Culture of Illusion – Why Bear Wrestling is Destroying the Youth of Today.

Wendy’s is a fine family restaurant chain with their rectangular burgers, their tasty free milkshakes offers and their bear fighting. It is probably a little known fact that bear fighting is a part of the Wendy’s brand. I was unaware of this until I saw the gift that appeared in the meal of the child that I was with. It came with two unassuming plastic bears, both of whom you will meet in a minute, and these delightful instructions:

Wrestle!

Now the game itself is a variant on the classic throwing things up in the air and then getting points from how they land. There is nothing wrong with that. There is nothing wrong with throwing things up in the air and then getting points from how they land on the flat surface that they end up resting on. Yet my mind is conflicted. Bear Wrestling? This is what we are teaching our children? No wonder they all become drug addicts and criminals always disappointing us and ruining society with their noises and their smells. If we tell them that bear wrestling is okay what else are we supposed to expect?

Have Wendy’s planned a whole series of these sordid games? Perhaps Michael Vick’s Dog Fighting? Jerry Seinfeld’s Cock Boxing? (I apologize to both Mr. Vick, who has served his time, and to Mr. Seinfeld for who there is no evidence that he has ever indulged in any kind of cock boxing. I am merely offering unsourced examples to make my point.)

Then my eye was drawn to the title of the game – Zookeeper…

What kind of twisted world do the creators of this game live in that they think that Zookeepers indulge in the sport of bear wrestling? Do they imagine that, when the gates close and the lights dim at the local zoo, the staff come out and then force the creatures under their care to participate in a complex series of Hunger Games style trials until the sun rises the next day? Do the elephants have to get encased in thick armour and force to wear large spikes before running round an oval track, the winner given food – the losers crushed under some kind of as to be determined elephant crushing machine? Do the lizards play Russian Roulette for sunlight? What of the butterflies? Are they harnessed and forced to dance up and down the greasy poles of zookeeper lust?

These are only questions. I am only asking the questions. It is up to the zoo community to provide the answers.

Regardless of these accusations which I haven’t made let us look closer at the hideous rules that our children must follow in order to play this Zookeeper sponsored bear wrestling. Each child gets a bear, a bear much like this dead eyed looking creature:

Please kill me, the bear pleaded as you stared into it’s cold dead eye.

Then each child throws their bear. If they do not wrestle, not in this instance tear at one another with their massive paws and their jagged face ripping teeth, but if they touch, THEN THEY MUST WRESTLE AGAIN! THERE WILL BE NO RESPITE FOR THE FIGHTING BEARS! NONE!

After five rounds of this brutal dance of death a human winner is declared and so the cycle continues.

So what, may you ask, are the various scores? Here are the various scores:

The revenge of the bear against the zookeeper will not be a pretty one.

Just to test out these rules I tried to roll all of them. I am nothing if not randomly thorough:

1 POINT:

Why have you not put me out of my misery?

This is what happens when a bear falls. Pretty much every time you get one point.

2 POINTS:

I surrender.

This happened somewhat infrequently but it’s still possible to get a couple of points like this. If you are inhuman enough to play such a violent game that is destroying our children.

3 POINTS:

So terribly afraid.

This is also possible. You can get points for this as you watch society crumble.

4 POINTS:

Forgive me Ancient Bear Gods for I just ate a zookeeper.

This one is, and sorry for being rude, fucking impossible. I tried for at least fifteen minutes. You will never get this one no matter how flat the surface or how patient you think you are.

5 POINTS:

I AM NOT A CIRCUS PERFORMER! I AM A BEAR!

This one is even more impossible than the last one. So fucking impossible that I only tried it for five minutes. It was even difficult to balance the beast like this with a flat surface and what little patience remained to me from earlier. At this point they were really just filling up space on their instruction card. YOU WILL NEVER GET THIS ONE. EVER.

So you battle for five rounds. Then the child with the highest points wins. Then they put these back in a drawer or probably just leave them on the floor for you to step on later because THEY HATE YOU and then you yell at them and then you throw them out of the window.

Then you bring them back inside and you put them in a series of  new positions and ascribe points to them:

100 POINTS:

“I love you.” “I love you too.” “Let’s not fight.” ‘We must. The Zookeeper has our children.’

1000 POINTS:

“Yes.” “Yes.” “Oh. That’s never happened before.” “That’s okay.” “Can we just cuddle?”

1,000,000 POINTS:

“This life is not the life I had planned.”

As Many Points as You Feel are Suitable:

“I’m stuck.”

Then if your children want the game back show them this:

Yes they may have nightmares and develop a nervous tick that wasn’t there before but you will have taught them a valuable lesson about the power of nature and that Zookeepers are the most dangerous people on the planet.

You are welcome.