Nine Year-Old Outvoted 3-1 In Family Suicide Pact

Despite stubborn opposition from their youngest member, the Peterson family of Willow Brook Lane in San Jose, California will poison themselves together this weekend after systematically destroying all their possessions, patriarch Dennis reports.

Robby Peterson, 9, cast the only dissenting vote against the alienated clan's suicide pact yesterday, with Dennis, his wife Michelle and sixteen year-old daughter Courtney all voting in favor.

"Robby's very naive," a sullen Dennis remarked. "He hasn't had the misfortune of living long enough to have been crushed by this miserable world. To have had his face ground into the dirt."

Robby, who counts his pet hamster Dumbledore, pizza, and video games as reasons to live, lamented his immenent death.

"I don't want to die," he said, weeping quietly. "My birthday is next week. I want to have a party with my friends."

Courtney Peterson says Robby's fixation on frivolous, immaterial things is par for the course for her "immature" little brother.

"He's actually concerned about who'll take care of his Sims characters when he's dead," Courtney reported. "This is what modern society has reduced us to - living vicariously through the exploits of imaginary people on a computer screen."

Added Courtney: "Of course he's only nine, so he doesn't even know what depression is. If he knew what high school is like, he'd definitely thank us."