by Conti, Gene;
I stopped momentarily to take a breath as I studied the faces of the students. Some had banal expressions, some curious, some bored, and some really intrigued.
“If you decide to stay in this class and take the red pill, the lies of the Matrix will be torn down brick by brick. The truth will slowly be revealed to you. Some of you may not like viewing the naked truth, others of you will embrace it—I cannot foretell the future for any of you. This journey will at times be very uncomfortable— veracity can be very painful. It will cut you open and bare the real you down to your core. Which pill will it be?”
CHAPTER FIFTEEN
CUSSIN’ JAR
No one left the class. Everyone remained seated, almost motionless, kinda staring at me - waiting for the next shoe to drop?
“Also this class will absolutely, positively require you to think and analyze, not just memorize,” I emphasized as my eyes scanned for signs of resistance.
It came quickly.
First from Matt. “Why can’t you just hand out copies of your notes or give us the course textbook digitally so we can study it off our devices?”
Matt sat in the fifth row, fourth seat against the windows. He was from Florida. His parents, divorced Jews, were real estate developers there. Many of the upscale townhome retirement communities in Boca Raton and Bradenton were their babies. He was majoring in finance and marketing, with plans to go into real estate for himself. Matt was atheistic in his opinions and had a real wheeler-dealer personality, with a smile akin to a used car salesman. He was also a big sci-fi nut.
“Matt,” I replied, “one of the objects of this course is to teach you to scrutinize, probe, critique, inquire—in general to actually use your brain.”
“I’m sure Matt is not the only one with this attitude. Part of the Matrix philosophy that you are all entangled in, is to convince you to not use your brains—just memorize and regurgitate. After graduation you are to perform your job or career like a trained monkey. The Matrix doesn’t want you to think too deeply, as you may conceive of an answer different from what they want imbedded in your cerebrum.”
“Remember the Star Wars movies,” I asked, still looking at Matt.
“Yeah, way cool,” and he gave a double thumbs up to me.
“Obi-Wan Kenobi used a Jedi mind trick, that he said worked easily on weak minds. ‘These are not the droids you’re looking for,’ I believe were his words.”
Maggie interjects, “Those droids were just too cute.”
Philip, still leaning back on his chair legs against the rear wall, rolled his eyes.
“Guys, nothing personal, but most of you are those weak minds. Trust me I was one of those who had swallowed the blue pill hook, line, and sinker for quite some time. You must realize that all of you, myself included, are all brainwashed,” as I started to walk along the space between my desk/lab table and the first rank of seats. Brother Francis was right to grant me ample leeway to “perambulate” back and forth as he described.
Jude piped up immediately; “I am not brainwashed!” he interjected as he half stood up from his desk, his face turning a reddish-blue as he pointed his finger at me. Seems he took my accusation personally.
Jude sat in the fifth row, last seat almost butted up against the windows where I more than once would catch him looking outside daydreaming. He was majoring in political science. His plans, I deduced through many class sessions, was to become involved in Washington politics in the worst way. I got the impression that who or what he got involved with didn’t matter; actually the more sordid the better.
Jude was from a middle class family on Long Island, whom he despised as being too common for what he aspired to; however, he was fine taking their very hard-earned money that was putting him through college. His parents had a thing for the Beatles and named him after the song of the same title. Jude was about as pagan as they come.
Nate turned around and advised, “Jude, chill out, man. We’ve just gotten started, and have a long way to go. You’re going to give yourself a heart attack.”
Nate sat in the fourth row, fifth seat, diagonally in front of Jude. Nate was from a financially well-off mercantile family in Boston. He was expected to take over the family business. Independent and proud, he wished to prove to his family and himself that he had the “right stuff.” He was putting himself through college, majoring in business and computer science. During vacations and holidays he worked at his family’s business, and they paid him an average worker’s salary—he asked for no special deals. Honest and a straight arrow, he was knowledgeable in Catholicism but was not a practicing Catholic.
After the exchange, things settled down. I continued.
“I believe Jude has expressed feelings similar to which others may have as well. What I am trying to say is that everyone has a worldview that defines who he or she is. We are all biased or brainwashed in our worldviews, and there is no such thing as a neutral opinion or position.”
“Outside forces—good, bad, and ugly—influence us to the way we think and act. These forces come primarily in the form of educational, religious, and media influences. Our parents are the initial and prime wellspring; however, even they are and were influenced by these same powers. Let me give you an example. This is when America lost its innocence. Please punch up on your tablets the YouTube video of the Zapruder Film,” and I spelled it out.
Jim shouted first, “I got it.”
“Ok, but find the one that gives you the frame by frame in HD,” I recommended.
Jim was from Ohio and sat in the second row, third seat, directly in front of Thad. Jim had a short-tempered fiery and funny personality. He had lots of energy. Over time, I sensed he was searching for the truth. He knew something was wrong with the system but couldn’t put his finger on it. It is why he signed up for my course—he was looking for answers. He was majoring in Ecology. Jim, about six feet tall and lanky, reminded me of Patrick Henry—firebrand of the Revolution, in manner, temperament, and size. He was a devout but confused Catholic.
