by Owen Stanley
The strange new guest would be living in one of the bedrooms in the apartment, and considering that he was still in pre-alpha development, there was no way in which, meeting him at such close quarters every day, the two women could have been fooled for very long in thinking that Frank was human. The shock to their innocent systems of having a humanoid monster in their midst would have been profound and would have resonated throughout the whole surrounding area within a day. So Harry sadly told the women that he was going back to the States for a couple of weeks’ break and having the whole apartment renovated, and therefore would have to dispense with their services for the foreseeable future.
They parted with mutual regrets, but Harry kindly took Tracey up to London to introduce her to the chef at his favourite restaurant, who was highly impressed by her appearance as well as her culinary skills and immediately offered her a job. Doris, to tell the truth, by that time had cleansed, polished, and purified Harry’s apartment to such a pitch of perfection that it no longer presented a very satisfying challenge. So although she was very fond of Harry, she welcomed the opportunity to move on in response to Ken’s and Shirley’s urgent appeal to come and do some cleaning at the Drunken Badger, upon which she descended in a whirlwind of dusters, mops, polishes, sprays, and buckets. Some of the old-timers were quite upset, however, when she insisted on ripping out the stinking old carpet in the bar, and said that it didn’t smell like home any more.
Chapter VI
Despite Harry’s enormous wealth, he was dismayed when the estimates from Bill Grogan and Vishnu were finally presented to him, not to mention Wayne Ruger’s, which looked like the defence budget for a small but unusually belligerent third-world nation. The project was obviously going to need considerably more money than he had originally anticipated, and, unfortunately, most of his capital was tied up in various forms of investment that precluded easy liquidation. Like most billionaires of his class, he had less cash in his bank account than was carried by the average Uber driver.
He was sitting in his office with Jerry one morning, reviewing the three estimates, which, no matter how many times he read them over, obstinately refused to shrink, and discussing the inevitable cash-flow crisis they would entail. By now, Jerry had quite a good grasp of the British R&D scene, and he suggested that Harry approach the Government’s Bio-Engineering Research Fund to see if they would consider offering some support to Project Frank.
“But if we do that,” Harry objected, “Frank won’t be a secret any longer. We can’t risk that.”
Jerry told him not to worry. “Granting agencies like the Fund deal with this problem of commercial sensitivity all the time. They have a very strict confidentiality policy that no details of any applications or grants are put in the public domain. None of our possible competitors is going to find out what we’re doing until it’s far too late.”
Not seeing any other way to move forward on the project, Harry reluctantly agreed to Jerry’s proposal. So they sent in an application containing the detailed specifications for Project Frank to the Fund, and, upon opening his morning mail a few weeks later, Harry was delighted to find a letter from Professor Price-Williams, the Fund’s Chairman, saying that they had been most impressed by the specifications and might, in due course, be able to offer a grant of up to four million pounds. But before the application could proceed any further, the project would have to be approved by their former Ethics Committee, since many of the projects supported by the Fund had applications in medicine and social welfare.
Rather ominously, the professor mentioned that the Ethics Committee had recently been renamed the Diversity and Inclusion Committee by the Department of Culture. But the CVs of the Committee members were enclosed, in order to give Mr. Hockenheimer the opportunity to prepare himself for the kind of questions they might put to him, and Professor Price-Williams wished him the best of luck.
The appointment with the Diversity and Inclusion Committee of the Bio-Engineering Research Fund turned out to be on a Friday afternoon at the Committee’s offices in a magnificent house overlooking Regents Park, one of the most desirable locations in London, and rented at vast expense by the Department of Culture.
The Government was lucky enough to be able to call upon a large pool of high-minded volunteers for such committees, who were happy to give impartial advice for the public good, without any recompense apart from their expenses. In this case, it is true, none of them happened to possess any scientific or engineering background whatever, let alone any qualifications to discuss robotics. Fortunately, practical knowledge of this kind was not considered necessary because the function of the Committee was to bring a more morally enlightened and humane perspective to the discussions that was beyond the limited mental horizon of engineers.
The Chairperson was a tall, handsome woman, Nkwandi Obolajuwan, who had been appointed to head the Committee when the Department found that she was not only a second-generation Nigerian immigrant, but also wheelchair-bound, which was believed to give her special insight into the challenges of marginalisation. Despite her triple handicaps of race, gender, and physical disability, she had nevertheless achieved a very comfortable life as a lawyer representing her fellow immigrants. To be sure, most of them happened to be very wealthy relatives of very corrupt African politicians and Middle Eastern royal families, but she did not think this was grounds for discriminating against them by refusing to help them. While she enjoyed her evenings in her luxurious apartment with a bottle of Prosecco and some Charbonnel et Walker chocolates in front of the telly, she was tireless in her support of many worthy social justice causes, which had first brought her to the attention of the Department.
