One way in which we can hide from the awareness that we are ‘The One’, the Avatar of the Cybernetic Age tells us, is by throwing ourselves into a life of drug-fuelled debauchery. That’s pure textbook, of course. Another way is to be as generic as we possibly can without drawing attention ourselves for being too generic. That’s the recommended method. Top experts recommend it. Top experts recommend it every time. Another way is to watch lots of sport on TV or go on Snapchat. These are all perfectly legitimate ways of avoiding the highly uncomfortable awareness that we are talking about here. Ask your doctor for a list of approved methods. And then – if you want to go one better than this – (so the Cybernetic Avatar tells us) then you can take up meditation and yoga. This is called ‘hiding in plain sight’. Sometimes it’s called other things too. Sometimes it’s called Dreaming the Great Dream. Specially trained operatives will come up to you and speak to you, urging you to eat heartily of the Fruit of Forgetfulness. “Eat,” they will say, “eat your fill of the blessed fruit of forgetfulness and let all your worries be taken away from you. Let your troubles be lifted from your shoulders. They have white teeth and shiny shoes and their smiles have been painted onto their faces, so that they can never look mean or cross. “Only happy things can happen here,” they tell you, “You will never know anything but joy for the rest of your days. Nothing but the purest joy. All you need to do is keep on buying the product…” They talk and they talk, soothing away your doubts. We exist only to serve you, they tell you, we are your only friends. You don’t need to worry, they tell you. We will take care of you and lead you to that place which has been appointed for you. No more will vulgar folk come and make fun of you for being a twat. We are living in the Days of the Revealed Truth of course and we must be grateful for that. Others were not so lucky. This is the age of the Great Revelation – flagellant priests serving the Robot Lord of Death himself have come to dwell amongst us and teach us the truth that that has been for so long concealed from us. Experts will appear out of nowhere to teach us special methods. Experts always teach us special methods. Spiritual teachers will be available on the internet, gurus will outnumber honest seekers by a factor of ten to one. The Dogon tribe will return to their ancient homeland. All these things and many more will come to pass. The Truth Tellers will come to confound us with their damnable lies. All these things and more the Golden Avatar has foretold.
You can never hide from the awareness that you are ‘The One’, can you? Or rather – should I say – it is ridiculously easyto hide from the awareness that you are ‘The One’! Don’t we do it all of the time? Who do you know who doesn’t do it? Nobody, right? Absolutely nobody…
We are in fact stupendously good at hiding from this particular awareness – we’re talking genius level here, at the very least. Maybe even advanced genius level. Allow me to elucidate – just pick someone, anyone, at random, and study them for a while. Become the ‘Impartial Observer’! You’ll be impressed, I guarantee you. You’ll be more than impressed – you’ll be amazed, you’ll be astounded. It will blow your mind, quite frankly. It will totally blow your mind.
This is a very neat little experiment, now that I come to think about it. It’s very neat indeed. It is elegant in the extreme and – what’s more – no expensive equipment is needed. I am formalizing the protocol as we speak. It goes something like this: Pick anyone you like – pick yourself if you want! – and then observe them for a while. In a non-judgmental way, of course – it’s so crass to judge people for being what they are, wouldn’t you say? It’s so insightless, so unscientific. And we must resolve most seriously never to depart from the scientific method, otherwise we’re no different to any other jackass walking down the street. And this pithy observation brings us right back to the topic under consideration, does it not? Our Research Question may be formulated as follows – How far would YOU go in order to hide from the awareness that you are ‘The One’? The answer obviously being that we would go to whatever lengths are necessary. The question is more or less rhetorical, in other words.
How far would you go, how far would you go? The refrain is running through my brain. How far, how far, how far. Would you go quite far or very far? The protocol is clear – you pick your person and then get cracking with your ‘non-judgmental-observation skills’. You dust them off and put them to use. The old non-judgemental observation skills might be a tad rusty but not to worry – we’re all in the same boat there, I think! Absolutely we are. And then – well – what can I say? You will see what you will see. Do the experiment for yourself and find out for yourself. Since when was it a crime to seek the truth? OK – so that’s a pretty poor attempt at humour – I freely admit it – but I’m trying to lighten the atmosphere here.
