Popular '80s Trend of Fearing Nuclear Annihilation Back

80s music and personalities have come back to the spotlight in recent years; '80s catchphrases, '80s TV shows have had highly-rated reunion specials. Now the ultimate '80s calling card is back in a big way: Nuclear annihilation.

Nothing quite summed up the '80s to those who remember it like L.A. Law, Richard Marx songs on the radio, the ever-looming threat of atomic destruction. With the fall of the Soviet Union and the end of the Reagan administration, however, the Cold War and the madness of nuclear annihilation passed into history, like razor-thin ties and Nia Peeples. Until now!

War on Terror, Sept. 11th, Al Qaeda, Terror Alert, India, Pakistan—all words that add up to a big return for atomic Armageddon. A whole new generation is experiencing the icy fear that, at any moment, the sky could turn red and rain death from above. A feeling most baby-boomers thought they would never live to feel again.

"I knew all the Reagan kids were communists or homos," said '80s nostalgia-lover and General Foods employee Ruby Tuesday. "Who knew there were more Bushes out there, even dumber and more terrifying than Reagan himself?"

But giving all the credit to one man for the resurgence in possible nuclear retaliation might be morally satisfying, but would be overlooking the heightened animosity throughout the world. Religious-based hate, intolerance, imagine or assumed grievances by the dozens, and we can't forget the re-emergence of decades-old historical-based conflicts.

The current heated debate between India and Pakistan over the disputed territory of Kashmir provides the biggest potential for nuclear destruction since the Bay of Pigs. Perhaps encouraged by the paranoia in the air following the Sept. 11th terrorist attacks, old territorial arguments over which country has claim to Kashmir sparked talk of nuclear war with the newly-nuclear capable countries.

But nuclear destruction fans aren't pinning their hopes on that bad blood alone; Osama bin Laden and his Al Qaeda group are possibly still out there, very active, and possibly capable of a nuclear assault of their own, and the likely target is on the continental United States.

"It's a fantastic new century for us '80s buffs," said '80s Preservation Society President Rold Hansard. "First there was that Laverne and Shirley reunion movie, then that Facts of Life reunion movie. Alf is back, even if it's just for commercials, but now that ultimate hallmark of the '80s—the threat of nuclear Armageddon—is back, and I couldn't be more pleased, as well as terrified."

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In the Highlands of northern Scotland, between the towns of Acch and Edenocker there lies Loch Ness, a body of water with a name that's Scottish for "Nasty Lake." This name dates back to the time of the Picts, a clan of tattooed assholes native to Scotland who ruled the land for thousands of years before modern-day Scots came over from Ireland and started throwing telephone poles around and head-butting small children and deer and whatnot.

Loch Ness was know to the Picts for being incredibly foul, thanks to the thousands of ducks who disobeyed the numerous "We don swim in yer terlet, so don you a crap in ar lach" signs posted around the lake. In order to keep slow children from swimming in the filthy loch, the Picts invented a story about a hideous creature named Nessie who lived within, a beast described as "a big smelly piano with flippers" that swallowed young children whole and wiped its ass on trees. Even more vivid details were summoned for particularly stubborn youths, tales of the beast using children's livers to play rugby and routinely cheating at checkers to boot.

As time went by the Picts were gradually head-butted out of Scotland, but their stories of Nessie lived on in the imaginations and heartburn-inducing nightmares of the modern Scots. Most were doubtful of the existence of the beast, unless they were standing on the shores of the loch and being double dog dared to go skinny-dipping within, in which case Nessie's existence was a forgone conclusion.

It wasn't until a spring day in 1804 that the public consensus began to turn. That morning, a pair of Scottish fisherman, pissed out of their minds and navigating with a map of continental Africa, set out onto the loch in search of brown herring. Their search for fish hampered by a lack of bait, nets or poles, they soon consoled themselves with a drinking game. The game was going smashingly until the fisherman happened to glance down into the water and saw the pale white face of a child staring up from beneath the murk of the loch. Upon seeing this frightful visage ruminating up from the deep, the fishermen cried out "Ayyybe! Vagoda!" which is Scottish for "Shit! Midget!" and made like the Harvard rowing team on Naïve Freshman Co-Ed Night getting back to shore.

Word spread quickly around Scotland like a game of "telephone" and by the time it got back to Loch Ness, the word was that the legendary Nessie was, in fact, some kind of terrifying midget nightmare who played bocce ball at the bottom of the loch. That was enough to inspire the populace to stay the hell away from the lake for another hundred years, but Londoners were not so smart.

In 1933 the London Daily Mail hired a big-game hunter named Marmaduke Wetherell to get coked up to the gills and either capture the Loch Ness Midget or make a newsworthy ass of himself in the process. Few doubted that he was the right man for the job.

Within days, Wetherell reported that he had spotted the wee little beast near the loch, and had made a plaster casting of one of its footprints. This he promptly sent to the Natural History Museum in London for analysis. While the world waited with baited breath for the zoologists to make their determinations, Wetherell slept with every available woman in Scotland and bought lots of things on credit. By the time word came back from the Museum that the tracks were merely the marks left from someone dropping a donut in the mud, Wetherell was nowhere to be found.

