From: eperkio@cc.helsinki.fi
Newsgroups: alt.destroy.the.earth
Subject: The Charter
Date: 29 Sep 92 00:32:51 GMT
Organization: University of Helsinki

Once again, the monthly charter, though few days early in order
to provide one answer to the question "What are you here for?"

Keep up inventing new reasons, and I'll keep adding them to the
charter. 

--- Apply the gasoline-leaking, overtly noisy chaisaw here ---
 
                          PART I
 
       THE CHARTER & HISTORY OF ALT.DESTROY.THE.EARTH
 
 
The Beginning of the End
------------------------
 
Alt.destroy.the.earth was created by a group calling itself
Society for Human Immigration from Terra (SHIT).  The name
should, of course, have read 'emigration' (leaving one's
home/country/planet/etc for a new one) instead of immigration,
which means quite the opposite, and the newsgroup became very
silent for a while after the error was publicly noted.  However,
showing their profound liking of their acronym, the society
promptly changed its name to Society of Humans for an Impure
Terra and continued operation.
 
[The name 'Society for Emigration from Terra', SET, was
suggested, both because of an Egyptian deity and because
of the acronym's potential for slogans, eg. "Get SET to go!",
but it did not catch on at that time.]
 
The agenda of SHIT was simple: for their various reasons the
members wanted to see humanity take to its wings and reach
the stars, or at least manage self-supporting space habitats
in the near future.  The SHITheads, as they called themselves,
wanted to hasten Man's progress into space by creating a need
for emigration through making the Earth inhospitable.  This was
to be done with all due haste because the population was rapidly
using up planetary resources and it was speculated that the
critical point after which humanity couldn't manage a massive
space effort was no more than a few decades away.  However, the
method of enviromental destruction was not to be overtly radical,
or needlessly destructive: humanity was meant to survive and be
able to colonize the solar system.
 
After a few months the group fell silent again for a long period
and was then revived by the destructionalists.
 
 
The Destructionalists, or How I Learned to Love the Bomb
--------------------------------------------------------
 
The destructionalist approach to alt.destroy.the.earth is literal;
Earth is to be destroyed one way or the other.  The reasons behind
this conviction vary from individual to individual and include for
example such matters as thorough disappointment in the human race
and aesthetic pleasure.
 
Schools of destructionalism disagree on the extent and the methods
of the havoc to be wrought - both because of ideological
preferences, as some merely want to do away with the human race and
leave the animals, others to demolish the whole planet, and due
to practical concerns, for humanity is not able to annihilate the
planet as of yet, and a sufficient technological breakthrough in
the near future is extremely unlikely.
 
The major destructionalist approaches to destroying the Earth
can be classified as follows:
 
   1. Destruction of all civilization.
   2. Destruction of all humans.
   3. Destruction of all surface-dwelling animals.
   4. Destruction of all animals.
   5. Destruction of all life.
   6. Destruction of the entire planet.
 
When discussing methods of achieving 3., 4. or 5., ways of preventing
re-evolution are usually mentioned.
 
 
"The meek shall die out"
------------------------
 
The Elitists plot to destroy mankind, except for a few selected, high-
quality specimes, ie. themselves and those they consider fit to
survive, or just plain necessary for their comfort.  On the remains
of the old, decadent, weak civilization they plan to build their own
proud culture to suit the 'overmen'.
 
 
The Satirical Viewpoint, or the 'Evil Twin'
-------------------------------------------
 
A fourth way of looking at alt.destroy.the.earth is as the refuge
of persons tired with today's rampant ecohysteria, a den of a somewhat
macabre variety of humor, a safe haven where you can cheerfully cry out
that you like to spray CFCs about just for the hell of it, declare your
love for the fur of some particularly rare animal, gloat over the
extinction of some miserable, unfit to survive species that everyone
else seems to be mourning for, publish designs of new, innovative methods
of messing up recycling operations etc etc.
 
 
A.d.t.e is the evil twin to alt.save.the.earth, and it should look
the part.  This is the place for those enviromentally unsound ideas,
twisted tales of destruction, parodies of "green" thinking, cheerful
discussions on the more spectacular uses of nuclear physics, and the
like.  We welcome you to participate, to look at the quest for
preserving the status quo of the ecosphere from a different angle,
and to share your wicked designs.
 
 
 
                          PART II
 
                 THE ETIQUETTE OF A.D.T.E.
 
 
x^n
---
 
Hard figures are always appreciated, especially in destructionalist
essays.  Many postings have suffered from a lacking sense of proportion
and sometimes even from VERY bad science.  ("If we could just change
this natural constant...")  The Earth is VAST.  Look at the numbers.
 
Radius: 6370 km
Equatoric circumference: 40 075 km
Mass: 6 * 10^24 kg
 
Please bear in mind that the Earth is not exactly a sphere - the radius
given is a median value.
 
A.d.t.e. is in dire need of people with solid knowledge on geology and
meteorology.  Bacteriology, physics and astronomy would also come in
handy.
 
 
"We will all go together when we go"
------------------------------------
 
Asking a destructionalist whether or not he or she intends to be
included in the destruction is pointless and rude.  A true
destructionalist's answer is "Of course".
 
As a matter of fact, asking ANY poster on a.d.t.e. publicly whether
or not he or she is serious is pointless and rude.
 
 
"Oh! You monsters!"
-------------------
 
Postings declaring the a.d.t.e:ers in general to be evil, sick,
infantile, demented, sexually frustrated, godless heathens
et cetera ad nauseam are not appreciated.  The same goes for the
"Get a Life"-school of posters.
 
If you feel any need to respond to such drivel, please do it via
private e-mail to keep the group clean and the offender's mailbox
messy.
 
 
 
                             APPENDIX A
                          SUGGESTED READING
 
Science fiction in general:
 
Greg Bear: The Forge of God
Fred Saberhagen: The Berserker novels
Philip K. Dick: Dr. Bloodmoney
Stephen King: The Stand
Larry Niven & Jerry Pournelle: Footfall
 
Black holes:
 
David Brin: Earth
Larry Niven: The Hole Man
[?]: The Krone Experiment
 
Nonfiction:
 
Richard Rhodes: The Making of the Atomic Bomb
[?]: The Los Alamos Primer: the First Lectures on How to Build
     an Atomic Bomb
 
Also, a.d.t.e:ers might enjoy the movie 'The Day After'.
 
 
---RRRRrr "Oh, sorry, Mr. Endangered Species of Squirrel" rrRRR---
 
As usual, comments, suggestions and spelling & grammar flames are
welcome.

--
Esa Perki|               "I should honor you?  Why?"
eperkio@cc.helsinki.fi      - Prometheus to Zeus according to Goethe
IRCer Shade
Newsgroups: alt.destroy.the.earth