This week TED Talks returns to Vancouver for another series of inspirational and motivational speeches by “thinkers, dreamers and mavericks” wearing headset microphones to engage and transform audience members who aren’t fazed by an $8,500 admission price. The list of speakers at the 2015 edition, held at the Vancouver Convention Centre until March 20, includes international relations experts, computer scientists, performance artists, researchers, space explorers, authors, social activists, sculptors, architects, poets, rhythmic gesticulators, animatronic former Cabbage Patch Kids and the dude who designed the Michael Jackson zipper jacket. We may have made a few of those up.
If you sense a slight bitterness in our tone, you’d be correct. This is the second year TED Talks has come to Vancouver and it’s the second time the organizers of the popular event have rejected or outright ignored our proposed seminar topics.
Apparently our dose of reality is just a little too real for some people. Here are some of the topics members of K&K would have blown minds and taken names with if TED Talks weren’t a bunch of pussies:
• Has Society Finally Reached Peak Yam Fries?
• Stop Posting or Liking Vancity Buzz Links on Facebook Before We Begin to Question our Facebook Friendship with You
• Givin’r vs. Those Who Give’r
• If You’re Sleeping with Mascots of Professional Sports Teams as Means of Achieving Your Goals, You Might Want to Rethink Your “Five-Year Plan”
• If Loving Mitsou’s “Bye Bye Mon Cowboy” is a Crime, then Lock Us Up and Throw Away the Key
• In Case You Didn’t Already Know, the Cyndi Lauper song “She-Bop” is About Masturbation
• Sorry to Break it to You, But Rick Springfield Sounds Like One Creepy Dude
• Why “Lodi” and “Electric Avenue” are Our Go-To Karaoke Jams
• Craft Beer Needs to Stop Relying on Hop Puns
• That Time Our Mom Confiscated our Purple Rain Cassette After Hearing the Lyrics to “Darling Nikki.”
