SociaLite

A short story I wrote a couple of years back.

‘August 19th, 2504; I’m still fuzzy, but better than last week, and easily better than before that.  Clearer headed. Less anxious. The list helps, I think. Looking at it now, I can almost feel…something.  Of course, I wrote the list while still influenced by my eMote, and now I’m not, can I claim to be the same person? Should these thoughts make sense to me?

I’m not sure why I should feel there’s anything wrong with eMote. By all accounts, we’re much better off now than before it. More connected. And we, as a people, have wanted that for ever. Religious followers, patriots, sport team supporters, Marmite lovers and haters, everyone wants to feel they belong, everyone looks for others like themselves. Prior to eMote though, this longing for a connection was as likely to express itself as ‘fear of the other’ over cosmetic differences as it was in any sense of deeper brotherhood. 

I feel ridiculous, telling myself a history I already know, but I think it’s helping. Pinning down facts sets a boundary, a guide-rail. Even hearing myself dictate the words, the assurance in my voice, “these are things I know”, I’m sure pushes back the haze. As I advance through the tale, I advance on my own mind.

Of course, I say prior to eMote, I mean prior to the old Penfield. Named after an item in an old science fiction book, a ‘mood organ’, the Penfield required a stationary base, usually in a home or office, and the user, or users, to be in proximity to that base to be effective. As soon as a user left its sphere of influence, any effect they had been subject to more or less wore off.  It couldn’t be sustained.  

Nonetheless, it didn’t take long for someone to notice that people who used the Penfields together got along better for much longer than they could without one.

The first eMote innovation was to make their device portable, enabling people to remain under it’s influence wherever they went. The second was to have their devices synch up with each other.

With the Penfield it had been possible to have two devices running at the same time, each affecting a different user. Thus, one user could select, for example, ‘peaceable relaxation’, while the other could select ‘critical vexation’. Each selection would conflict with the other, causing discord, and ultimately leaving neither party satisfied with the experience. ‘Peaceable relaxation’, would become, perhaps, ‘tense defensiveness’, or ‘frustrated righteousness’, while ‘critical vexation’ would often find itself morphing into more of a ‘hysterical hopelessness’. The best outcome one could hope for in such a situation was that both would resolve into ‘weary resignation’, but such a resolution could not be relied upon.  

The synchronization element between eMotes was automatic.  If two or more users shared the same space, they would experience the same emotions. This, finally, was a true social application for the internet, which, until 2136, when the eMotes first came out, had had people ‘socialising’ mostly by sitting in front of a screen in a room on their own.

I sound like my old history textbooks…

Has it really been that long? Nearly 370 years since they entered our lives. And since then, only one major difference, the mood-glow, or SociaLite, introduced in the early 22 hundreds. And thank God for that. It’s bizarre to look at my hand now, without its reassuring luminescence of some cheery hue. Sub-dermal implants in the back of the left hand, which change to indicate the mood being experienced, which let you see at once that you are in accord with those around you. It’s amazing, the feeling of inclusion, as you join a group, and watch the subtle colour changes as your mood is absorbed into that groups. I can quite understand why alcohol, caffeine and other chemicals fell out of favour. The wrench that must have been experienced by both sides as someone jittery on such a stimulant, or mindless through some other excess, joined a gathering, simultaneously corrupting the group and to the same degree purifying the individual, must have been quite jarring.

Whatever I feel may be wrong with eMoteing, I am glad of the numerical tipping point, that if more than five people gather, only emotions in the positive spectrum can be experienced. The idea of five or more hot-heads getting together, egging each other on, and then heading out into the streets, or wherever, is terrifying. Who knows what may happen?

So, what began as a fashionable accessory, a ‘must-have’ item, truly became a must have item, through sheer convenience. Users found people who weren’t in-tune with them unnerving, and those who found themselves doing the unnerving found the social exclusion discomfiting, and soon hooked themselves up with an eMote unit themselves to see what they were missing. Soon, parents were having their children fitted with one at birth, so as to better understand the state of mind of their child.

Perhaps that’s it, my problem; after all, by opting out for this hour each week, I am removing myself from the fold, and alone. Should I be allowed to do this? I mean, I know after an hour, or if I try to leave my flat, the eMote will automatically come back online, bring me back to myself, but for this hour I feel so alien. Isn’t that dangerous?

Perhaps it was the realisation that I never saw a politicians hands. Any broadcast shots are strictly from the elbows up. This isn’t a problem, as such, because the broadcast medium emits an eMote field to ensure that everyone feels the way they should when the transmission is received. It’s just recently struck me as being peculiar. Apparently, though, the last big problem the politicians had was getting agreement to compulsory euthanasia once unable to work, and that was back in 2323 (a nice easy date to remember). But once people couldn’t work, they couldn’t afford their eMote tariff, and once cut-off, felt vulnerable and alone, so most of them were in favour, and visiting relatives, unable to empathise effectively with the eMoteless also tended to come round to the idea, so it was with some relief that the practice was adopted.