Percy Crump was the Committee’s self-appointed representative for the Fat Acceptance Movement. His very limited academic credits were largely in the field of women’s studies and it was through these that he had become aware of society’s persistent prejudice against women of ample proportions. He was naturally sympathetic to their plight because he was himself conspicuously overweight, and he had no sooner heard about the Fat Acceptance Movement than he became one of its better-known advocates. He had made a full-time career out of demanding concessions and the construction of special facilities by public transport companies, traffic engineers, and businesses to compensate himself and his fellow sufferers for all the discrimination and bigotry and daily micro-aggressions they endured from the so-called “normal.”
The committee’s token student, representing British youth, was Aminah Khan, a Muslim in a headscarf. Serious and orthodox, or as the less sympathetic might have called her, sullen and narrow-minded, she detested most aspects of Western culture and longed for the day when the infidels would finally submit to Allah. In the meantime, she was determined to assert the claims of Sharia law in decadent Britain.
Godfrey Sunderland was Lecturer in Protest Theory at the London School of Politics and in his spare time an activist for the People’s Antifascist Front. Originally from a wealthy family of aristocratic lineage, his blond dreadlocks nevertheless expressed his claim to have been born black in a white skin. “Race is just a cultural construct, man,” he would snap at anyone who dared to find his assertion of ‘wrongskin’ somewhat implausible. He regarded Nkwandi as a sellout to the system, not to say a coconut, because he particularly despised lawyers. In Godfrey’s opinion, lawyers accepted the whole rotten system of unjust power, and instead of undermining it, tried to work within it like maggots inside a corpse. When the Revolution came and the people took back the power that was rightfully theirs, there would be no need for lawyers who, if they were lucky, just might be allowed to slink away unharmed. And if they weren’t lucky, well…
The fifth member of the committee was a lesbian social-worker, Toni Clark. She was a feminist and ill-disposed to men in general. Somewhat surprisingly, she did not regard gay men as allies in the LGBTQIAP+ alliance, but as hoggers of the political limelight, only interested in talking up their own status as victims, and just as prone as th
eir straight brethren to pushing women to one side. She viewed Harry with disapproval, of course, not only because he was an American capitalist, but because his business activities objectified women in an offensive and blatantly heterosexist way.
The Committee had read Harry’s CV and the specifications for Project Frank prior to the meeting, and in the preliminary discussions its members had taken a distinctly hostile view of both Harry and his project. As a very white, very male, and very rich American capitalist who had literally built his fortune on the exploitation of women adorning themselves for the sexual pleasure of men, he was already politically suspect, and his project promised to be even worse.
While the technical specifications were almost entirely above their heads, they had grasped the general gist of Harry’s proposal, and as Nkwandi said when Harry took his seat at the end of the table, “Our main problem, Mr. Hockenheimer, is that your whole project has some dangerously elitist tendencies, and is markedly insensitive to just about every marginalised community in our society. We feel that it’s hard to combine the idea of a toy for the corporate elite with the principles of equality, diversity, and inclusion that guide this committee. If your project is approved, it is bound to become extremely well-known, and one may even say ‘iconic’, so we have to consider very carefully what kind of messages it will send to the general public.”
“I wasn’t really thinking about messages,” replied Harry. “My intention is merely to build and provide a great new technology to the public.”
“That’s all very well, Mr. Hockenheimer, but the fact is that in this case, the medium is the message. You simply can’t avoid sending messages in a project of this sort, and that’s why, I’m afraid, we’re going to require some drastic modifications before we can even consider approving it for funding. Perhaps I should explain that whereas the old Ethics Committee existed primarily to ensure there were no inappropriate conflicts of interest, the Diversity and Inclusion Committee has the much broader remit of ensuring that all the Fund’s projects adhere to the societally correct values of equality and social justice.”
Harry’s heart sank.
“As a Muslim,” broke in Aminah, “I have to protest this project in the strongest possible terms. An imitation human figure such as this disgusting robot is a complete violation of Sharia and we should simply reject it.”
“We really feel for you, Aminah,” said Nkwandi. “We know what Muslims have to endure in our Islamophobic society.” All the Committee members did their best to look suitably contrite on behalf of their fellow Brits. “Unfortunately, I’m afraid that from the strictly legal point of view, the Department of Culture could not, at least at the moment, accept Sharia law as a valid justification for rejecting the project. But, as I’ve said, there will have to be many major revisions nonetheless,” she added consolingly.
As Aminah nodded in morose resignation, Nkwandi continued, “In the first place, Mr. Hockenheimer, I think we are all agreed that your robot must appear to be female. We simply cannot approve the glorification of patriarchy intrinsic in featuring a male figure in this role. That is simply out of the question in what is supposed to be a post-gender world.”
“But there are sound commercial reasons for making him appear as a man,” said Harry. “In the current business market, a man is simply more acceptable as an economics adviser, and besides that, he is also supposed to be able to act as a bodyguard!”
“Those are just the sort of totally unacceptable gender stereotypes that we’re here to challenge,” said Toni, “and that’s precisely why your robot should have the appearance of a woman. This is our chance, as a Committee, to initiate some real change here.”
“That is exactly right,” said Nkwandi. “Your robot doesn’t have an actual gender because it’s a machine, so there is absolutely no reason why it can’t carry out its functions as an adviser and a bodyguard in the form of a woman. That’s obvious, and I don’t feel we need to discuss it any further.”
