by A. J. Ramsey
A dozen more old white men began chanting “freedom” to themselves.
“Secondly, our proposal will allow us to innovate the Internet by creating special lanes to prioritize traffic. Currently, if a customer’s pacemaker needs to send vital data to their doctor, it gets in line behind the other junk in the tubes. This is simply dangerous to customers who have pacemakers. There are at least a dozen people in the entire world that this threatens. Certain communists have suggested that we want to create fast and slow lanes. That is a gross oversimplification. We want to innovate by creating turbo lanes. These lanes will allow us to reach agreements with content providers to improve their services in ways they didn’t even know they needed to improve. These turbo lanes are vital to innovate the Internet. We don’t want to have to choke companies’ data in order to force them to pay us extra. We’ll do it, of course, but we would prefer that the shakedown method simply be legal.
There will still be another lane of traffic, of course, but we certainly won’t be calling it slow. The content providers and customers that choose not to pay extra for the turbo lane will simply get what we call “the leftover lane.” Whether it will be slow or not will be a matter of opinion. Compared to dial up Internet of the 90’s, it will be pretty fast. These grand innovations will allow new startup companies based in people’s garages to jump to the top of the pile by paying for access to these turbo lanes. They wouldn’t have to languish in Internet obscurity waiting to be recognized for the unique service they provide. In fact, it won’t even matter if their service is good or bad as long as they have the money to pay for the turbo lane. Our Freedom Net proposal is really the only proposal that stays true to our country’s ideals.
That is all.”
The cat, who hadn’t even gotten up for his speech, started licking his paws and purring as applause poured down from the lawmakers’ seats. The standing ovation, with chants of “freedom,” went on for quite some time. Emal felt the rage radiating off of Brittany as the cats bowed and purred. One of the old white men stood up and quieted the dozens of lawmakers who were still present. He addressed what were now four cats, two more having decided to merge at some point during the applause.
“Thank you so much for your proposal, fat cats. I am always amazed at the ideas you’re able to provide us measly lawmakers. Without your willingness to write laws for us to pass, who would have the time? Does the FCC have any counter arguments they wish to voice?”
“No, sir,” said the last mouse very, very quietly. The other mice had all disappeared at some point during the speeches. “We certainly agree with what our former colleagues have said and don’t think Net Neutrality has anything else to provide at this point.”
“Well, should we have an official vote?” Judge Kelly asked the room.
Unable to contain herself any longer, Birttany leapt onto the bench, gesturing at all the old white men and fat cats, and yelled, “What the hell is wrong with you people?”
“Silence,” yelled Kelly, banging the gavel fiercely on the podium.
Brittany hurdled the railing and stood on the mice’s table while old white men jeered at her. The cats did nothing but lick their paws.
“This entire hearing is a farce. It’s a kangaroo court. It’s an illegal meeting with no one to represent the people of the Internet. You Old White Men are supposed to represent the people but are instead in the pockets of your donors. Why do you need to defend these cats that have grown so fat on their own? Regulating fat cats will not kill the Internet. The Internet will die because you got together in some back alley where you agreed to do these cats’ bidding. Freedom died when the government and its agencies became ruled by economic power instead of justice.”
One of the old white men collapsed in shock and another covered his eyes as he began chanting stock quotes to himself.
“Make her go away,” another old man yelled. “I am not responsible for my urges when a woman stands in front of me in a skirt and slightly unbuttoned shirt.”
Brittany continued unabated as Kelly continued to bang on the gavel. Brittany also ignored Nancy, Joe, and Frank when they came into the room, looking for an excuse to shoot someone.
“This plutocracy before you has killed anything remotely resembling free enterprise, and now you want to use your power to kill the Internet. You will silence the voice of the people by influencing who can speak and to whom. You fat cats, straw men, cowardly mice—who have all been eaten—and kangaroo judges cannot claim to want a fully separate state and economics, as your favorite quote says, and yet run to each other to protect yourselves from the power of the people. The people can’t self-regulate service providers when you give them no choices. The protections should be for the people. Not these fat cats.
You cannot claim to be blind justice when you are counting stacks of money as it is stuffed in your back pockets. Where is the justice in preventing unfettered access for all people to the greatest invention of humankind? Gore bless Al Gore. The Internet brings together the collective wisdom, and stupidity, of the entire world—everyone from the ignorant fools who post duck-faced selfies, to the group funding sites that help children with cancer who have no health insurance. You can even get Veronica Mars made into a movie by using the power of the Internet.
The utility the Internet provides to people is endless. And that’s the key for you, isn’t it? For all your talk of freedom, you want to remove choices. Well, I for one won’t let you. I am one of the people. Hear me now!”
Brittany had been pacing on the table, but as she roared the last part, she attempted to jump across and attack one of the half sleeping cats. Kelly, Frank, Joe, and Nancy had all heard enough and were on her before both feet had left the table. They all crashed into the wooden railing in a confusing tangle of limbs and shouted curses. Emal scrambled to the railing, leaning over to pull bodies off his friend and received another blow to his nose for his trouble. He cried out, “Mentor,” through his once again bloody nose as the old white men continued to jeer and Brittany was pulled to her feet by Frank, Joe, and Nancy. Kelly rushed back to the podium and began banging her gavel again until there was silence.