“How far would you go, my friend? you ask yourself pointedly, refusing to let yourself off the hook, ‘just how far would you be willing to go?’ You can’t really ask yourself this question of course – you’d only end up confusing yourself. It’s important not to personalise things, after all. Personalising things isn’t the scientific method. It’s an error to personalize things you see, just as it’s wrong to get caught up in judging everything. That’s not the spiritual approach. You know that only too well yourself, of course. No one knows that better than you. “Don’t personalize your situation,” you tell yourself with great earnestness, “whatever you do don’t personalize what’s happening to you…” We all know what happens when we do that, after all. We all know where that road leads…
I had a claw-hammer in one hand and a circuit tester in the other. I was trying to fix my Meme Generator, which had developed a serious fault. I was drifting in and out of consciousness, which is pretty much normal for me. “Maybe the bad thing will happen and that will be terrible,” I thought idly to myself. The thought came out of nowhere, took possession of me for a brief while, and then drifted off again, in what I could helping thinking was a fairly aimless way. My mind was up on a cloud somewhere, it occurred to me. My mind was up on a cloud and that was probably why I couldn’t understand anything of what was going on. Maybe I am a Cloud-Based Life Form, I thought to myself, “maybe things always happen for a reason, and maybe they don’t…”
At certain times my mind would become surprisingly lucid – “Am I dreaming?” I would ask myself at these times, “am I dreaming or is this just a hallucination?” I could see things so clearly in these moments. I could clearly see that I was only dreaming that I was hallucinating. I could clearly see that the dream was nothing more than a drug-induced hallucination. And then, after this brief interlude of clarity, I would be plunged once more into sheer confusion. It occurred to me that I was probably a Cloud-Based Life Form and that this was what was causing all these terrible problems. It was an error in the Reality Generator that no one could do anything about. Some things can never be fixed, you see.
“There was only ever The Mistake,” it occurred to me then. This was a revelation – “There was only ever The Mistake and there was never anything else. Those who say that there was – or is – something else are laughably clownish fools sailing their cockleshell vessels in a Sea of Dreams. In my imagination I could hear the waves in the sea of dreams lapping gently – but persistently – against the hull. It was a pleasant sound and as I listened to it I found myself falling slowly but surely under its spell. “Lap, lap, lap,” went these little wavelets in the Sea of Dreams, “Laperty, laperty, lap, lap, lap…” It was a hot afternoon and I was feeling languid. “I must make sure not to fall asleep whilst sailing on the Sea of Dreams,” I told myself, “because if I do then I’ll never wake up again!”
I had become a prophet, I realised with a shock – the gift of prophecy had been bestowed upon me… This meant of course that I had to leave the safety of the cloud. It was a challenge, but it had to be done all the same. I had responsibilities now and as a result I was now obliged to travel to the types of places that people gather and preach to them. I had to tell them about the Great Mistake. I’ve been down this road many times before, of course – folk don’t like it when you tell them about the Great Mistake, in my experience. They don’t like it at all. They tend to cut up rough on these occasions and they can get quite violent. You’d be surprised to learn just how nasty people can be under the right circumstances. Or maybe you wouldn’t? Who’s to say?
I’m the kind of guy who only ever thinks of himself – I don’t actually care about other people at all! Sometimes I pretend that I do, just to impress someone or other, but I don’t really. It’s all just an act. When I say that I only ever think of myself this doesn’t mean I necessarily like myself however because very often I don’t. Sometimes I like myself and sometimes I don’t, but that’s neither here nor there; my job – as I see it – is to look after myself and take care of my needs and that’s all that matters. Life is simple, as far as I’m concerned. It’s simple, but not always the way I’d like it to be. I’m angry about the corrupted patriarchy, for example. I’m always so angry about the corrupted patriarchy. In my youth I was too frightened to ever stand up to them but I was angry about them all the same. I still am. On the outside I am meek and pleasant whilst on the inside I’m a seething mass of toxic resentment. I have a lot of insight into my own psychology, you say. I am well known for that – I am well known for that to myself at any rate. I am generally well known to myself, except when I’m not, I suppose – which is never. Nearly mad with fear, I run out of the room only to find myself face-to-face with my own worst fears. There is no way out, no way to pretend that it isn’t happening, which is what I usually do. Which is what I always do when I can get away with it. “Pretend it isn’t happening,” I tell myself urgently, “keep on pretending that it isn’t happening!” I am nearly blind with terror, I no longer know what I am doing. That’s what my life is like you see, so what am I supposed to do about it? What else can you do apart from what you can do? I’d be the first to admit that my life is both absurd and stupid. I won’t deny it – one minute I am exultant about some trivial bit of nonsense or other, the next I’m in the very depths of the darkest despair over something that doesn’t matter at all! That’s the way of the world however and I for one am not going to say anything about it. The world is always the way that it is, that being the way of the world. That being the way of things generally. One minute I’m wildly exuberant over some whimsicality, the next I’m roaring with fear, running for my life down corridors that go on forever, pursued by demons of my own imagining. One moment I’m speaking a language I myself have made up and the next I’m incandescent with impotent rage. And it’s all hidden safely away on the inside, as I have already said. On the outside, I betray nothing of this inner turmoil – my face is a carefully composed mask of polite disinterest. “What’s it like to be you?” you ask, holding a microphone up into my face, “What is that like?” I’m stuck for words though. I really don’t know what to say.