The only other people whose hands I never see are the technicians, who seriously creep me out. Not when they’re around, because they carry emitters which send a calming mood to all around, but afterwards, when I look back at any incident, because all I can remember is their gloves. Of course, they only turn up when needed, if someone is regularly accessing the negative side of the eMotes, and inflicting themselves on others, then the technicians will come to remove or limit that function on that individuals eMote unit. I respect what they do, and appreciate it’s a necessity, but wearing gloves seems so wilfully…other. What are they hiding?

It occurs to me that what I have just dictated is known to almost everyone on the planet, because these events are almost exclusively the major events of the world since the 22nd century. I mean, there were a few natural disasters, but people soon stopped talking, or even thinking, about them due to the negativity the subject bred. I know things happened, but I couldn’t name a location for or feature of such an occasion. But what strikes me now is that in over 300 years technology has barely advanced a step. Before that, as I recall, technology was constantly moving forward, gathering momentum, each step, each fresh discovery, forcing us faster and faster on to the next. Since the eMote united us, brought us contentment, we’ve slowed to a crawl.

Africa! That was an event. With global warming reaching a peak in 2194, the population had been dwindling for many years, I remember my whole class being simultaneously horrified by the thought of what had occurred and glad that we didn’t have to deal with it. There was a collective unspoken agreement to distract ourselves from the subject as soon as possible, and to never return to it again. I wonder why I’m remembering it now?

They understood, of course, that to send food was pointless. In that heat, food that would keep for long enough to be distributed was far too expensive. Likewise they appreciated that they could not afford to move elsewhere, and if they could, almost everywhere else had no room for them. What they asked, instead, was that for that last year, in which it was estimated that the great majority of those remaining would finally escape in the only manner left them, they be hooked up with eMotes, and the synchronicity field be expanded to cover whole countries, the idea being that the suffering of a few thousand people, and less each day, be shared out amongst many billions of people, while the comforts that those billions enjoyed be focused to some degree into those few thousand stranded there. Needless to say, those outside of Africa were reluctant to increase their own woes, and so the whole thing was mooted, leaving the Africans to die in solitude and despair.

This strikes me as barbaric and needlessly cruel. Even such concentrated suffering, as diluted as it would have been, would have barely affected my mood. Right now, I like to think that I would have been one of the few we heard about that considered accepting a unified field over the ‘net, and I even think I may have gone through with it, but I know, in reality, that even had I considered it, the mood around me would have prevailed and I, as did those that were there, would have given up on the idea pretty quickly.

I guess it’s for the best that we’re not constantly looking for the next big thing, the next advancement, the way we used to before eMote. Contentment has set us free. People used to hate their jobs, try to outdo each other with petty possessions, people used to yearn for something more, and often people would assume there was something wrong with themselves if they were unhappy with who they were or what they had, which led increasingly, from the 20th century, when people began to expect to be happy, to the recognition of various depressions, manias, syndromes and the like, and the prescription of various mood altering chemicals. Nowadays there is far less mental illness, no problems with addiction (what could be better than sharing eMote with people?) of any kind, depression is a thing of the past, and competition over material goods has virtually died out, since anyone bragging over something with someone in their eMote field would be sharing their satisfaction, and hence the emotional benefit of the trinket or bauble, with that person, too.

I’m beginning to feel restless. Looking at my list from last night, things I have felt I should be concerned about, none of them seem to make sense to me now. I thought my dictation was leading me somewhere. I don’t know who wrote these things, but it was not who I am now: ‘Crime?’?; What’s that supposed to mean? Why should I worry about crime when there hasn’t been any for over 200 years? ‘Art?’?; I should know that we stopped considering the point of art long ago, such a divisive subject would and could provoke wildly different responses within the same group, evening out as a kind of malaise, which, if the goal of ‘Art’ is to provoke a response, this forced indifference surely defeats the point. Besides, no-one’s created anything new for generations. ‘Necessity is the mother of invention’?; Well, as I mentioned earlier, technological advance has slowed right down, so I feel sure that we do not need anything, although I feel quite strongly that I do. I’m hating each second that I’m not connected now, and I’m counting down the seconds until my eMote comes back to life. Can’t stop looking at the back of my hand.

