeah. Just got it now. What is it?"

I'm getting close now. I managed to sneak into a meeting. Jesus it was hard. They had goons everywhere. I copied their demands...that's what I faxed you. Read it now.

The fax appears to be some kind of guide to make everything acceptable for older people. The tone is homely but authoritarian. You wonder what lengths these people will go to if their demands are not met.

Concerned Parents of Everythingians

You still there...What's that noise?...There's someone...CLICK.

The line is dead. That was the first time anyone got close to the shadowy concerned parents. Steve was a good man. You shiver and wonder what their next move will be.


Inspired by Jet-poop's node for the ages, a warped desire to make insulting softlinks, the layout of the qwerty keyboard, and inaccurate typing.

One of the things I like to do is to get together with a bunch of guys like myself, straight white men in their late 80s who are confused, don't understand anything going on around them, and have no moral compass (Internet kiddie term). What we do then is drive around town grabbing tender-aged children, putting them in the back of a van, driving to an abandoned warehouse, marching them into the warehouse, and then asking them to tie us up and teach us things. This is both educational and fun,, and most of those children don't end up needing therapy.

You might find this offensive, and I am glad that you do because I am starting to see that doing this is problematic for many, many reasons. It might be dead wrong, but I'm uncertain because I have no moral compass. This is one of the reasons I do what I just talked about doing.

There are ways for you to get confused straight white men in their late 80s to stop doing this, because we do it a lot. I mean to say you wouldn't believe how often this sort of thing happens in today's America. My point is simple. ALL NODES AND COLUMNS BY ALL NODERS need to be written in such a way that they will make sense and be educational for confused elderly white men with no moral compass. This means noding harder and noding educationally. I am raising the bar here at everything2.com brand website because we are not reaching these important folks. You are just not doing it the way things are going. If you can't hack writing in a way that will make sense to this key demographic, then see you later, buddy! Nice knowing you, but we have raised the bar and that always leads in the right direction!

How can you do this? Let me count the ways!

  1. When using pop culture references, make sure they appeal to someone who did the bulk of their television viewing during the 1950s and who only reads AARP Magazine and Readers Digest Large Print Edition.
  2. Why stop there? When talking about women or writing about them, use simple terminology that lets us know they are a woman. "Dames" and "skirts" are two examples of what you need to be use when refering to women. There are too many terms, lets get back to basics people.
  3. Be more descriptive about your boobs or someone else's. If your writeup doesn't mention boobs, work it in.
  4. Make sure all stories have a part where the main character visits a wise old man who gives him new learnings like "Straighten up and fly right" and "Pull yourself up by your bootstraps." That really gets us excited.
  5. More writeups are needed that really tear into young people for being lazy and whiney. You're letting those people off too easy in your writeups. Get your act together.
  6. More writeups with maps and photographs. Sometimes I want to see what a bridge looks like because I have forgotten. If no images or maps can be posted, use what is called a "link" to somewhere with a map or pictures. I was reading about bullfrogs the other day and there was no way for me to visualize what a "bullfrog" is. There were no "links" to pictures of these creatures and so I was like a fish out of water if you know what I mean.
  7. We'd like to hear more about the grades you are getting in school so we can pat you on the head and give you very small amount of candy.
  8. Stop reviewing so many films made after 1980 and reviewing more that were made before that. No one understands any of the movies made after 1980 so don't even try to pretend you do. It is arrogant and unattractive.
  9. Using easy to follow language, and no words introduced into the dictionary after 1940, try to explain things in the modern world. Speak slowly and clearly when you do.
  10. More coming of age stories that describe how you got a rude awakening when you became an adult and learned you have to work hard for a living and can't flitter about with all that prancing around hippie nonsense any longer. Time for work!

There are other ways, but we need to steer this website in that direction. As I said, we are raising the bar here at everything2.com brand website. Get on board or get seasick.

Thank you for listening to this policy announcement that I am not legally authorized to make, but I think it will be okay.

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