The Lure of being Exclusively Pointless
South Park, a popular American animated sitcom created by Trey Parker and Matt Stone, has many lessons to teach us about human behavior (once you get past the potty-mouth cursing and gory scenes).
In one of the episodes, “Cartmanland”160, the controversial main character Eric Cartman inherits $1 million from his deceased grandmother. He decides to use most of the funds to buy a struggling theme park just to entertain himself there without being stuck in lines.
Instead of trying to improve the business, Cartman makes a full 38-second TV commercial to show how amazingly fun “Cartmanland” is and emphasizes that no one besides himself can enjoy it. “So much fun in Cartmanland, but you can’t come!” is the catchy slogan.
After realizing he needs more money to hire a security guard to keep his friends out, Cartman starts to accept two customers a day to pay for the security costs. He soon realizes that...