‘Individualism’; The last word on my list, and the most puzzling of all to me. I can’t concentrate on it. I can’t think why I wanted to do this. I shan’t be doing it again. I’m starting to panic now, what if the eMote has broken? It never has in the past but…

I shouldn’t have worried. A pleasant warmth spreads across the back of my hand and a friendly green glow radiates from that warmth. I can feel my girlfriends universal love from the other side of the wall. The couple upstairs are watching a comedy, and I enjoy their response to it. Below us, a child is feeding his cat, and his appreciation for the love he receives is a special kind of buzz we are glad to be a part of. Even the lonely lodger next door, recently visited by the technicians, seems to be emanating bonhomie. My own joy at being readmitted bleeds into their collective mood, and we all appreciate how lucky we are to be a part of this.

It’s good to be myself again.’

Alright Ed West, you just made the list....

While researching for a new blog post (yes I do), I came across this piece of nonsense rhetoric from 2010, which presents statistics in support of its opening statement that, if anything, show the opposite. 74% of those given a community penalty are reconvicted within 9 years, while 70% of those who served a prison sentence of a year or less reoffended within a year, although this is only relevant to 1 in 8 prisons, rendering the statistic virtually meaningless. In 14 prisons, 7 in 10 (70% again. Sorry) of those released reoffend within a year, and 1 in 5 (20% in the interests of clarity) given a caution also reoffend, though without a time-scale presented.

He attacks Kenneth Clarke's comments, which had sounded surprisingly reasonable to me, before suggesting that 'most evidence points to the unfortunate truth that no form of punishment, whether it's prison, community sentencing or sending kids on safari, has significant success rates'. Well, perhaps 'most evidence' does, but as I mentioned in my previous post, HMP Grendon has had success at significantly reducing recidivism, and does a lack of success elsewhere mean that we should stop exploring and plump for an increasingly expensive punishment, an ineffective deterrent, building and filling ad nauseum?

'The “prison works” argument of the unfairly maligned Michael Howard is the rational conclusion based on empirical evidence; the “prison is rehabilitation” argument is based on sentimentality, and an irrational radical idea that anyone can be perfected given the right social conditions, something which goes against our understanding of human nature. There is no evidence that shorter sentences do anything to improve the re-offending rate – quite the contrary.'

Jeez, that's a beauty, isn't it. Where to start? Having illustrated that prison doesn't work, he claims that Mr Howard was correct to state that it does, based on the same empirical evidence that points to the unfortunate truth... etc. I don't believe that anyone has made the claim that “prison is rehabilitation” in quite some time. However, the therapeutic prison of which I'm so fond has helped to rehabilitate offenders, and while they may not have been 'perfected', they have adjusted to social living. Which of us can claim to be perfect? With regards the paragraph's last sentence, it is equally true that there is no evidence that longer sentences improve the re-offending rate; in which case we must balance the cost to individuals and society of the crime/s committed against the cost of housing the offender at her majesty's pleasure, which appears to be exactly what Mr Clarke was attempting to do...

The articles closing paragraphs regarding class are so fatuous as to be risable. In fact the whole article is so rabid and absurd that I feel I may have been trolled.

These are some of the lengths taken to distort public perception in order to maintain the illusion that 'prison' is 'doing something about crime'.

It started with serial killers. Or maybe it didn't. Maybe before that, it was the idea of death.

My Mum tells me that, when she used to read me bedtime stories ('28 years old, I was' etc) I repeatedly asked to hear about death. It was a subject which fascinated me. A state of otherness that nobody could describe, but that everyone would experience.

Around age 10 I began to get interested in serial killers. If murder is the worst crime somebody can commit, prematurely sending someone to this other state, what sort of person could repeatedly commit it? Is impelled to perform the act again and again, refining and honing, perfecting, tailoring the experience to suit themselves? How deviant!

From there, it was a matter of degrees. By the time I was ready to go to university, I was interested in all crime. I read mysteries and detective fiction. I followed news reports about drug smuggling operations being 'busted', about celebrities discovered not paying their taxes, or using 'hookers', about Doctors found to be administering overdoses of diamorphine to their elderly patients... Of course I was still interested in killers, but they were at the extreme end of a broader question What does it take to be a criminal? For most of us, the answer is simply 'being caught'.

It often surprises me how few people accept that they indulge/have indulged in criminal behaviour. Drinking under-age, pocketing an eye-liner from Boots, downloading a film or album, walking off with erroneously excessive change, speeding, taking stationary from work, or an experimental puff on a 'funny cigarette'...

Often we excuse these behaviours as young people pushing their boundaries (drinking, drugs, shoplifting), or because 'everybody does it' (speeding, stationary theft, accepting extra change), some result in financial losses for the victim, others only affect the perpetrator, but they are all criminal activities. That is not to say that I feel we shouldn't excuse them in this way, with appropriate soft penalties when discovered to demonstrate disapproval, but merely to illustrate that just because someone is a criminal does not make them a bad person.

