Rex Huppke: Doomsday Clock moves up. Yay! Let’s get this over with

Like most Americans, I was relieved to learn the Doomsday Clock has once again sped up, bringing humanity closer to the end of all things and putting us well within reach of the sweet, welcoming silence of extinction.

The Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists – one of my top-five favorite doomsday-related bulletins – revealed Tuesday that the Doomsday Clock has advanced to 85 seconds to midnight, a full four seconds closer to global catastrophe than last year and the closest to midnight it has ever been.

What happens at midnight? In scientific terms: POOF! The things we’ve built and the ways we’ve behaved and the manner in which we’ve rudely neglected the planet that has been kind enough to host us will result in our destruction. Roll the credits. There will not be a sequel. Whomp-whomp.

Reflecting on the state of things globally, John Mecklin, the bulletin’s editor, wrote:

“Hard-won global understandings are collapsing, accelerating a winner-takes-all great power competition and undermining the international cooperation critical to reducing the risks of nuclear war, climate change, the misuse of biotechnology, the potential threat of artificial intelligence, and other apocalyptic dangers. Far too many leaders have grown complacent and indifferent, in many cases adopting rhetoric and policies that accelerate rather than mitigate these existential risks.”

Climate change, the advent of AI, the “rise of nationalistic autocracy in countries around the world” – those are among the things that led the scientists to conclude: “Our current trajectory is unsustainable.”

Heck, I could’ve told them that.

The Doomsday Clock is certainly not a definitive thing. These days, I see it more as aspirational.

Given what has unfolded in America in just the first month of this year makes me want to lean on the clock’s giant hands (I assume it’s a giant clock with big hands set up in a dark, ominous room somewhere) and push us closer to the finish line.

Let’s face it, as a species, we’re not great. We fight over stupid stuff, we don’t think about the future or the consequences of our actions, we let people like Donald Trump and Vladimir Putin run things, and we’ve filled the oceans with so much plastic that dolphins need to learn how to walk. For all our advances, we’ve put the planet in an existential crisis; many Americans respond by demanding larger gas-powered cars they can drive to their glammed-up disaster bunkers.

Ever since the invention of the sandwich-board sign, bearded weirdos have wandered about displaying “The End Is Near!” messages. We once laughed them off, but now, if we’re being quite honest, we see them and think: “Yeah, that sounds about right.”

I’m all for fixing things, but I’m also a realist. And I’m tired. Tired of the blabbing and yelling and efforts to out-stupid one another. I’ll fight to the bitter end and all that, but I’m not going to lie and tell you the Doomsday Clock doesn’t offer a glimmer of hope that we can just wrap this mess up and call it a day.

In the late 1950s, the great musical satirist Tom Lehrer sang about nuclear annihilation:

And we will all go together when we go.

What a comforting fact that is to know.

Universal bereavement,

An inspiring achievement,

Yes, we all will go together when we go.

Lehrer conveniently and sneakily died in 2025, presumably fed up with the lot of us and eager to get a jump on other things. But his words on the comfort of an approaching Armageddon ring on.

I’m not saying I want the Doomsday Clock to strike midnight. I generally like existing. But given the way many in this world are behaving, that clock’s-a-tickin’.

So we might as well be optimistic about the possibility of the end-times. After all, it would at least bring a refreshing quiet to the land.

Follow USA Today columnist Rex Huppke on Bluesky at @rexhuppke.bsky.social and on Facebook at facebook.com/RexIsAJerk.