“I rather think we do,” said Godfrey Sunderland, looking sharply at Nkwandi. “Aren’t you forgetting the needs of the transgender community? There’s far too much cis-gender chauvinism in this Committee. If we are going to be sensitive to the needs of the truly marginalised, then we have to make a genuine effort to address their concerns. We’ve already agreed that the robot has no inherent gender, which means that it is already conceptually transgender. All Mr. Hockenheimer has to do is to incorporate the features of both genders into its design. It’s as simple as that.”
Harry blinked. The transgender Terminator. It didn’t bear thinking about.
“I’m afraid it’s not as simple as that, at least not from the Islamic point of view,” Aminah broke in. “A transgender robot would be completely haram, and cause great offence to the Muslim community. If we are to have a robot at all, it must be either male or female.”
“Thank you for reminding us of that, Aminah,” said Nkwandi, delighted that the odious Godfrey had been trumped by the younger woman’s Muslim card. “On consideration perhaps we should go with the robot as female then?”
The rest of the committee signalled their agreement, with the exception of Godfrey, who said nothing.
“So we agree that the robot must be female. The next point,” continued Nkwandi, “is the robot’s colour. We have to say, Mr. Hockenheimer, that your casual assumption that it will be white seems to verge on racism.”
“It’s just a matter of supplying the market with the product it wants. We anticipate that the vast majority of our customers at the present time will be white. Of course, if the product catches on, and the Japanese, for example, or the Indians show an interest, we could easily produce differently coloured models for them.”
“I’m afraid that completely misses the point,” replied Nkwandi. “I must stress to you, again, that the primary concern of this committee is not commercial profitability or technological advancement, but moral advocacy. Since you are asking for government support, I’m sure you agree that it’s reasonable for us, representing the government, to make our own conditions for giving you a grant. One of the essentials we require in a project of this sort is a challenge to current societal attitudes, not just a passive acceptance of them. I’m sure your white customers in Europe and America would love a robot that reflects their own white faces, but that is precisely why they should not be given one. They must be forced to accept diversity, whether they like it or not, and that means providing them with a black robot.”
“I don’t see that there’s a real problem here,” replied Harry, reminding himself that nearly five million dollars was at stake and doing his best to bend with the wind. “As it says in the specifications, the robot will have opto-electronic skin, so the customer can change the skin colour to anything he—or she—would like,” he added hastily. “It could be green or even purple, for that matter.”
“Skin colour is not a joking matter, Mr. Hockenheimer,” said Nkwandi. “I suggest, if the committee agrees, that your customers should not be given the option of altering the colour of their robot, but should instead have to accept a specific colour.” There were general nods around the table.
“But some of our customers will be in Japan and China. Will their robots have to be black, too?”
“Why not?” said Godfrey. “Diversity is a universal value.”
“I don’t see it like that at all,” retorted Aminah. “Diversity is just a lesson that the imperialist West needs to learn after centuries of racist oppression of non-Western cultures. But imposing black robots on the rest of the world is neo-colonialism and would be strongly resented in the Muslim world, for one.”
“I have a suggestion,” said Nkwandi. “Why don’t we make it a requirement that the robot can be any colour except white? In that way we impose the acceptance of diversity on the West, while at the same time permitting everyone else to have the colour robot they prefer?”
Everyone, even Godfrey, agreed that this was a brilliant solution to the problem, ex
cept for Harry, who was starting to look notably depressed.
“So, I think we’ve settled the primary problems. Now I feel we should move on to some of the more specific issues that the various committee members have individually raised,” said Nkwandi.
“There’s a particular problem here that I’d like to bring up,” said Toni. “Now that we’ve agreed that the robot will appear to be a woman, in light of Mr. Hockenheimer’s background in pornographic apparel I feel there is a distinct possibility that he will try to give us some kind of obscene curvy Barbie Doll. So, I suggest we should discuss the parameters of the robot’s actual appearance.”
“That’s absolutely right!” agreed Nkwandi. “You should realise, Mr. Hockenheimer, that Lookism is a major injustice in Western culture today. In fact, it’s one of the worst aspects of body fascism in general. Lookism is every bit as bad as racism or sexism or even transgenderphobia. So we would expect a conscious effort on your behalf to produce a very plain robot, perhaps even an unattractive one.”
“Perhaps she could have a very large nose and uneven features, or maybe a receding chin and protruding teeth,” Harry suggested, only half-sarcastically, but the Committee looked rather impressed and nodded their agreement.
“She should be flat-chested as well,” added Toni, “We don’t want any of your big-busted cuties here, thank you very much.” She stuck out her chin at him defiantly.
“I’m particularly concerned that you specify the robot as slim and looking well-toned,” said Percy. “I find that really disturbing myself. It is basically an unprovoked attack on those of us who refuse to be intimidated by healthist propaganda. Twenty-five percent of women in this country are obese and are subject to gross personal abuse every day of the week. Many of them can’t even sit down on a park bench or squeeze through a shop doorway, and it’s imperative that we send a strong message of support to this seriously marginalised minority. I say that Ms. X should have a Body Mass Index of at least 35.”