“Yeah, we discussed all of the Kennedy assassination stuff in junior high,” he wisecracked immediately. “This Oswald guy, the lousy coward, shot JFK in the back.”
“Ditto on that,” echoed Tom.
“Philip, you have a background in physics. Would you mind helping the class out?” I knew that challenging his ego would get him to answer.
“If I were to punch Jim in the face, which direction would his head go?”
“Backwards,” Philip replied.
“And if I shot him in the forehead with a high-powered round?”
“His head would snap back,” Philip answered in a bored fashion to the obviously dumb question.
Meanwhile most of the students had already been carefully surveying the Zapruder footage.
“Holy s**t,” Tom blurted out loud, “Did you see that?”
“What the … ?” Jim bellowed.
“OK, before we discuss the video,” I injected quickly before Jim could finish the obscenity. “Let’s establish some ground rules. When we are with one or two friends, all of us are a bit loose with our lingo at times. However, when you are in a professional arena with people in a job or career setting, or classroom environs, it will be incumbent on you to watch your vernacular. Can you imagine a CNN or ABC journalist using profanity giving a news report on a train crash or other dramatic event?”
Thad, the journalism major, immediately barged in, “Doc’s right!”
“Here’s the deal, anyone caught cussing in class has to put a dollar in a cussing jar,” I articulated in as serious a timbre as I could muster. “I’ll bring the jar into our next class session on Wednesday.”
“Who’s going to decide what is a cuss word?” asked Jude with a snobbish attitude in his voice.
“You are, all of you. Majority rules if it is a cuss word or not. If your own classmates deem it to be so, you need to put your buck in the cussin’ jar. If there is an even number of students that day, if needed, and only t
hen, I will be the tie-breaking vote. Got it!?”
Jude just sat arms crossed, lip poked out, like he had been weaned on a pickle.
There were no other objections. We went on with the Zapruder example. The questions and comments from the students came fast and furious.
Matt complained, “Why have we never seen this before?”
Followed by Tom and Pete’s anger at having been misled all those years.
“For those of you who want more info, you may wish to check out the interviews of all the doctors and nurses who were present that day in the trauma bay at Parkland Memorial Hospital.”
“Furthermore,” I added, “to a man—and woman or doctor and nurse, each of them, stated they saw the ballistic entry at the right forehead and exit wound from the right occipital portion of the skull. They are all individually and separately interviewed in the film and use their fingers and hands gesturing in the same almost uniform fashion for entrance and exit.”
“Finally before you leave, I challenge you to find me just one example of one totally unbiased person living or dead, if you can. Don’t stay up too late. See you on Wednesday.”
CHAPTER SIXTEEN
LUNCH BREAK
Father was already at the Holy Grounds coffee shop when I arrived about 11:00 AM. We had agreed to an early lunch. He was sipping on what appeared to be a savory iced tea.
As I sat down across from him, he asked in jovial fashion, “Well, me lad, how did your first day go?”
“Actually, pretty well for not having taught in decades,” I replied motioning for the waiter to bring me an iced tea.
“How much did you reveal to them?”
Before I could answer, the waiter came to deliver my iced tea and take our order. Father ordered his favorite, corned beef on rye. I was in a burger mood and ordered one of their famous hamburgers made from beef raised by our agricultural students and monks on the property.
“I’ll take one of the half pounders cooked as rare as the law allows, with the works on it.” Looking at the waiter and then glancing at Father Ed I added, “thank God for the government protecting us from our decisions.”
The waiter, a young naïve student, just gave me a blank stare and went off to fill the orders.
“Joe, that is why I brought you here to teach. The youth today have absolutely no concept of freedom and the rugged individualism that made this country the powerhouse that it once was. We now have a nanny state, where big brother protects us from every bump and scrape in life. Everything from cradle to grave is provided for by the state. Ben Franklin warned us: ‘Those who surrender freedom for security will not have, nor do they deserve, either one.’” With that, Father Ed took another sip through the straw of his iced tea.
To that I piggybacked with, “Yeah, people now want guaranteed food, clothing, shelter, healthcare, cell phones, you name it. We already have a place like that where everything is totally guaranteed and secure, it’s called a prison. Franklin was right,” I exclaimed chugging down my iced tea, being thirsty from the one-hour class.
“Were you able to discuss with the students that all this security is a façade, an illusion, like your Matrix that the government dangles in front of the people?”
“No, Wednesday we start our trip down the rabbit hole. They will start to learn that in exchange for all these false promises, the government has a goal, and it’s about power and control—over them!”
“By the way, Joe, will you and Emily be able to make it financially with you teaching only one class this year?”
“No, I’ll still have to work a few shifts per month in the Emergency Department.”
Our food had now arrived, and Father and I blessed ourselves with the sign of the cross, and together said grace over it.
CHAPTER SEVENTEEN
BIAS
I walked into class on Wednesday carrying the cussin’ jar and placed it on the lab table squarely in the front for all to see. It was a big, wide-mouth plastic jar that formerly held almost five pounds of animal cookies. As the students rambled in, practically all of them noticed the jar immediately. However, no one said anything. As I predicted, they all took the same seats they had during the first session.