The Wetherell hoax set back the cause of Nessie research for the better part of a year, and it did not recover until the Daily Mail published a shocking photo by a London Physicist named R. Kenneth Wilson in 1934. The picture, a snapshot from Wilson's vacation to Scotland that year, featured Wilson standing in front of Loch Ness and showcasing with his smile the most horrendous set of odd-sized, discolored and poorly-maintained teeth the world had ever seen. Even the English people were appalled, and dentists the world over sent him hate mail.

It wasn't until a year later, when some of the shock had worn off, that someone was able to look at the photo closely enough to realize that, over Wilson's shoulder, the Loch Ness Midget was plainly visible signaling for a fair catch on the shores of the loch. A re-cropped version of the photo swept the globe and Nessie-mania was born again.

Although the photo was determined to be a hoax in 1980, when researchers discovered that the "midget" in the photo was merely a Raggedy Andy doll that Wilson's daughter had left on the beach, it had helped to keep the search for Nessie alive for over fifty years. Several sonar sweeps of the loch between the 1970's and 1990's revealed numerous unexplainable midget-sized objects moving in the loch, and thousands of eyewitnesses have come forth with tales of seeing the creepy little bugger frolicking in the waves. Scientists have discounted their claims, suggesting that people are merely mistaking floating logs, otters, schools of fish or bathing leprechauns for the fabled midget, but eyewitnesses remain unconvinced.

While experts are forever skeptical, the prudent are reminded of the numerous legendary creatures of yore that turned out to be improbable, yet quite real. There was a time when narwhals, gorillas, the Smothers Brothers and okapis were all thought to be merely the products of overheated imaginations, and yet today they exist squarely in the realm of scientific fact. Is the Loch Ness Midget to be the next? Or will it be beaten to the punch by the Abdominal Snowman or the Sascrotch? Only time can tell.

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You see, George? I told you the name of that movie was Deep Blue Sea, the one where the sharks eat the people. I should know, it's probably one of the best movies I've ever seen. Yet you doubted me. Well, tonight I dine on victory.

Lake Placid? How you could get a movie about a giant alligator in a small town confused with a movie about hyper-intelligent sharks eating all the people at a floating sea lab? No victory for you, George. You clearly don't keep good inventory on your mutated-creature-attacks-people movies. I, on the other hand, who do keep good inventory on my mutated-creature-attacks-people movies, will be eating big fat slabs of victory tonight, right off the bone.

Not that Lake Placid is a bad film, George—that's not my argument at all. Bill Pullman, Bridget Fonda, Oliver Platt, a great cast all around. But are you honestly telling me you mixed up Oliver Platt with Samuel L. Jackson? An incalculable error on your part, George, which is why I munch victory chips and you get crow. Enjoying your crow, George? I've had to eat crow far too many times to feel sorry for you. I've eaten enough crow for the population of India in my years. And they're practically starving, George, so you know they would eat a lot of crow. But tonight my soup is filled with chunks of victory.

What about the sheriff? There's not even a sheriff in Deep Blue Sea. Not that I'm not enjoying delicious victory-chip cookies over my win, but I don't understand how you could so clearly confuse a small town with a partially submerged sea lab. Did the diving suits not give it away at all? When the fellow at the party asked what was the movie with Samuel L. Jackson where the sharks are trying to kill him, and you said, "Oh, Lake Placid!" did it not seem at all possible that sharks in a movie about a lake was a major blunder?

The more I think about it, the victory isn't all that sweet. Sure, it's good, especially for a change since I've so often had big fat crow while you chomped victory, but I didn't want to win this way. It takes some of the fun out of it. Did you let me win on purpose? Is it possible you fouled up the movie title so completely hoping that I would pick up the ball and run the touchdown? Seriously, George, it's starting to bother me—are you retarded? Not that it's a problem if you are, but if you have suddenly become retarded during the course of the party last night, I need to know. I sure didn't want to win this way.

I'm starting to see you in a whole new light, George. Sitting here, cutting my victory into small pieces and eating it quietly… you're not at all the impenetrable fortress of knowledge I once thought you to be. You're truly fallible, aren't you? Especially where your weak knowledge of modern giant creature movies comes in.

It was bound to happen, I guess. Maybe before I was too awestruck by your ability to recall most movies without failure, to beat me to an answer and make me look like a jackass. I imagine those days are over, and I'm a little sad. I won't be eating crow anymore, just sweet, sweet victory, but still, it changes the way I see things now. The rosy-colored glasses are off and I see you for what you are—a buffoon, I dare say, when it comes to telling the difference between giant shark and giant alligator movies. God forbid someone ever asks you about Gator or Jaws—you're liable to burst a blood vessel and drool all over yourself and become a complete vegetable.

Let's hope it was a one-time thing, for both of us, and never speak of it again. Here—share my victory. Just this one time.

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