The other day I was dispensing sage advice to a friend. Later it occurred to me that if my advice were followed, my friend could end up getting married and starting a family.
In other words, I might have accidentally created a baby.
Whoops.
And not just one baby. The couple could end up having two or three. And those babies will grow up and have babies of their own. I might have created thousands of babies without realizing it.
Without me and my stupid advice, those babies would never be conceived. Instead, the two people might end up with other people and then other babies would be conceived instead of…wait-a-minute. oh CRAP.
I just realized I might have accidentally denied life to thousands of potential babies. I might as well be taking a wiz on embryonic stem cells. I am the Pol Pot of advice givers.
Giving advice is extra dangerous for me because I have a way of appearing wiser than I am. I think it has something to do with my mannerism or choice of words. But every once in a while I’ll toss out some peanut of advice that I have spent exactly two seconds thinking about and the next thing I hear is “You’re right! I will quit my job despite having no savings!” And I’ll think “Oh crap. I did it again.”
It makes me wonder why advice isn’t regulated. I’m not allowed to litter but it’s perfectly legal to talk you into joining the army. I have to think that at least half of all the dangerous things people do are caused by bad advice. “Here, inject this in your arm. Trust me.”
So the next time someone does you wrong, retaliate with bad advice. “Wow, you have a lot of muscles. Have you considered doing cage fighting? I think you’d be good at it.”
Do you have any other suggestions of bad advice?