Daniel Johnson wrote:Absolute Platitude by Mike Dorman
Whenever I tell my story, the following objections inevitably arise: how did you come to possess such technology? How does it work?! To which I always reply…shut-up and listen! If I wanted my entire point disregarded, I wouldn’t have started speaking in the first place, thank you very much.
So yeah, I possessed the technology to control every living person’s mind—just deal with it—and what do you think I did? Another guy once scoffed, pointing out my missed chance at the NBA, to which I replied, “shut-up and listen!” Control over people’s minds didn’t mean I could make Spaldings swish through hoops.
I could, however, make my wife obey, and that was every bit as wonderful as you’d imagine. Apart from the obvious, Julie was also a competent cook, and I gorged on cherry cobblers and tuna casseroles until I couldn’t take anymore. And before you judge me unscrupulous, imagine your wife became like some 6th grade crush you couldn’t shake, no matter how mean you got. Or unfaithful.
So yeah, I cheated on Julie, if you want to call it that. Things were going well for me at work—real well—and I took my rightful spoils as the newly appointed CEO, upgraded the office right along with the house and the mistress. Julie was likely devastated, but I left her a handsome severance package, if not exactly any clue on where to find me.
Much like Julie however, my role as CEO also grew ill-fitting. A glorified insurance peddler? For one possessed with my persuasive abilities, securing the ventures of the more powerful was hardly what I envisioned. So I switched industries—sectors, if you want to get technical—and climbed into public office.
The campaign proved a pleasant distraction; at the very least, it delayed the full severity of my solipsist predicament so I could enjoy the adulating crowds and entire stadiums jam-packed with Julies, all wanting me--needing me--to save them.
You know that platitude about absolute power corrupting absolutely? It’s nonsense. I mean, if you’ve got all the power, corruption’s kind of a mute point. What absolute power does create, however, is absolute boredom. But it takes a while to get there.
So yeah, I became president, one with a House and Senate eager to mold my American dream with the corresponding bills and regulations. Can you imagine? With the rest of the world’s leaders kowtowing to my better judgment, there was no need for wars. After I tackled that global warming quandary—easily solved with a world government headed by yours truly—I got to dealing with the domestic fall-out. Jobs could neither be replaced nor easily created, to say nothing of the costs of my desired universal health care, so I came up with a novel solution, which isn’t to say it wasn’t without its ethical shortfalls.
Question: if cyborgs don’t have souls, are humans stripped of free-will any loftier? I ultimately decided that automatons are automatons, flesh or not, so yeah, I started killing people, if that’s what you want to call it. Shuffled them all into their voting locales and whoever rolled a six was euthanized.
At this point, my relationship with my daughter, Melanie, went south. Even though I let her boyfriend off the hook (he’d rolled a six), she couldn’t forgive me, called me a monster and the like.
How, you ask, could any mind-controlled daughter hate their mind-controlling father? Because—you guessed it—my daughter was exempt.
Believe me, during my down time, I often thought of acquiring Melanie’s affection the easy way, but, cliché or not, love ain’t love unless its freely given. Couldn’t she see I wanted a better world for her?
“Don’t worry, I won’t be staying long.”
“Melanie!” Sitting up in my chair, I shot a look at the agent responsible for this barging-in. Looking at my daughter, I smiled. “What a nice surprise. Come, take a chair—“
“—Did you block my passport?”
“How’s…what’s his name again…Ricardo doing? He still playing in that band?”
“Did you block my passport?”
I leaned back, sighed. “I can’t have you running off again. What if something happened to Mom and I needed to contact you?”
“First of all, for the life of me I don’t know why Mom still adores you.” Her green eyes, her wavy brown hair—all heirlooms of her mother—taunted me. “And second of all, you can’t control me, Dad. I’m not one of your lackeys—“
Try as I might otherwise, I chuckled. “Lackeys?”
“Yeah, and I’m not one of them.” She narrowed her eyes, a remarkable likeness to Julie. “And I’ll never forgive you if you don’t unblock my passport. Never.”
If you can’t imagine how I would miss behavior like that, than you’ve clearly never controlled the planet. Melanie was the only spot of sunshine in my drab, predictable world. I mean, what was I supposed to do? Just wait around until she saw her old man in a different, more forgiving light? Even if—miracles never cease—she did, I wasn’t accustomed to waiting. So yeah, I manipulated my daughter’s mind, if you want to call it that, and it was my biggest regret to date, because when Melanie finally wanted to spend time with me, I didn’t even like her. Her affection had no substance.
To think, I used to scoff at my theological upbringing. I mean, why would an all-powerful Creator sit back and allow his measly creations to curse and break his will, unless, contrary to canonized wisdom, he wasn’t as powerful as he was cracked up to be?
Now—too late—I know better.
The End