by Chris James
“The job specification of Dismantlement is simple: to achieve the same population level, and comparable quality of air and water, green space, forestation and wilderness by the twenty-third Century as we had in the eighteenth. We’re now at the point of must return – the beginning of the longest revolution in human history.” Lethal silence filled the Mother Dome like radon.
“We cannot determine the shape of our island by walking around its coastline,” Pilot continued, borrowing Vaalon’s words of twelve years earlier. “So bear with me while we fly over it at altitude.
“Returning to our global person, as well as turning him around, we need to change his sex. For the next two hundred and fifty years, a female order must supercede the male one which has dominated through history, otherwise Dismantlement – synonymous with protection, care, nurturing and sensitivity – won’t be possible. Benevolence and compassion flows in the hormones of both sexes and we must bring them to the fore. With the correct disposition and a clear vision, we will be able to dismantle the machines and practices that are killing us. Illustrations…
“The arms industry. The black flashdrives in your information packs contain the roadmap and timetable for a global disarmament programme designed to dismantle the arms industry down to the last bullet and the last arms dealer within forty years.” The opposing poles of the human magnet before him – positive/negative, applause/silence in equal strengths – gave Pilot cause for satisfaction. That so many seemed emotionally in favour of killing the arms industry surprised him. He wasn’t confident his next target would be as well received.
“Globalization. We propose the deglobalization of world trade and the dismantlement of the multinationals. The red flash drives contain a detailed blueprint for restructuring multinational companies into groups of smaller, more ethical and more accountable entities. Twenty of the most eminent thinkers in the corporate world have lent their expertise to the authorship of not just attainable multinational company dismantlement, but of a further dozen sensitive dismantlement issues covering commerce, business and industry. Differing cultural and national mores have been recognized and accommodated across all of these proposals, and the word profit has been redefined.
“Urbanization. We propose a gradual disurbanization of the world’s cities. How? The average life of a New York skyscraper is thirty or forty years. Replace every other building with an open space for parks, squares and allotments, put a ceiling of four storeys on all rebuilding, and by 2260 Manhattan could be the same pleasant town it was in 1760, but with all the technological advances we enjoy today. This is the template for all cities. Dismantlement will create a new balance.
“Remember, we’re talking about a timescale of two hundred and fifty years, so it’s not going to be as disruptive as it may appear. Dismantlement can happen gradually. But it has to happen consensually.”
Pilot paused to allow the translators time to catch up.
“The current Dismantlement map includes all the developed nations as a matter of course. Depending on which Dismantlement we’re talking about, additional countries may be added to this list.
“Those nations listed under each Dismantlement should, if they all act together, effect the desired changes on those countries currently outside their influence, and therefore not yet prospects for inclusion on the Dismantlement map. They will quickly see the stark choice before them – dismantle like the rest or suffer.” Pilot glanced down at Aaron Serman, sitting sphinx-like and unreadable in the front row. Next to him, Macushla was following the bullet points in the folder on her lap like a theatre prompt, ready to cue when necessary. Apart from the shaky beginning, her partner was doing well.
“Dismantlement starts at the top,” Pilot continued. “Like tearing down a building, it has to be done one brick at a time, because it is a building we still occupy. The top countries, the top people in government, commerce and industry – that’s where Dismantlement begins. The workers have had their revolutions, now it is the turn of the managers. The reason it has to start with them is simple. The underdeveloped countries will only consider halting their own mindless charge towards the seemingly gold-paved streets of globalization if they see the developed countries ripping up those very same streets and walking back to join them halfway.”
The vacant expressions before him showed Pilot that he had hit a brick wall. He decided to go off-piste. It was Mara’s job to return him to the script after he’d made his point. “To those of you at the top looking down, your fears are understandable. Today, you are at the peak of your game, the peak of your competitiveness, drive and potential. By your way of thinking, there is no stopping you… But there is. The foundations are crumbling beneath your feet.” Pilot chose a particularly corpulent corporate type at whom to aim his next words.
“Imagine being told that you have cancer. The worst news you could possibly hear. The good news is that it’s operable, and your chances of survival are good if you take your medication as instructed. It isn’t Eydos telling you of your condition, it’s the Earth. Turn your considerable skills towards self-healing and the world will heal with you… and your great-great-grandchildren will stand a chance of being born.”
Austin Palmer winced. Len Wenlight clenched his fist. Lim Lin Hok nodded imperceptibly.
“Industrial and commercial Dismantlement will be the task of the developed nations,” Pilot said, returning to message, “but its positive effects will be felt everywhere. It is a daunting task, but one which has had the benefit of much preliminary work already.
“Today, on Eydos, we are officially opening the Office of Dismantlement – The O.D.. OD is an acronym in English of where we as a civilization stand on the balance sheet and the medical chart. We are overdrawn on our account with the planet and we have overdosed on our indulgent borrowings. I’m sorry if this play on words does not translate into your language. The basic truth remains. Our destiny is to die in poverty – very soon, at our current rate of spending.