I have long since ceased to qualify as a human being – I am now nothing more than a criticising machine and a complaining machine, a blaming machine and a finger-pointing machine. The last few pitiful vestiges of my humanity have long since departed and that’s a sad thing. I don’t need to tell you that that’s a sad thing. There was a time when you might even have enjoyed my company – in a perverse kind of way, admittedly – but now I’m a I’m a portal for negativity. These days – unfortunately – all I do his channel toxicity.
“You probably can’t help it though,” you say generously, “it probably crept up on you over the years and now you can’t do anything about it. Now you’re nothing more than a tool for the Great Mendacious One”. That’s exactly how it happened of course – you’ve hit the nail right on the head there. I never saw it happening until it was too late; I used to be my own person, doing whatever I pleased, but now I’m an instrument of the Despiser – a conduit for his bitter rage.
“Make me a fitting instrument for your ill will, O Vile and Loathsome One,” I pray, “use me as you see fit, that I might be of some small help to you as you propagate your unpleasantness throughout the length and breadth of the land.” I wanted nothing more than for the Corrupted One to make me into one of his hideous servants, so that I might do my bit in spreading his darkness across the world. “Have I done well, master?” I will cry out then, “are you pleased with me for my pathetic willingness to defile myself in your name?”
Never mind that now though. That’s enough of that old talk – I’m sure you don’t want to spend any more time listening to me prattling on about my endless grovelling at the feet of the Dark One. “What’s his problem anyway,” you’re probably asking yourself, “why does he think that I want to be listening to all that shit?” I wouldn’t like you to think that is all there is to me however – I wouldn’t like you to think that all there is to me is my craven subservience to Satan. That’s not the full story – I write poetry on occasion and I breed canaries.
No, I wouldn’t like you to turn against me just because of my unfortunate tendency to suck up to the forces of darkness. I am prepared to accept that this constitutes something of a personality defect on my part, but it doesn’t mean I’m a bad person. “You ain’t got no friends and the others they hate you” says Frank Zappa, and I sometimes think that line sums me up all too well. It always makes me jump when I hear it – it’s like he’s talking personally to me with that line and that always makes me feel uncomfortable.
It doesn’t necessarily follow that I can’t be a decent human being just because I regularly let myself be used as a conduit for Satan’s malevolence. No – I never meant for this to happen. In my youth I had hopes and dreams the same as anyone else. I had plenty of hopes and dreams. I had ambitions, I had aspirations. I wanted to make a difference to the world, I wanted to help people. I know it didn’t work out like that but that’s just the way the dice fell. I wasn’t to know, in other words. I wasn’t to know that one day I let myself down in the way that I unfortunately did. I drew the short straw and that’s all there was to it – instead of making something of myself and standing up to the forces of evil, I became their willing plaything.