“Death! By the powers vested in me, I sentence her to death. Take her out back for deletion,” Kelly shouted.
“I have a right to be heard! The people of the Internet have a right to be—”
Brittany wasn’t able to finish her sentence because a hand covered her mouth and she was ushered out the back door. Kelly brushed herself off, straightening every stray piece of fur before speaking again.
“I’m so sorry for the interruption. That is why we don’t give the people a chance to speak at these things, am I right?” she said to the laughter of the assembly who were returning to their seats. “I believe we were about to finally settle the matter of Net Neutrality vs. Freedom Net. Let’s have a tally for the approval of Freedom Net.”
Emal sat in stunned silence as all the old white men shouted, “Yea,” in unison. Then, quicker than you might expect the old men to move, they filed out of the room through another set of doors. The cats calmly gathered their possessions, one of them spitting a mouse tail onto the floor, and left. Emal and Kelly were alone in the room.
Emal had been in the Internet for a day. In that time, he had run into a brick wall and become aware of his surroundings. He had been attacked by cats, made a friend in Jeeves, lost a friend in Jeeves, made a new friend in Apollo, found a mentor in Brittany, been shot at by the FCC’s lackeys, lost his mentor, and witnessed the death of the free Internet. With all these things in his head, it was no wonder that Kelly had to bang the gavel again to get his attention.
“My dear. Yes, you. It’s time for your deletion, I’m afraid. Well, I suppose I should sentence you first . . .”
“Wait!” Emal shouted in desperation.
“Oh! What is it dear?”
“Can we take a quick recess? I . . . I really have to go to the bathroom,” he spat out.
“Well, I don’t thin
k that will matter very soon, child,” Kelly said.
“Yes, but I don’t want to soil myself after I die.”
“Quite thoughtful of you. Certainly you can use the bathroom. Just go out those double doors we came in, and there’s a bathroom in the hallway, my dear. Oh, but keep in mind, you can’t actually escape your fate, so I shall expect you back in five to ten minutes,” Kelly said.
“Yes, Ma’am.”
Emal hurried into the hallway and went straight for the doors they had been brought in. They wouldn’t budge. Other than the one that read “Urination Station,” he noticed there were no other windows or doors. Sighing, Emal decided to go in anyways. At the very least, I won’t soil myself after I’m dead.
He found a single stall in the room and no way out. He used the toilet in despair, a common enough emotion, and then washed his hands. Emal had no place to go and no one to help him. He was going to be executed for crimes he hadn’t been told about and that he wasn’t even sure he had committed. Some hero of this story I am turning out to be, Emal thought as he bent over the sink and stared into the empty water basin. He glanced back up and did end up soiling himself a bit when he saw the reflection of a tabby cat in the mirror.
Seated on the back of the toilet, where it certainly hadn’t been a moment ago, was an orange tabby cat. And not just any orange tabby, but the one who had previously attacked Emal when he hadn’t been able to give it a cheezburger.
“You!” Emal cried out as he spun around to face his potential attacker.
“Meh?” the cat asked in mock surprise.
“Yes, you. If you want to attack me again, go right ahead; I’m about to be killed anyways.”
“Meh attack yu? Ai no rememberz that.”
“Yeah, well I do. I still have the scratches on my legs and face—and probably some kind of infection.”
“Youz baybeh!”
“What do you want? You didn’t just appear here to insult me, did you?
“i can haz cheezburger?”
“Stop that. You know I don’t have any cheezburgers. Speak normal,” Emal demanded.
The cat began to lick its paws, contemplating something, and then spoke in a regular cat voice.
“Fine, Emal. Though I think you are really ruining the mood of this scene by not allowing proper lolcat speak.”
“Lol what?”
“Lolcat. That’s me. And that’s how we talk. People like it.”
“The cats in there didn’t talk like you,” Emal said.
“Those are not cats. They look like fat cats, but they are not. They are given the rights of people and appear as fat cats, but they are really just faceless and nameless nothings. They are names on paper to be traded between people who really like paper and don’t give a shit about anything else.”
“What in the world are you talking about?”
“Never mind that. Why do you think you are here, Emal?”
“Because I didn’t want to soil myself before my execution. Though, it’s too late for that now.”
“No, why are you about to be executed in the first place? Why aren’t you jumping into a portal as we speak?”
“Because I ran into a brick wall; then you and your friends attacked me. One of you was quite vicious, I might add. He just kept going right for the face.”
“Oh yes, that’s Oscar. Good kid, just has a little obsession. If it makes you feel better, he has been disciplined.”
“How?”
“He had to pose for pictures in strange little outfits, of course. Though I do think he actually likes wearing eye patches, but that’s another story entirely. More to the point, you were actually heading toward home when we met. But we couldn’t have that happen. Let me explain,” the tabby cat said, raising a paw to stop Emal from interrupting again.
