Planet Mitosis: How the World Learned to Stop Worrying and Love the Split
The World’s Favorite Divorce: How “Split” Became the Planet’s New National Sport
By Matteo Vargas, Senior Correspondent, Dave’s Locker
Somewhere between the Arctic Circle and the last functional ATM in Beirut, humanity has decided that fission is fashion. From marital splits to sovereign secessions, from stock splits to split infinitives, the global zeitgeist has become one long, slow-motion mitosis. While diplomats in Geneva still pretend to be shocked, the rest of us are busy unfollowing each other on every platform that still loads.
Consider the United Kingdom—once an empire on which the sun never set, now a country that can’t even decide on a thermostat setting. Brexit was merely the overture; this spring’s council elections saw Cornwall flirting with “devo-max” and Yorkshire quietly printing its own passports on recycled tea bags. Downing Street responded by splitting the difference and promising “levelling up,” which is civil-service argot for rearranging deck chairs on the Titanic, but with Wi-Fi.
Meanwhile, across the Atlantic, the United States has elevated the split to performance art. Congress now functions like a bad marriage where both partners have restraining orders but share the same Netflix password. The looming debt-ceiling cliff has become a quarterly tradition, like Christmas, only with more egging on from credit-rating agencies. Should the Union actually fracture, analysts predict the two new nations will immediately start arguing over who keeps the national anthem and who gets stuck with the Kardashians.
Not to be outdone, the tech sector has gamified the concept. Tesla executed a 3-for-1 stock split last year so traders could feel “more accessible” to retail investors—translation: the house doubles the number of chips, the roulette wheel stays rigged. Over in crypto, entire blockchains are splitting (“forking,” if you like your jargon served cold) faster than teenagers ghosting prom dates. Each fork births a new coin, a new Telegram channel, and the same old get-rich-quick sermon delivered by someone whose avatar is a pixelated ape wearing sunglasses in the shower.
The global south, ever the laboratory for northern neuroses, is likewise busy subdividing. Sudan recently split in two, then South Sudan decided it wasn’t south enough and began subdividing itself into pre-tribal bite-sized pieces. In Latin America, Chile is drafting a new constitution so radically federal that even the glaciers are requesting autonomy. Analysts call it “post-neoliberal fragmentation.” The glaciers, being non-verbal, just keep melting faster—an existential mic drop.
Europe, never one to miss a bureaucratic opportunity, is drafting a 400-page “Directive on Harmonized Dissolution Procedures.” The draft leaked last week; Article 47(b) stipulates that any region exiting the EU must return its commemorative tote bags in “original, non-soil condition.” The satirical French paper *Le Canard enchaîné* responded with a headline reading: “L’Union se divise, mais le merch reste.” Brussels insiders insist the clause is merely “aspirational,” which is euro-speak for “unenforceable but fun to threaten teenagers with.”
Of course, the human element remains the same everywhere: someone ends up sleeping on the couch. In the case of the Koreas, that couch has been the DMZ for seventy years. Cyprus still wakes up to find its living room divided by a green line and a UN peacekeeper raiding the fridge. Even the International Space Station—mankind’s last shared Airbnb—has begun sprouting metaphorical duct-tape lines as cosmonauts and astronauts argue over whose turn it is to fix the urine recycler. Houston, we have a custody dispute.
So what does it all mean? Simply that the 21st-century motto is: “If you can’t stand the heat, subdivide the kitchen.” Whether it’s counties, currencies, or marriages, the preferred coping mechanism is to carve out a smaller piece and declare victory. The planet keeps spinning—albeit slightly faster as mass redistributes toward the poles—and the rest of us update our passports, wallets, and loyalties with the weary efficiency of frequent flyers in the divorce lounge.
In the end, the split isn’t just political or economic; it’s ontological. We are all, in some sense, cutting ourselves in half to see which side bleeds nostalgia. And somewhere, in a quiet corner of the metaverse, the blockchain formerly known as Earth is minting commemorative NFTs of the moment we decided that togetherness was an optional extra, like airline legroom or hope.
