False Hope Dispenser

Worn charm-like on belt loops and backpacks by the era’s aggressively ignorant young people

This 21st century talisman is composed of plastic and alcohol, also known as garbage and denial, two ingredients instrumental in the unfolding of the Year of Our Great Dismay. When rubbed between two desperate hands as if to coax a genie from a bottle, it generated a convincing but ultimately false sense of safety. False because the invisible force field of protection only lasted until the next time those hands came in contact with a single other surface, which proved to be approximately .0004 seconds later.