‘The difference between stupidity and genius is that genius has its limits ‘ – Albert Einstein
I absolutely love the Darwin awards, which, for anyone who doesn’t know, is a yearly collection of stories from around the world about some of the stupidest things people have ended up killing themselves over. A celebration of the concept of natural selection if you will.
Below are some of my favourite nominees from 2014:
1. Two drunk men in Rotterdam, Holland decided they thought it would be a hilarious idea at a packed train station after a football match, to prove that if you lay down in-between the rail tracks, the train would just roll right over you leaving you to walk away unscathed. Whilst one of the men, not quite so brave, decided to kneel down and the side of the track pressing his face against where he thought the train would pass, neither of these doofusses accounted for the oncoming train being lower and wider than expected. They both died instantly.
2. A man in the UK waited 3 days before attending A&E after getting a cock ring stuck on his, erm, well cock. His member had swollen so much, and turned such a dark purple that hospital staff had to call the fire brigade to try and cut through the titanium ring. Sadly the fireman’s cutters were no match for the ring and the poor man ended up having to be fully castrated. Ouch!
3. Staying in the UK, there are apparently some apartments in South London famous for being a good place to spot couples getting jiggy jiggy on the balconies. One such couple were doing just that at a party in June, pausing any time anyone came outside for a smoke or some fresh. It would appear that the passion eventually got the better of the couple, and whilst the gentleman hoisted on the bannister and she seemingly just kept on going, taking her al fresco lover with her.
4. Give a hillbilly a lake to play in and he’ll entertain himself for a day, him a hillbilly and a lake and a shopping trolley to play with and he’ll…..kill himself. Aptly named Chance Werner from Georgia playing the ‘Shopping Cart game’ however instead of tying the cart to a static post to use as an anchor to catapult himself (or Jimbob or Billyray) into the lake, our hero decided to use himself as the anchor and tied the cart to his belt. Poor old Chance didn’t really stand a chance and was fished out of the lake some 3 hours later, still tied to the shopping cart. What was perhaps even more Darwin worthy was his family’s quote after the accident “We have all done stupid things. Not one person thought that this was not a good game to play.” *head in hands*
5. ‘Selfie’ was voted word of the year last year so it stands to reason that it was only a matter of time before the first selfie related death occurred. In April two men in Kenya decided to get some selfies with a wild elephant (which included actually touching the elephant’s face whilst taking the pictures. The elephants didn’t take too kindly to this and trampled over both of them and buried the corpses under a bush. Obviously not a fan of Amaro.
