I’ve been doing some serious thinking lately, and I’ve decided I’m going to take the plunge. There’s no reason not to—the benefits are quite substantial, and there’s really no downside to doing it. Frankly, the more time I spend in the modern world, the more surprised I am that someone hasn’t figured it out earlier.
I’m talking, obviously, of registering my body as a corporation, with my mind as a limited liability representative.
All the important components are already in place, so really all that’s left is the paperwork. I have a board of directors (they’re quite argumentative at times, especially when Rationality and Emotion start going at it, or when Primal Urge feels unfulfilled), and they all have local addresses and can be easily contacted (except when they don’t feel like it). I’ve issued stock to various outside investors, letting them dictate how much value they own (because money, after all, is merely the abstraction of time spent performing a task). My wife and football are the majority owners right now, but the kids are starting an aggressive buyout, and I think in a couple years they’ll have almost full control. There’s also a list of corporate bylaws that I made up myself and follow when it doesn’t inconvenience me, so I don’t foresee any legal holdup.
Once I register, I think the benefits are really going to be worth it. My taxes will be much lower than they are now, so that’ll definitely go over well with the shareholders, and having limited liability will make certain functions of life a lot easier. If I ever kill someone, or steal a bunch of money, or bribe people to get a more favorable outcome on something I want, I’ll just pay a small fine and not even have to say I did anything wrong. It’s awesome! I couldn’t even be charged with a serious crime, unlike you silly normal people. I could literally walk down to the local Federal Reserve and take a couple billion dollars, and as long as I paid back several million and promised never to do it again (not that I did anything wrong in the first place, of course), there’d be no problem whatsoever. Everyone’s a winner!
(By everyone, I obviously mean “my board of directors,” because that’s all that really matters. Why should I care how other people are affected by my body’s actions? Not liable, remember?)
There’s also the environmental aspect to think of. Once I declare my body a corporation, it’s not my fault if what I do harms the world around me. I have to look out for my shareholders, so if that means I run over a couple pedestrians to get to work faster or throw a bunch of dirty diapers in my neighbor’s backyard rather than take the time to go put it in the trash, they can rest assured that I’m working for their best interests. The more time I spend with them, the more value they get, and, frankly, that’s the only guideline I have to follow. You can be damned sure I’ll be talking to policy crafters accordingly. Luckily, I’ll be able to use as much money as I want to influence their decisions about what to set into law, so, thanks, Supreme Court! Thanks, Washington! Appreciate the assist!
Now, don’t get me wrong, there are a couple downsides. First off, to get that preferred tax rate, I’m going to have to base my corporation in the Cayman Islands or some other business-friendly nation, so that’ll necessitate a couple copies of myself to act as shell companies. They don’t really have to do anything, just sit there and provide the polite legal fiction that I’m actually residing in that country, so I’ll probably just get a couple of Fatheads or something and glue them to the side of a local strip mall. They won’t even need to pick up the phone if someone calls (which is a good thing, since inanimate objects traditionally struggle with phone-answering etiquette), but those shipping costs are going to set me back at least twenty or thirty bucks. Hopefully I’ll save that much with the tax laws.
Second, I can’t do anything totally shocking or horrendous until I’m so big that everyone in the world would be devastated by the mere thought of losing me.
Obviously, I’ll need to start a reality-television show or something similar to ensure that everyone who has time invested in me will be completely unable to function in any way, shape, or form if I disappear. Even the possibility of not having me around should be enough to drive the world into such a panic that otherwise completely rational people will mortgage away their future for the totally essential services I provide (chiefly: being me), but the only way to make this happen is for me to repeatedly tell people just how necessary I am to their well-being. Remember: You need me. I complete you. If I’m not here, your life is meaningless, and you’ll probably end up starving in a gutter somewhere. I can’t really prove this in any substantial way, but I know I’ll be adversely affected if I’m dissolved or broken up, so just trust me on this one. I’ve repeated myself so many times, there’s no chance it’s a lie.
Finally, I’m not sure how I’m going to deal with the perpetuation of my corporation once those on the current board of directors decide to call it quits, but to be honest, I’ve offered them some pretty big bonuses to stick around for as long as possible (no matter how they perform), so I’m not too concerned. There’s no way my board would ever do anything not in the best interests of the corporation and purely for its own selfish benefit, so once I finish my seventh shot of tequila and do this line of blow, I’m going to drive on down to the local chamber of commerce and get the ball rolling.
It’s time to start living life the way it was meant to be lived—as a soulless conglomerate of ideas and desires whose only concern is to make as much profit as possible regardless of harm inflicted on those surrounding it.
It’s time to incorporate.