We all stood to say the Pledge of Allegiance, with the lone holdout being Simon/Ali who sat quietly in his seat and didn’t budge.
“Okay, has anyone discovered a person, alive or dead, who is not biased in any way, shape, or form?” Scanning the class, I didn’t see a single hand up. No hands.
Before I had a chance to go on, Jude spouted out, “Who is going to keep tabs on the money in the cussin’ jar?”
I don’t know why, but I half expected something like this to come up, and I was ready.
“Jude, I will make you in charge of the jar.” He did a double take, not believing what he just heard.
Matt, adding to the conversation, turned around to Jude and stated, “And I’ll double check your accounting.”
Super, I thought, the used car salesman checking on the K Street lobbyist.
Thank, God, Nate came to the rescue. His eyes fixed on Jude and then Matt, Nate asserted, “Every company needs an auditor, and you’re looking at him.”
It was his way of letting both of them know he didn’t trust either of them and would be watching their every move regarding the money in the cussin’ jar.
“I think the pecuniary issues regarding the fiscal management of the cussin’ jar has been acceptably arrived at by all parties involved.” I tempered the mood with a slight British accent to my voice.
Nate gave me a big smile, as chortles and giggles were heard throughout the room. Jude and Matt looked at each other sort of dumbfounded.
“Okay, let us proceed with great vigor, to quote a famous British statesman,” I said still using my British accent.
“Since I have not seen any hands up, I assume that none of you were successful in finding anyone without bias.” I continued, “Everyone, repeat everyone is biased about virtually everything in life. It depends on which bias one decides to be biased about. And all our biases are based on other people’s biases that we adopt as we go along in life.”
Everyone just stared at me with a “What did he just say?” expression on their faces.
“Pick a topic, any topic,” I directed to the class.
Juan raised his hand. He was sitting in the fifth and last row, third seat back against the windows. He wanted to become a teacher and was majoring in Education and psychology. Juan was of Hispanic descent and his family immigrated to the USA, and had been citizens living in Arizona for decades. He was a bit on the quiet side but gave strong opinions when he felt right about an issue. His family was Catholic, but he went to church only to please his parents.
“Doc, how about marriage? Some believe marriage to be between a man and a woman, others believe in gay marriage. You’re saying both positions are biased?”
“Yes, absolutely,” I emphatically responded.
“Regardless of which position you support, you take and adhere to that belief, because of the influences around you, be they your parents, friends, professors, the media, pastors. Whichever voices you listen to the most will be the bias you claim to be the correct one.”
Andy now chimed in. “Whoa, whoa, are you saying some biases are right and others wrong, or what?”
Andy sat in the third row, fourth seat next to his brother, Pete, who sat in the fourth seat in the fourth row. Their family owned a fishing business in Alabama outside of Mobile Bay. Andy was taking marine engineering with a minor in architecture. Pete was a geology major minoring in marine science. These guys loved the sea and were salt-of-the-earth good people. They believed there was a God, but didn’t know Him personally, as their parents were borderline Christians and only went to church on Christmas and Easter.
“Andy, you are getting close to the answer. Bias in and of itself just is. Now depending on the topic, one bias could be right and another bias wrong. It depends on the position and by whom or wha
t has brainwashed or biased you.”
“Let me be clear, the term brainwashed has negative connotations. I’m using the term to force you to think that everyone is biased or brainwashed whatever the topic. Get it?”
“Using Juan’s topic of the definition of marriage, whatever your position on it is—pro-gay, anti-gay, pro-heterosexual or anti-heterosexual marriage—you believe what you believe due to those forces I mentioned.”
Jude vigorously raised his hand. I acknowledged him, and he stood up.
“There is no right and wrong, and therefore anyone can define marriage any way he or she wants to,” he stated abruptly and then sat down with a scowl on his face, which implied he knew it all.
“So Jude,” I started, “based on what you just said, I have your permission to define marriage as only between a man and a woman, correct?”
Jude gets wide-eyed, “Yes … I mean, no. Gay marriage is right.”
“So your bias, Jude, is for gay marriage as right and heterosexual marriage as wrong?”
“Yes, well, two normal … I mean heterosexual people can also marry. Man, you are confusing me.”
“Okay, gang let’s slow down, take a big breath, and see if we can approach this from another angle,” I said, hoping to organize everyone’s thought processes.
“How does one even determine what is right or wrong?”
“That’s easy,” Matt said as he raised his hand at the same time. “I determine what is right and wrong for me and my life. There is no God to tell me what to do,” he proclaimed. Several students nodded in agreement.
“Fine,” I replied, “then can I decide what is right and wrong for me and my life?”
“Oh, yeah,” Matt smugly answered. “Anyone can make up his own rules for what is right and wrong. We all learned this in situation ethics and relative morality courses.”
“Hands,” I ask the class, “how many of you believe you should be able to determine what is right and wrong for yourselves?”