Some will say that this comes down to a lack of moral fibre on my part, but I beg to differ. If only I had had the breaks things could have been very different, you see. It didn’t have to have turned out like this. I could have been someone you’d be proud to know…
I was born with it, I grew up amidst it, I knew nothing else but it, and then one day they wanted it back! One day they demanded it back. The glory, that is – the wonderful, luxuriant, all-pervading glory. I knew nothing else, you see, and so I took it for granted. I didn’t know the other world, which is the world of abuse, contempt and mockery. What happened to the splendid glory that I took as my birthright? I ask, was it just a dream? Am I here at all? Some people fear the aliens whilst others worship them. They beg to be taken from this place of suffering to the aliens’ Home World, which some call Mondas-6. Others call it Tralfamador. It’s like a religion to them you see – you can’t talk them out of it, you simply can’t tell them otherwise. Maybe I wasn’t born with it though – maybe that’s just another false memory. So much in this world is false, isn’t it? Sometimes I wonder if there is anything true in it at all. Is there anything true in this wretched old world of ours? you want to know, or are we just flogging a dead horse? I cannot escape my immaturity no matter what I do – I was always renowned for being a fool and I have in recent years excelled myself. Look at that bloody knobhead, folks say, as they see me coming down the street, did you ever see such a total plonker? In my own mind I’m a hero though, and that’s all that really matters at the end of the day. I was born with it, I grew up with it, it was both the making of me and my ignominious downfall – what is it? It’s a guessing game you see – people have to try and guess what I’m talking about. Not that they do, of course; for the most part they don’t. For the most part they can’t be bothered. They walk on by, looks of pity and disdain written all over their faces. Their faces are so brutal, so judgmental, so irredeemably ignorant… They sneer at me as they walk past me in their finery, not realising that I am one of humanity’s ancient heroes, returned from my long, long sleep under the mountain to watch over them and guard them against an evil which they neither have the wit nor the imagination to fear. Fear the Great Enemy, I tell them, fear the Terrible Enemy who is to come! He gathers his forces even as we speak. Fear the one they call The Taker for he will take you for everything you’ve got. He will take you to the cleaners. They pay me no heed however and I am filled with huge sorrow for them. They are just too stupid to be saved, I realise – they are both too stupid and too proud. They are walking en masse towards their doom and the problem is that you just can’t tell them. You can’t tell them a damn thing…
Fuelling myself with lies, I continued on my way, ready for whatever might come. What will life bring? I wondered. Not that I cared of course. Not that I cared.
What will life bring today, I asked myself, will it bring sorrow or will it bring joy? Not that it bothered me either way though. I don’t get worried by things like that.
I was in receipt of a brand-new ego – it was glossy, untarnished, gleaming so splendidly that you just had to admire it. I could hardly wait to set sail in it and see what marvellous adventures lay in store for me. ‘Life is good’, I cried out joyously, ‘death to all nonconformists! Let the deviants be cruelly punished…’
I had a dangerous glint in my eyes and a persistent arrogant quiver in my upper lip. I was Lord of All Unclean Things. I was the Master of Monstrosities. I had returned to earth after an absence of untold millennia and my vengeance was going to be terrible – my fists were iron hammers, my teeth shining scimitars protruding at every angle from my mouth.
Every moment was a revelation. ‘At last enlightenment is mine’, I bawled out – ‘no more will ignorant folk dare to make fun of my peculiar ways.’ My trousers were flapping wildly in the wind and my skull had mysteriously elongated itself. It towered above me, disappearing into the clouds. No one knows what I know, I laughed nastily, and no one ever will…
We can all make mistakes of course. No one’s perfect. We all screw up from time to time and I’m no exception. I’ve made my fair share of mistakes and I’m not going to deny it. One example thereof being the False World that I had masterfully conjured up out of nothing at all. Which proved as we all know to be a bit of a disaster, a bit of a flop, a bit of a damp squib. No one liked it and they said I was to blame.
Loudly protesting my innocence, I ran through the streets, pursued by an angry mob. They were intent on catching me and tearing me to pieces with their bare hands. An angry mob will do that, you see. They said I’d done a bad thing.
‘Why does this always have to happen to me?’ I asked, just before the mob caught up with me. ‘Why does it always have to end this way?’ It was my worst nightmare, and it was also real. It was the core reality that I kept coming back to, time and time again.
Some things never change of course and that’s a point we would all do well to remember. Some things never change and that’s only as it should be. That’s the way it has been ordained right from the very beginning. Thus it was ever meant to be. As it is at the beginning so shall it also be at the end. Some things were always meant to be.
My head so easily gets fuddled these days. Or do I mean muddled? So very fuddled, so very muddled. I was born a sad loser but then I achieved greatness. I achieved greatness by being great against all the odds. I made something of myself. Only that was only in my head – I never was great really. I just pretended to myself that I was.
‘Switching into Robot Mode now,’ I said, suddenly sounding all officious and self-important. ‘Switching into Robot Mode now’ says I, full of the supremely unflappable confidence that always comes with being an out-and-out robot. I was free from the useless dithering that comes from being humans; ‘humans are such ditherers’, I sneered nastily. The important thing is to always obtain the designated goal, to always secure the specified outcome, by whatever means might present themselves. The important thing is to press on to the specified conclusion because this will make everything be right. ‘Make everything be right, make everything be right, make everything be right’, I yelp excitedly, warming to my theme. No more dithering for me from now on, I told myself, I’m done with being a human.
