'Little Lady' Breath Mirror Corpse Detection Set (mid-70s)

Apocalyptic toys were all the rage in the late 1970s, not that they were thought of as apocalyptic at the time. Citizens didn't fear their annihilation; they quite looked forward to demonstrating their 'Dunkirk spirit' with the misguided belief that it would somehow bring the country together. It didn't occur to them that their dogmatic nationalism might instead bring about the demise of the nation.

As the country moved toward collapse, social unrest and inevitable casualties increased. The paranoid state began anonymously exterminating citizens who so much as hinted at insurrection. Average (and the vast numbers of below-average) people were killed in street clashes between opposing factions and there were spates of frightened suicides.

Scar Toys exploited this expanding market opportunity and created a range of toys aimed at the many children in the process of being orphaned. One such toy, the Breath Mirror Set, aimed at young girls, was designed to accompany their more traditional beauty/vanity toys. The deluxe set (see picture above) included one mirror for each parent, colour-coded as per gender convention: pink for girls, blue for boys.

The wording on the back of the packaging encouraged children to use the mirrors beyond the death of their own parents. Included was a little booklet into which little pink stars could be affixed for every corpse that was identified using the mirrors. Highly sought-after prizes were awarded to the girls with the most stars and council archival documents reveal that the police turned a blind eye when gangs of little girls began slaughtering adults in frenzied attempts to accumulate more stars.

Amateur Execution Allowance

Though pushing people off buildings was all the rage in 1970s Scarfolk, it was quite damaging to concrete paving. Hundreds of paving slabs had to be replaced in 1974 alone, at an estimated cost of £35.

With some of the most at-risk slabs dating as far back as the early 1970s, a local charity called SPLAT (Society for Pavement Liberation from Amateur Terminations) dedicated itself to the protection of paving slabs and their heritage in general.

Though the charity raised awareness, it had little impact on the number of people impacting the valuable concrete from great heights.

The charity lobbied the council which eventually agreed to regulate the amount of people that could be hurled from tall buildings (see poster above).

Paving slab damage was reduced by 25%, but the problem transferred to locomotives, specifically their paintwork, which was at risk of chipping after  pushing people in front of trains became the new, preferred method of amateur execution.

See also: Living cement and concrete pornography.

Cub Scout "Bob-a-Body" Week (1977)

The annual boy scout Bob-a-Job week was an institution. However, from 1975 the jobs that scouts were expected to undertake moved away from the mundane - the washing of cars, sweeping of leaves and mowing of lawns - and became much more demanding.

Below is a scout leaflet from 1977 which was the first year that Bob-a-Job week officially changed its name.

During Bob-a-Body week, hundreds of cub scouts roamed Scarfolk helping members of the community with their assisted suicide needs. The old, sick and formally shunned most frequently employed the services of the scouts, though the council's Oxygen Resource Board allegedly sent lists of reluctant residents to scout groups in advance, along with illicitly duplicated front door keys and gallon jars of a toxic nerve agent.

"Raingods" Children's TV Programme (1970s)

Rainbow was a popular daytime children's television programme in the 1970s. Yet very few people realise that it was originally pitched as an altogether different show called Raingods. Below are the only extant frames from the pilot.

Raingods introduced children to a pink, one-eyed, Aztec god of rain, Tlaloc, whose name translates as 'enraged niece of Bruce Forsyth'. Other characters included minor deities such as Tezcatlipocabungle, the bear executioner deity; Zippyloc, god of arrogance and poor dentistry; and Geoffrey the Devil.

Ultimately, a full series was not commissioned because it became apparent in the pilot that Tlaloc's fearful cohorts not only had to appease their vengeful god with sweet songs, but they also had to sacrifice live human children in his name.

In the first twenty minutes alone, two thousand children perished and the programme's producers received upwards of fourteen complaints from disgruntled parents and sweatshop owners.

The programme was soon thereafter redeveloped as the less malevolent Rainbow, Tlaloc was renamed George and the number of child sacrifices was reduced to an acceptable level.

"Management Psychology" (Klofracs Books, 1972)

 

In the 1970s, big business concerned itself exclusively with getting results, irrespective of negative effects on employees. Some Scarfolk companies were so successful that the state's secret service turned to them for advice on how to get more productive results when interrogating dangerous terrorists.

In 1972, under the guidance of management staff from a Scarfolk pickle factory, imprisoned terrorists saw their holidays reduced to 25 days per annum, lunch breaks reduced to 30 minutes, and per diem expenses decreased from 5 pounds to 3 pounds. They had to participate in regular trust and team-building exercises, such as group games, sing-a-longs, waterboarding, sensory deprivation and, as the book indicates, mock execution - all the techniques that had made British business profitable, at home and abroad.

But when interrogations were further reduced to 3 days per week and some detainees were even made redundant, many terrorists said enough was enough and went out on strike. They refused to engage in any interrogations until a full 5-day week, as well as tea breaks and afternoon naps were reinstated.