The Kill Rule

I won't even begin to take credit for this, but it was too good not to share. Much respect to the author, who you can follow here on twitter. I give you 'The Kill Rule.'


A guy I worked with about a decade ago once told me about a theory he had for improving society. At the time, it seemed about psychotic an idea as you can ever tell someone you barely know in your workplace. But over the years, I have grown to realize that it’s the most genius idea I have ever heard.
The theory goes like this — everyone is allowed to kill one person. Kills can’t be transferred or sold or carried over like vacation days. You’re allowed to kill one person and one person only. Well, you can kill more if you want, but you’re only allowed to kill one person legally.

After that, you have to get a tattoo somewhere on your body where everyone can see it. The tattoo will indicate that you have already used your kill and present no immediate threat to anyone in your area.

To be fair, he told me this theory a long time ago, and I’m sure it’s far more detailed and thought-out than how I’m explaining it, but that’s the gist. On its face, it sounds insane. And it is, don’t get me wrong. But when you dig a little deeper, it would be the greatest thing to happen to society since the invention of Las Vegas.

I’m sure there are qualifications to the free murders. I don’t think he advocated smothering newborn babies or pushing cripples off roofs. But wouldn’t you be less likely to run your mouth at someone if they lacked a kill tattoo? And wouldn’t you walk around a whole hell of a lot happier knowing that you could snap the neck of the woman on your bus who is screaming into her phone about how much she loved last night’s episode of Jersey Shore?

And, in turn, wouldn’t you temper that sort of thing? If I knew someone could legally murder me for not holding a door open for a lady, I’d be way less of a prick at all times. Not that I don’t hold doors for ladies. I guess a better example would be farting in elevators. I’d knock that off tout suite.

Imagine you’re walking down an escalator where the understood rule is the left side of the escalator is for walkers and the right side is for those who wish to remain motionless. You’re walking down the left side, and there’s Jimmy NoMotionPants and his hipster glasses and canvas shoes rocking out to Death Cab For Cutie. If I’m running late for a meeting and my knife is sharpened, I could take him out like Rambo and continue about my day.

But then maybe I’d have to stop and schedule my tattoo appointment. I don’t know exactly. So there’s holes in this theory. I don’t know. I guess I’d like to stop sitting next to people on the bus who talk on their phones for 20 minutes about nonsense while I’m trying to listen to my Alanis playlist. Her emotion is so raw.