This was originally posted to news websites in timeline #00347-FAF on Monday October 14, 2080, during the 50th Anniversary remembrances of The Fracturing. It was reposted to Fluffybooru on October 14, 2018, by timeline terrorists, and is reposted here to preserve the historical record.
ASK FLUFFIESAREFOOD
Volume 1 Number 36
Happy Monday Fluffherders! It’s time for another edition of Ask FluffiesAreFood! Today is Monday, October 14th. It’s the 50th anniversary of Bloody Monday in the former United States. After a week of martial law failed to quell pro-Trump militias in Alaska and New England, President Paul Ryan ordered the US Air Force and US Army to use chemical weapons on armed blockades along US Interstates. Survivors were rounded up by regular Army and activated National Guard troops and shot for insurrection. Families of the insurgents were arrested en masse on charges of aiding and abetting treason. Nightly news broadcasts showed pictures of insurgents side-by-side with corpses of Russian special forces, and all of America was made aware that the Russians attempted to take over the United States. By nightfall on the West Coast, the only insurgent stronghold left was in Prudhoe Bay, Alaska.
As hilarious as this sounds now, my family and I all thought the worst was over! Of course, by the next morning, it was October 15th, 2030, and we woke up to the news that the Russians had already overrun Poland, the Baltics, and Romania, and were pushing into Hungary, Slovakia, Czechia, Austria and Germany. Serbia had invaded Croatia and Montenegro and Turkey had taken the rest of Cyprus and was rolling into Macedonia and Greece. World War Three had started.
And now to your questions. Carnivore in Colorado asks:
I’m new to fluffherding, and while I keep hearing about the importance of the Knifey Game, I’m not sure what the Knifey Game is. Can you explain?
Absolutely CiC! In order to understand the Knifey Game, you first need to understand the most basic principle of fluffherding: The Fluffies must never know they are being raised for meat. Fluffies are very empathetic creatures, and their natural state is to love each other and their human masters without reservation. If they find out that their human owners want to eat them, this causes a psychological break that can lead to Fluffy Psychosis, where the fluffies start acting erratically. This can manifest as everything from no longer obeying their human masters to eating their children in order to save them from the cruel world. Needless to say, the stress ruins the meat, which becomes inedibly sour.
Even so, we need to slaughter the fluffies eventually, and fluffies are going to want to know where their companions went. Decades ago, we started telling fluffies that good fluffies go to Skettiland, a magical place where fluffies eat as much spaghetti as they want, never make bad poopies, never get sick or have hurties, and can play and hug all day long.
Once they are sold this delusion, fluffy psychology will reinforce it for us! (“Wha happen tu fwend mashmewwo? Nu see eva since Daddeh took him tu gawage.” “Am simplaw! Mashmewwo am gud fwuffy, wen’ tu Skettiwand!”) But this only works as long as we do not break the delusion.
To help preserve the delusion until it is far too late, we have the Knifey Game. The Knifey Game is a game that every fluffy plays before they go to Skettiland. We don’t tell them exactly what the Knifey Game is. Some fluffherders experimented with telling fluffies that after the Knifey Game all their troubles would go away, but that resulted in deeply unhappy fluffies that demanded we play the Knifey Game sooner. Instead, after careful experimentation, the scientists at the Fluffherders Association of America issued Knifey Game guidelines that we stick to to this day:
AS FOALS: all talkie foals should be told about Skettiland and told that only good fluffies go to Skettiland.
AS COLTS AND FILLIES: all adolescent fluffies should be told that the Knifey Game is only played once, and it is played when the fluffy is ready to go to Skettiland. These are the ONLY details they should be told about the Knifey Game.
AT HARVEST TIME: we encourage fluffherders to tell fluffies ready for harvest, in front of the rest of the herd, that they are going to Skettiland! Dress the harvest-ready fluffies with a pretty decorated ribbon for the herd to admire. Give the fluffies time for last huggies and goodbyes. Then take them, one at a time, somewhere isolated from the rest of the herd, so that none of the herd can see or hear what happens next.
From there, you play the actual Knifey Game. As you may have surmised, this is when we cork the fluffy, put them in either a legboard or skinning harness, and then use a very sharp knife to dispatch the fluffy. Within seconds the fluffy is “in Skettiland” and we skin, gut, and butcher the carcass.
It’s worth mentioning that the Knifey Game got its start in fluffherding, but has, not too long ago, taken on more insidious meanings. After World War Three it became a shorthand both for genocide in Russian-alligned Europe and for antifascist activity in French-alligned Europe. In 2055 Confederate religious police used it as shorthand for castrating and otherwise mutilating the enemies of then-President Nash McCullen. Fortunately those days are in the past, and the Knifey Game is back to its original, benign meaning.
Ask FluffiesAreFood is a service of the Fluffherders’ Association of America. If you have a question about raising, slaughtering, or eating of fluffies, you may comment here.