“He-Who-Must-Always-Be-Named might have built the Internet, but we lolcats have made it what it is today. These imposters want to destroy that. If they get their way, there will be no more lolcats. We will be considered the lowest of the low in terms of traffic priority. No one is going to pay them extra money just for little old me—no matter how many cheezburgers I ask for. We want to stop these fat cats just as much as your friend Brittany does. We want the Internet to be free again. We want lolcats to have a thousand year reign.”
Emal raised his eyebrows.
“Well, let’s just keep that our little secret. We helped get you here for a reason. We have been watching and making sure that everything led to this moment. You, Emal, are our only hope. You’re the hero of this little story.”
“I don’t want to be anyone’s hero; I just want to go home.”
“First, all the heroes say that, so I’m just going to ignore it. As far as you going home, that is what we want as well. In fact, you going home is what must happen and what will make you a hero. But, we also need you to do something else first.”
The orange tabby sprung from the back of the stall, onto the sink, and whispered the plan into Emal’s ear. Emal giggled from the whiskers tickling his ear, but he listened and accepted the plan. After their discussion ended, the tabby cat walked to the bathroom door. She stopped and turned back to Emal.
“I almost forgot. I’m Tabitha. Welcome to the Internet.”
Tabitha left Emal, giving him a moment to gather his thoughts.
I know what I need to do, Emal thought to himself. It wasn’t going to be easy, but he knew what he needed to say and, more importantly, who he needed to say it to.
Protect me, O corporation
~
It took just a moment for Emal to gather himself. He needed to hurry before Kelly came looking for him.
“Jeeves! I am sorry. I need your help!” Emal called out to the now empty bathroom. “I need the help of a friend.”
A few moments passed with Emal thinking his plea hadn’t worked, when suddenly Jeeves appeared in front of him.
“Hello, Emal,” Jeeves said with a calculated indifference.
“Hello, Jeeves. I want to apologize to you. I am sorry for the things I said earlier. I should never have questioned your intelligence or called you a simple program. I should never have said you were ugly and scary looking,” Emal said.
“I don’t remember you calling me ugly or scary looking,” Jeeves said, squeezing his metal parts into a quizzical look.
“Oh, I guess I just thought that part. Anyways, I have been thinking—what is it that makes us human? I don’t think it’s something you can just program or put in a computer chip. It’s the strength of the human heart, Jeeves. And while you don’t actually have one of those, I think that you’re just as human as I am. So I am sorry, my friend.”
Jeeves stayed still for just a split second before letting out a little sob. “You had me at ‘my friend.’ Come here, you smelly bastard. I will give you my heart,” Jeeves cried.
Jeeves and Emal attempted the first ever paperclip to person hug, and Emal almost lost an eye. After carefully separating from each other, Emal wiped a tear, or perhaps blood, from his eye and told Jeeves what his plan was. Jeeves readily agreed and they quickly got to work.
Five minutes late for his own deletion, Emal strode back into the courtroom with Jeeves hovering behind him. He went and stood in front of Kelly, who had quickly gone from annoyed at his delay to shocked at his companion.
“Who is your friend, Emal? Does he wish to be executed as well?” Kelly asked in her most pleasant voice.
“There will be no more executions today, Kelly. My friend here is Jeeves. Together we have transcended being simple beings and have become a corporation.”
Kelly’s jaw dropped open, her eyes searched the room for help that wasn’t available. It was her court after all.
“But . . . well fine; what’s the corporation’s name then?” Kelly asked, sure they hadn’t thought that far ahead.
“Our corporation is called, TIPFU. That stands for The Internet Is a Public Fucking Utility! The F is silent.
“Language, child. This could’v
e been a young adult novel until you dropped the f- bomb. Besides, you can’t be a corporation without customers, so who are your customers?”
“We have signed our first exclusive client. The lolcats.”
“Well . . .” Kelly stammered, running out of options to stop them. “What resources do you have? You need money or something; you can’t just declare to be a corporation. How are you going to purchase support without paying lobbyists to stuff pockets?”
“We do have resources,” Emal said proudly as he waved his prescription from He-Who-Must-Always-Be-Named in the air. “We have unlimited carbon offsets!”
“My Gore,” Kelly cried. “That makes you the richest and greenest corporation in the world.”
“Damn right. And here is all the necessary paperwork,” Jeeves said, while dropping a stack of papers out from his clip. Which, I suppose means he dropped them out of his butt if you think about it too much.
Kelly glanced through the paperwork for a long time, trying to find something not filled out properly, but all was in order. Jeeves had been the key to creating the corporation because his brain had instant access to all the necessary forms and legal information required.
“Well, Tifpu . . . Tipfa . . .”
“TIPFU, it rhymes with achoo. The F is silent.”
“Well, I am so sorry there was confusion about us potentially deleting you. As a corporation, especially one with unlimited carbon offsets, you are too big to be guilty of anything. You now have an actual license to kill, and you’re certainly too big to be executed,” Kelly said with deference to Emal and Jeeves, who now controlled the largest corporation in the world.
“Thank you, Kelly. With our first act as a corporation we are demanding a committee be formed to consider Net Neutrality again. As the largest corporation, we must rightfully determine which of these proposals are in the best interest of our needs. We will, of course, provide a few thousand carbon offsets to any of The Old White Men you need to pay off for us.”