Ever feel like you are in on a secret after reading a story?

You proudly walk around knowing how a book ends, what happened to this character and that one and all of those silly plot twists here and there. If there’s a movie or TV series out there based on the story, you would gladly cite the differences (maybe with pride or arrogance). And, ultimately, you hold power over those not in the know.

There’s a wonderful and dangerous drug in writing where the writer may hide (or lie about) a story morsel and then later reveal as things start unraveling. Whether it’s from ironclad outlining or plucked blindly from Never-Ether-Land, those well-placed story bullets can literaturally blow a reader’s mind.

Then it comes down to the payoff. It’s the writer’s promise to the reader. It’s your reward, or lack thereof, as a reader for following the bread crumbs to the last word of the story.

So why the hell would something so heinous as a spoiler t-shirt exist on our home world? You! Take that off now!

There is no such thing as statutes of limitation on spoilers. Let our children find out for themselves who the hell Rosebud was. Let them find out if the top of Roland’s Dark Tower is empty or not. Let them understand why M Night Shyamalan could only yell Surprise! for so long. And yeah, it’s common knowledge — perhaps taught in kindergarten– who Luke’s father was, but at least I showed the movie first to my kids before blabbing about it.

These spoiler t-shirts should be abolished, especially those homemade ones spun together like less-than-stellar meth Walter White would mock (yes, there are people out there who don’t know what happened to Mr. White).

Okay, there are more damaging things a person can do in life to others. We do live in a world where random acts of violence occur almost non-randomly. Spoiling a story for others is definitely not the same as shooting someone.

But it is about spoiler-folks being assholes.

It’s about them bastardizing a writer’s work and stealing away the magic of the story. The spoiler-folks laugh it off because the concept is so simple; it takes trivial effort to share spoilers with others with merely a quip, some keystrokes or wearing a stupid t-shirt. You don’t even have to have read the story. Just pass along the ruination to others, weakening the power of the story until it is dead. Only assholes would do this.

Spoiler-folks use public toilets and they piss on the seats. They walk around in the summertime saying ‘How about this heat.’

At least spoiler-folks are limited to what they know (Lisbeth Salander is safe for a while).

If you of the non-spoiler types see these mongrels, perhaps at a book signing, wearing their spoiler t-shirts stating ‘[Character name] Dies,’ stay away from these people. Maybe if you ignore them, they will go away completely. They are not cute. They are not cool because they know something you don’t. They do not impress the author with their sense of boldness or originality. They are there just to piss you off.

With great power comes great responsibility. If someone hands you apparel that can spoil 100 books at once, please, I beg you, put it away. Hide it from the children of our future. In the meantime, continue to read what you want to know about. Watch what you’ve been waiting to see. Only then will you take away the power of the spoiler-people.