Murdering Americans

by Ruth Edwards

  ‘As used by Philip Marlow?’

  ‘Indeed. Though I gather it’s a bit lighter and more up-to-date.’

  Godber shrugged. ‘When in Rome…?’

  ‘Precisely.’

  ‘No fatalities, I hope.’

  ‘She shot over their heads a few times and they ran away, but the cops then arrested her for not having a permit to carry a gun in public. She’s down at the station, but she says they don’t seem to know what to do with her, being cowed by her title, the fact that they hadn’t given her any protection, her having a lawyer on the case, and her invoking Martin Freeman as a character referee.’

  ‘I didn’t know she knew him.’

  ‘She’s met him twice, she says, and they’re on their way to being allies. Marjorie’s trying to get hold of him now.’

  ‘Martin pretty well owns the town, so he’ll have a lot of clout. But what she’s done is serious. She’ll be lucky not to be deported.’

  ‘Maybe she’d be much more lucky if she were deported.’

  ***

  ‘I’m like Sue-Ellen and Mark,’ said Joshua. ‘I can’t stand being condescended to and I hate being told that being gay defines me. I said I wanted to major in History and English but the admission people said instead I should take Queer Studies.’

  ‘How did they know you were gay?’

  ‘You have to tick a box on your application form.’

  ‘Isn’t that very intrusive?’

  ‘It sure is intrusive. Especially if, like me, you’re not entirely sure what your sexuality is. And you’re inexperienced. Actually, I’m trying to stay celibate for the moment. I was attracted by a couple of guys at boarding school so I thought I was gay but last summer I held hands with a girl and danced with her. So maybe I’m bi.’

  ‘Or even straight?’

  ‘Anything’s possible. But Freeman wanted me to opt for something. And I couldn’t complain that the form didn’t offer plenty of choice. In the end I opted for gay because I’d heard Freeman doesn’t like mainstream and I was already white and Jewish. But then they started on me to do Queer Studies.’

  ‘You’d have been safer ticking “bi.”’

  Joshua looked puzzled. ‘But then I’d have had to do Bi Studies. That’s worse.’

  ‘Bi Studies exists?’

  ‘Part of the GLBT department.’

  ‘Sorry?’

  ‘Gay, Lesbian, Bi, and Transexual. Didn’t you know?’

  Amiss sighed heavily. ‘No, I didn’t.’

  ‘I didn’t either at the time. I asked what was the point of Queer Studies and the admissions tutor said something about how you learned about identity and desire. I said I’d work out my identity and desires myself, but I wanted to learn about the world and its past. That didn’t go down well. He said I was running away from myself. I said I didn’t even know if I was gay, so he asked if I’d feel more confident in Bi Studies. I said at this stage that I had a very sore toe and wondered if they had Ingrown-Toenail Studies. He offered Disability Studies….’

  ‘What!’

  ‘Oh, sure. It’s a real subject here. So I said I’d been joking and he said jokes were inappropriate and I was lucky not to be reported. Then he looked at my form again, saw I had ticked Jewish and suggested my religion was coming between me and the examination of my sexual identity.’

  ‘He sounds crazy.’

  ‘Freeman is crazy. These assholes seem to think we’re all narcissists who just want to see life from our own narrow perspective. Maybe I’m gay, but whatever I am, that’s not the most important thing about me. The most important thing about me is that I want to learn, I want to broaden my mind, I want to know stuff. But what I’m getting in terms of an education is jack shit. And I’m really really mad.’

  ‘Don’t you have any decent teachers?’

  ‘Even in Honour College they just pander to the dumbest. I thought we’d be having intellectual arguments, but I think even if they wanted to, the faculty would be afraid to encourage debate. Someone might say something that resulted in a minority student complaining about hurt feelings and then the professor’s caught up in the complaints procedure. In one class, when a black student sneered that I came from Hymietown, no one blinked an eye, but when I said that was a bigoted remark, I was warned I was being racially offensive. I don’t know if there are decent teachers, but I don’t see any who are brave. They’re all wieners.’

  ***

  ‘There seems to be a reign of terror going on,’ said Amiss to Godber. ‘I’d thought of political correctness as something irritating and shallow. What’s happening at Freeman seems more like Stalinism.’

  ‘That’s a good comparison,’ said Godber. ‘Political correctness is as rigid and comprehensive a belief system as was economic Marxism. Indeed a commentator called Bill Lind has recently rightly defined it as cultural Marxism. Where economic Marxism said that all history was determined by ownership of the means of production, cultural Marxism substitutes the ownership of power. So the job of the intellectual vandals of cultural Marxism is to insist that history, literature, and the rest of the humanities be examined in the most partisan and negative possible light to see—when it came to power—who were the haves and who were the have-nots. Instead of the class war, we’ve got the gender and race wars.’

  ‘And by keeping the pigeons in separate intellectual holes….You know, Warren, I think this metaphor is becoming rather laboured. What I mean is that by ghettoising disciplines like history and literature, you guarantee that your students develop only the most narrow and partisan view of what they’re studying.’