“Most of you came here believing this congress would be a waste of time – that vested interests and politics would ensure that nothing was agreed and that nothing would be achieved from it, like a football match without a referee. This time, it’s different. Because this time there’s an independent arbiter.” He looked over his shoulder at the Secretary General, who was nodding her head in affirmation for all to see.
“There was only one place the Office of Dismantlement could be located to overcome the massive barrier of global lethargy and partisanship which threatens our survival. Only one place that has everyone’s interests at heart. And when I say everyone, I’m drawing a line from you straight through to your descendants in the twenty-third and twenty-fourth centuries. To make sense of Dismantlement, you have to look way beyond your own lifetime.
“One of the most important jobs of The O.D. will be to keep the various Dismantlement programmes on the boil. Collective human concentration has no staying power. To keep the resolve of our global person alive for two and a half centuries is going to take some doing, especially when our circumstances begin to improve. Dismantlement stops only when the job is finished.”
Pilot took several gulps of water from his glass, wiped his mouth with the back of his hand, then looked up at the vast curved ceiling, glowing with the transluscence of white jade.
“Let me describe the Office of Dismantlement to you. One room – the cockpit of a jumbo jet fuselage atop the grounded ocean-going barge Ptolemy. It has no desk, no phone, no filing cabinet, no computer. The Office of Dismantlement is not a place of work. It’s a symbol. A reminder that the principles of Dismantlement are lodged at the only truly neutral point to be found on the planet. They will remain there until the job is finished.
“The actual work of Dismantlement will take place elsewhere – in office blocks, government ministries, factories, laboratories… in people’s attitudes… in their conjugal beds.”
‘S-N-O-W-B-A-L-L-I-N-H-E-L-L’, CNN’s Chief Correspondent typed in large c
aps on his tablet, not in spite, but in sympathy.
“In six administrative centres− Lucerne, Switzerland; Niigata, Japan; Cambridge, Massachusetts; Lima, Peru; Wellington, New Zealand; and Mumbai, India – we are providing facilities for the study, research and strategic planning of Dismantlement. These places will be both University and Ministry. We will be recruiting professionals from the sciences, academia, economics, industry and other crucial disciplines to administer and coordinate the work of these six centres – people to define the terms of Dismantlement within specific regions… to determine the priorities for change… to draw up the timetables for change… and to anticipate the knock-on effects of Dismantlement from one area to another.
“These six centres, working strictly to the Dismantlement blueprint drawn up on Eydos, will set the parameters for action which individual governments should then, with the much vaster intellectual and economic resources at their disposal, put into practice. We on Eydos are lucky in that we are already where the rest of you could be in 250 years’ time. Our job is to ensure that you all get there too.”
On a signal from her partner, Macushla lifted an object covered in a colourful patch of dacron cut from one of the mothballed hot air balloons and approached the stage. Pilot moved to the edge of the platform to take it from her, then returned to the podium.
“The planet Earth is out of control, thanks entirely to her dominant species, homo sapiens,” he said, positioning the object on the lectern. “Today, we have a choice. Let the garden grow wild by letting human nature take its course, or use our brain power – that most remarkable, yet most misused of tools – to exert control over where we are heading and avoid needless suffering in the future.” Pilot removed the dacron and raised Jane’s bonsai tree above his head. “With Dismantlement we are attempting to shape our destiny by controlling our expansion and keeping it within the bounds of our growing tray, the Earth. As in the art of bonsai, we do this through cutting, pruning, wiring and careful tending. Dismantlement is all about containing ourselves without losing our shape… about restricting our outward growth without curbing our inner development. This tree will live in The O.D. on board Ptolemy as a living symbol of the skills we have to learn and apply over the next two hundred and fifty years.” He placed the bonsai tree on the stage in front of the podium, catching Macushla’s reassuring eye for a millisecond, then returned to his position behind it.
“Effective and fair Dismantlement can only be achieved through consensus, as I said before. And the mechanical intricacies can be mastered only by people fluent in those fields included in the Dismantlement agenda. For example, the motor industry can only be dismantled by the motor industry itself, and the –”
A hoot of derision sounded from somewhere within the US delegation. A US Congressman of twenty-six years’ service to his State, Country and Self, was finding Pilot’s words tantamount to blasphemy. He was not an environmentalist at heart and had manipulated his appointment to the Congressional Committee on Environmental Projections not through altruism, but as a way of heading off any Federal controls that might curb the interests of his select friends in commerce and industry.
“When we say dismantle the motor industry, we don’t mean they should stop making vehicles,” Pilot said, throwing his words in the general direction of the heckler. “Your blue flashdrives contain a number of novel concepts in transportation solutions, co-authored by some of the motor industry’s most creative and innovative strategists during visits to Eydos. Road trains, for example. Through the introduction of road trains, powered by a new breed of hybrid engine adding human muscle power to the mix through hand and foot pedals, there will be better transport efficiency, greatly reduced emissions, no traffic jams – not to mention their impact on obesity.”
“The fat guys will just let the healthy ones do all the work,” Reuters said to Associated Press. “Lonnie Pilot has no understanding of human nature.”