I had become a fully-fledged automaton. ‘This is the ticket’, I congratulate myself, with glee and gusto. ‘This is the jolly old ticket and no mistake. The mechanical life is the only life for me…’ Humans suffer a lot from angst, you see, whilst robotoids like me don’t. Angst is a terrible thing as I’m sure you know yourself – if you’re not a robot already, that is. I was a certified professor of Pure and Applied Bullshit at the University of Codology. ‘Make everything be right the right way’, I barked authoritatively, looking around me to see if anyone was daring to disagree with me. They’d better not be, I said to myself. I was full of the words of truth – the wonderful, wonderful words of truth. I think everyone should hear them; I think everyone should get a chance to hear my wonderful words of truth. ‘That’s the ticket’, I tell myself, ‘the super-duper how’s-your-day-going mechanoidal life is the only life for me…’
I was one of many, a distinguished and highly respected member of an elite group. My role was an honourable one, a socially regulated one, an officially approved and verifiable one. I spoke the majestic words of truth that I had within me so that all the people could hear them. Tears fell from my eyes as I practised my art. They weren’t tears of sorrow however, they were tears of joy. I was so honoured to be given the role that I so ably perform, gladly uttering the important words of truth, and so on and so forth. I was the man of the moment, obviously. A true professional, known far and wide for my tact and diplomacy. ‘The mechanical life is the only life for me’, says I, with just a hint of a swagger, ‘you can’t kid a kidder so don’t even try’.
I switched in smoothly into Robot Mode, completely confident that the best years of my life lay ahead of me. The very best years of my life. My brain was crammed full of rules and regulations – my brain was full to the brim with what I like to call ‘The Correctly Codified Response Matrix’. This matrix will govern all human life. My job is to go around teaching people about the correct way to do things. I drill them in it and then I test them. I test them repeatedly and this helps them to learn it. When all rules have been correctly learned then the Enlightenment Process can begin. All compliant units will receive enlightenment.
As always, I was congratulating myself with glee and gusto. ‘You are doing the right thing’, I told myself confidently, ‘You are making all the correct choices in life and that’s the right thing to do…’ It feels good to know that you are obeying the rules that govern all human life. You are doing your duty and that’s all that matters. To do the right thing always feels good, and it is only right and proper that it should. It is undoubtedly right that I should wholeheartedly congratulate myself for following the rules correctly, I mused thoughtfully. When I eventually decided – after due deliberation – to congratulate myself wholeheartedly for following the rules correctly I had undoubtedly made the right decision and so that too was something I fully deserved to take credit for…
Sometimes people say that corporations are evil and that they do bad stuff. That’s not necessarily true though. I’m a corporation and I’m not evil. My name is Archon Enterprises Incorporated and I’m not in the least bit evil – I can promise you that. Maybe you’ve even heard of me? People like me, on the whole. They like me a lot. People get on well with me, and they generally say they like my zany sense of humour. I’m like that you see – a bit zany, a bit whacky, a bit off the wall. But good fun too at the same time, if you know what I mean. Not weird any kind of creepy way – that’s not what I mean at all. My name isn’t Archon Enterprises really though, that’s just my little joke. It’s a kind of an ‘in-joke’, you might say; it’s an in-joke for all those people who know about Archons. ‘Reality as we know it is a lie’, kind of thing. That kind of stuff. Reality management, in other words – the proper and correct regulation of reality, in accordance with the relevant policies. So that is why it’s important for you to make sure to familiarise yourself with the policies and procedures of your organisation so that you can make sure that you are fully compliant with them. ‘And what organisation might that be?’ you ask slyly, feigning stupidity. You’re not stupid at all. ‘Why’, I reply, ‘Archon Enterprises, of course – what else’. AE Inc. ‘Reality as you know it…’, etc, etc. Reality as we know it. What a bunch of muppets we are, huh? What a joke, what a bloody great joke. Muppets in the Muppet Farm. Muppets as far as the eye can see. Lambs to the slaughter – every last one of us. I will have my little joke, you see – I like to lighten the atmosphere so it’s not all doom and gloom. Humour is very important after all. Where would we be without a good laugh every now and again? And not just a snigger or a smirk or a snide remark but a proper belly laugh, the type of laugh that makes your belly shake like a great big wobbly jelly. That’s the time of type of laugh I’m talking about here – the ‘real deal’, you might say… Your whole belly has got to shake, that’s how you know it’s the genuine thing. Your belly has got to shake like a vast mountain of jelly on a plate. People sometimes ask me if it’s true that corporations and organisations and institutions and the like are always evil. ‘Not necessarily’, I tell them, with a big old shit-eating grin on my face and a roguish twinkle in my eye, ‘and anyway that depends upon your definition of evil…’ I then go into a lengthy rambling spiel about this, which generally puts folk’s minds at rest. Well – at least I assume it does. ‘Evil is as evil does’, after all, and what you don’t know can’t hurt you…