When I talk with people about options other than prison, many first respond by extending my point beyond any comment I've made, saying 'So you don't want to send murderers to jail?'... To which I'm forced to admit, 'Well, no and yes...'.

In many cases violent offenders lack empathy, but can learn it, as evidenced by the success of the daily therapy regime in use at HMP Grendon. This is the kind of prison that we need more of, if we want prison to accomplish anything more than simply removing offenders from our streets for a finite time. It's reduction of recidivism would ease the problem of 'packed' prisons, save money long term, and result in less crime, all of which traditional prison regimes have failed to achieve. However, budget cuts in the short term are causing problems, as is general overcrowding, and threatening to put a stop to the only prison in the UK to have proven to lower re-offending rates' ability to do so.

It's just occurred to me that those who are still against the rolling out of this system may be exhibiting the same lack of empathy displayed by violent offenders. There's irony.

Those who aren't against rolling out the reforms, let me know. Let's start something.

There's a moment in Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy when the character Smiley explains that the things he talked about during an interview gave away more about his own preoccupations than they ever revealed about the interviewee, who had stayed silent throughout. I read this several years ago and it's an idea that has stayed with me, our projected motivations reflecting on ourselves, often popping up while I listen to someone trying to shout down opponents to their point of view.

One area in which this behaviour is particularly prevalent is contemporary politics. Of the two dominant parties, the Conservatives seek to punish transgressors, and force compliance of the masses through fear of reprisal, leading to security and comfort for all in a well ordered homogeneous society. Labour seek to support individuals, understanding and accepting differences which demonstrably do no societal harm, removing the need to transgress in the first place. These examples are reductive, but illustrate fairly well the core of each system, and each has been shown to have a degree of success in some areas, and be less successful in others. An example of them working well in concert is Karyn McCluskey's Community Initiative to Reduce Violence, and its handling of gangs and knife crime in Glasgow.

Recently, The Daily Mail reported on a study which seemed to show a link between lower intelligence and right wing political beliefs. This ignores the fact that some very intelligent people purportedly hold right wing beliefs. I have friends who claim to subscribe to some right wing philosophies. I say claim, because actions of theirs I have witnessed often fly in the face of these ideological tenets. Similarly, I'm not always as tolerant and/or accepting as I'd perhaps like. Permanently enthusiastic people, for example, tend to wear me out.

The bigger problem, as I see it, is that it ignores the fact that many right wing politicians are intelligent, and are absolutely aware of what the consequences of their 'common sense' policies are, but forge ahead knowing that they will be popular with a significant number of voters, due to a lack of education/interest/interest in education on the subject of politics, and, equally cynically, that there may be investment opportunities in the future. In many cases, there is historical evidence that gives the lie to promises made by these policies. They would HAVE to be fools to have chosen a career in politics while being unaware of the results of strategies previously implemented. Instead they are deliberately perpetuating a system which increases financial disparity, increases alienation, increases fear...

Ken Clarke's proposed sentencing reforms of a couple of years ago are wonderfully illustrative of this very point. The reforms contained several ideas which have been proven to work, both in reducing rates of re-offending, and reducing the prison population in general. Implicit in the reforms was the acknowledgement that significant numbers sentenced to prison are suffering mental health problems, and would be more appropriately dealt with by other institutions. Also important to note is that the proposal was welcomed by prison reformers. This is in stark contrast to the current proposed reforms to the NHS, which have been almost universally condemned.

The prison reforms were never implemented. Cameron 'bowed to public pressure', and rejected the proposal, rather than explaining why it was a good idea, or indeed ploughing on regardless, as he seems intent on doing with the NHS bill. Of course, Labour cannot be said to be blameless with regards the prison situation, as we have to question why they didn't implement the same changes proposed by Mr Clarke while they held power. Sadiq Khan, the Shadow Justice Secretary has now admitted that the ideas were good ones, and Frances Crook (Yes, yes, an ironic surname, one supposes), Labour Party member, and Director of The Howard League For Reform, has long looked to her party to apply it's traditional values to this most contentious of areas. My question is, why must it remain contentious? There is a wealth of proofs that support these reforms, but they need to be communicated to the public. Rather than 'soft options', they should be presented as what they are, the most successful ways to manage and reduce crime and criminals. The public should also be reminded that it is they who pay for the poor management of this system, not least through tax. In 2010, the average annual cost in England and Wales of housing one prisoner was 34000, at a time when the prison population reached a record high, exceeding 85000...

One irony here is that those who subscribe to right wing views due to low intelligence reportedly do so because it makes them feel 'safe', but are, along with everyone else, actually less safe while governed by right wing policies. Another is that the political judgements we make, our projected motivations, reveal as much about ourselves as individuals as they do our view of society.