“Yeah, but the fat guys’ll die first,” AP replied.
“Another idea currently in development is the Mus,” Pilot continued, “an inner city muscle-powered bus driven by as few as fifteen medium-fit passengers out of a seating capacity of forty-five. Any shortfall in the power generated through the pedals is made up by the vehicle’s battery. The Mus has a top speed of fifteen miles an hour and will operate on any incline under one in twelve, even when pulling its trailer of light-weight bicycles. The same technology is being used for the Domestic Energy Table, or DET, around which families can sit and have quality time together as they charge their home generator through pedals under the table. The family stays healthy, enjoys valuable together-time and makes electricity all at the same time. Half an hour around the DET generates enough power to run their lights and computers for a day.” Pilot stole a quick glance behind him and drew strength from Lim’s eyes. Above her, the giant video screen displayed a moving image of someone who looked just like Lonnie Pilot.
“The brain power and financial resources that could be thrown at our problems are enormous, and our projects are only scratching the surface,” he said. “Dismantlement isn’t all about the salvation and restoration of Homo Sapiens, though. It’s about returning wild animals to their original status by restoring their wildness… by dismantling the zoo and creating mega-reserves− not of tens or hundreds of square miles, but of thousands of square miles. And not in the world’s most remote countries and places, but right in the middle of the most developed ones. Once the borders of these mega-reserves are drawn, the gradual removal of the human footprint can begin. As the land demands of humans decrease as a result of the most important single Dismantlement, which I will come to shortly, our presence within the mega-reserves will shrink correspondingly.”
Pilot looked across at Mara, who was signing the letters E and X. He had almost forgotten. “As I said before, all of these proposed dismantlements have to be adopted by global consensus. The O.D. is not a Dictatorship. The O.D. is an Exemplarship.” Pilot allowed time for the word ‘Exemplarship’ to be translated, which was no mean feat. “The Greek word eîdos is defined as the distinctive expression of the cognitive or intellectual character of a culture or a social group. The character and culture of Eydos can act as the model, or exemplar of change.”
Pilot shook out his legs the way footballers do during national anthems, but less obviously. He’d been standing for quite some time. No one was prepared for Pilot’s next bombshell.
“Now we arrive at the most important Dismantlement of all. If we succeed with this one, then everything else will follow like a Jacob’s ladder. But… IT IS THE SINGLE MOST DIFFICULT TASK WE FACE.
“We’ve cured cancer and AIDS. Now we have to treat that most threatening of conditions, pregnancy.” There was a collective intake of breath which Pilot sensed immediately. He was ready for it. “While respecting the gift of pregnancy and the wonder of new life, we have to begin rationing it to protect those very lives we are creating. Only by halving our rate of regeneration can future life be safeguarded. The gradual, systematic dismantlement of the human population is the most important Dismantlement of all.” Pilot waited for the hubbub invoked by his words to die down.
Please,” he said pushing down with his hands to signal silence. “The old concept of zero population growth is not radical enough to achieve what we believe to be the optimum global population of nine hundred million by the year 2275. That’s a reduction of ninety percent off today’s number.”
Four thousand people in the Mother Dome were stunned to silence.
“The human world is like a business that has grown too big and has failed to adapt to market changes. ‘Go Forth and Multiply’ was written when the global population was less than 230 million. We are grossly over-manned and have to make large-scale redundancies if we are going to stay afloat. I use these market economy analogies to illustrate the point because, for many people out there, it’s a language they can easily understand.
“Before we explain how to make these cuts, let me
tell you why they are necessary. Most of you sitting here already know, but for many watching this live on their computers, TVs and phones, it would be a serious omission on our part to speak as if all the problems are universally understood, because they are not.
“Let us take this auditorium as being the Earth. It has four thousand seats and, as you can all see, today we’re full. It took around a hundred and fifty thousand years, from modern Man’s supposed beginnings up to the year 5000 B.C. to fill just the first eight seats of our four thousand seat auditorium. By the time of Christ, this had doubled to sixteen seats. Fifteen centuries later, when Columbus landed in America, 200 seats, or the first two rows only of these forty rows, were occupied. By the time of the American Revolution, just three hundred years after Columbus, this had doubled to four rows. By the beginning of the 20th century there were still only six rows occupied. Six hundred seats out of four thousand.” Pilot turned to the Chair and extended his hand. “Within Lim Lin Hok’s lifetime, the population has doubled twice – to two thousand seats, now to four thousand. That’s every last seat in this hall. In just twenty years’ time there will be two people occupying every seat… in thirty years, four… in thirty-five years, eight. Not only is the auditorium full as of today, but it was really only built to house four hundred people comfortably at most. Each person needs at least ten seats – four to stretch out on at night and the other six for their possessions, work, gardens, recreation etcetera. Occupying all available seats does not worry us here today, because we have somewhere else to go afterwards. But if this dome were the earth, there is nowhere else.”
Pilot’s mind went blank at this point and he signalled Macushla to turn the light back on. She slid her finger slowly across her throat. Extermination. It had been one of her ideas.