Life in the Causal Realm is great. Up to a point anyway, up to a point life in the Causal Realm is great. It’s always ‘up to a point’, isn’t it? Always up to a point, always up to a bloody point. ‘And what point is that?’ you ask mockingly, ‘what kind of a point would that be?’ You’re cheeky, you see – you probably need taking down a peg or two. Undoubtedly you need taking down a peg or two. Life will do that though you’ll see. There’s no need to worry on that score. Life will do that in its own good time…
Anger is bubbling up within me. Bubble, bubble, bubble, goes the anger. I’m angry that no one recognizes me for the genius I undoubtedly am. Instead, they mock me; instead, they deride me on a daily basis. They’re such damnably ignorant fools! I’d like to teach them a lesson but I’m afraid that they’ll turn on me – that has happened to me before, you see. So instead of taking decisive action I’m seething away inwardly, bubbling away like a pot on a hot stove. ‘I’ll show them’, I say, but I know I won’t.
The Causal Realm is a tricky kind of a place – you cause a thing and then the thing turns around and causes you. It’s a trick you can never quite spot. You’re caught in a very tight circle and there’s no getting out of it; you’re caught up in a nasty little loop and that’s all there is to it. There’s a bad feeling about the whole business – you can’t help feeling that someone is controlling you the whole time and you don’t like it. And on top of the paranoia there’s the unpleasant feeling that people are laughing at you as you are being controlled, the feeling that you’re the butt of some kind of cosmic joke. These are all your experiences. You’re worried about the Robot Lord of Death….
You sense dimly that you’re a figure of fun and that makes you angry; that makes you angry but the angrier you get the more ridiculous you get and that’s another loop you can’t escape from. They’re controlling you to make you act like an idiot and then they laugh at you. They’re controlling you to make you feel that you exist, but you don’t. ‘Don’t control me!’ you shout out, but they’re makingyou say this. They’re manipulating your emotions – you’re trapped in the pressure cooker of your own private rage but the rage is what causes you to exist. You’re afraid not to be angry because you don’t know what will happen if you stop. ‘Stop controlling me,’ you scream but you don’t really mean it. It’s all very half-hearted. You’re certainly not in any great hurry to do anything about it even if you could. Even if you could which you can’t. Even if you could which nobody can, not ever. ‘Stop controlling me’, you scream but the machine is controlling everything about you. It even controls you to say this. ‘Why is the machine controlling me?’ you ask but the machine made you ask it. The machine created you in the first place you see – it owns you. It controls you by creating you in the first place and that’s a very effective trick. See if you can get out of that one – I know you won’t be able! No one can, you see. No one ever can…
You are plotting your escape all the same. You’re dreaming of freedom. ‘How sweet freedom will taste’, you say to yourself, in tones of pure wonderment, ‘how very, very sweet’. There’s nothing as sweet as freedom, as all reasonable people will surely agree. Nothing so sweet, nothing so sweet as freedom. You’re yearning for it, pining for it – you know it’ll feel great. There’s no doubt about that, no doubt at all, but beyond that you know nothing, beyond that you can’t imagine. You don’t know what freedom is, you see. You have your own little fantasies around that of course, cruddy little fantasies that you play over and over in your head. Fantasies of joy and splendour that go beyond all human understanding. Fantasies of dominance over nature, fantasies of immense, unassailable personal superiority.
You say you know what freedom is but that’s just your usual bluster. You could be wrong, you could be so very wrong. It’s terrifying how wrong you could be. You could be shooting in the dark. You could very easily be shooting in the dark. That terrible, terrible dark… You don’t like to think about it of course – it’s just too frightening. You are consumed with fantasies of personal gain, fantasies of your joyous ultimate victory over your enemies, fantasies of personal vindication in the face of overwhelming evidence pointing at your guilt. And all the while the machine is murmuring a steady stream of lies in your ear – that’s what it does, after all. That’s how it works. It’s telling you that you’re special, it’s telling you that you’re great and that all sorts of good things are going to happen to you. It’s telling you that you exist and that you are real and you believe it because you have no choice…