  ‘Exactly. But there’s more to it than that. Haves by definition are bad: have-nots are good. In economic Marxism, the bourgeoisie and owners of capital were the haves, who were expropriated in favour of workers and peasants. In cultural Marxism, the white straight male must yield to women, blacks, Hispanics, homosexuals, and so on—anyone who can be represented as an outsider and who plays the game by claiming victimisation.’

  ‘Hence affirmative action.’

  ‘Exactly. The descendants of the good are now entitled through affirmative action to be privileged at the expense of the descendants of the bad; and the humanities are to be studied purely for the purpose of reinforcing this ideology. So not only will the likes of Dean Pappas-Lott never have to think, but she’s programmed to try to abolish thought, for, if anyone did think, they might point out that just as the workers and peasants didn’t benefit from economic Marxism, the minority groups are doing worse rather than better as a result of cultural Marxism.’

  ‘Tolerance of difference is a good by-product of all this, though, isn’t it?’

  ‘Tolerance comes from good manners and mutual respect—not from dogma.’ Godber drained his coffee. ‘PC ideology claims to be about tolerance, but it’s tolerance exclusively for those who accept the dogma, who are the left. The dissenters of the right are by definition not to be tolerated.’

  ‘Don’t the right fight it on campuses?’

  ‘Left-liberals outnumber conservatives by around ten to one, so it’s not difficult to silence them.’

  ‘So free speech is dying.’

  ‘At Freeman it’s already dead.’

  ‘Which is why Sue-Ellen and Mark and Joshua are told they’re traitors to their sex, race, or sexual orientation.’

  ‘And to the other pigeons in their respective holes.’

  ‘Is Freeman typical?’

  ‘Probably worse than the norm. We were resisting the barbarians until poor old Jim Haringey died and was replaced by a PC fanatic. Say what you like about Helen Fortier-Pritchardson, she was a most industrious zealot who succeeded in a very short time in destroying everything fine for which Freeman stood. I’m sure she’d be very proud to know that.’ There was the sound of a car outside. ‘Ah, that’ll be Ryan.’

  ***

  ‘You’re certainly a diverse group of conspirators so far,’ said Amiss. ‘Joshua’s even partially disabled by a bad toe. De
an Pappas-Lott would be proud of you.’

  ‘I spoil it all,’ laughed Ryan. ‘I’m the enemy. White, male, and straight.’

  ‘So what drives you?’

  ‘What I’ve just said. I resent being the enemy. And I specially resent being classed as the oppressor when in fact I’m the oppressed. I didn’t want to go to Freeman. I wanted to go to Princeton, but because of affirmative action I lost out.’

  ‘Couldn’t you have done better than Freeman?’

  ‘When I didn’t make Ivy League I didn’t care much where I went. And my folks live in Chicago, so Freeman’s handy.’

  ‘What gave you the inspiration for VRC?’

  ‘Seeing so many people really pissed about what’s going on here. I couldn’t believe how bad it was when I came here first, and it kept getting worse. Last year, a few guys tried holding an affirmative action bake sale to show how dumb it all is. That’s where you have different charges for cookies: a dollar to a white or Asian male, seventy-five cents to a white or Asian female, fifty cents to a black male and forty to a black female and so on. First they were beaten up by a crowd of students urged on by Gonzales and then they were hauled in front of the campus tribunal and given a final warning: one more transgression from any of them and they’d be out without an appeal. Three of them were kicked out since.’

  ‘And it’s not just Gonzales. One day, just to wind up some of the left, I wore a Republican T-shirt to the canteen and an instructor kicked me.’

  ‘Are you serious?’

  ‘Sure. She gave me a vicious kick in the leg and then said she should have kicked me harder and higher.’

  ‘What happened?’

  ‘I asked her to apologise and she wouldn’t. She said I’d been provocative in wearing the T-shirt and the campus was pacifist. So I made a formal charge.’

  ‘And the Provost threw it out?’

  ‘She sure did. She said my clothing had been inappropriate and provocative and that she believed the instructor that she’d only accidentally touched me with her shoe, because it was men that were violent, not women.’

  ‘Had you no witnesses?’

  ‘Too scared. You can’t imagine how scared people are. Provost Fortier-Pritchardson had a reputation for organising trumped-up charges when it suited her. And Gonzales knew how to get the results she wanted.’

  ‘So you decided to fight back.’

  ‘Not then. But I got mad a few months later when Brendan and Lindy got thrown out. Lindy’s a cool chick and she and I dated for a while as freshmen so I took it kinda personally. Then later on, I was told I’d have to take ‘Whiteness Studies.’ It’s a new course that’s being made compulsory for all whites in all departments.’

  ‘I’ve got jet-lag, Ryan, and have had a very intellectually taxing day, but I know enough to presume that unlike Black or Queer or even Bi studies….’

  ‘Don’t forget Chicano.’

  ‘What!’

  ‘There was a big debate, Professor Godber told us, about the movement to set up something for Mexicans. The problem was that there are differences between U.S.-based Mexicans who think they’re American, those who think they’re Mexican-American, those who don’t like their Mexican heritage but feel Spanish and want to be called Hispanos or Latinos and those who don’t feel American however long they’ve lived here and have chosen to be known as Chicanos. It’s a rude word like “Nigger,” but it’s OK if they say it. So the final decision was to set up Chicano Studies, though non-Mexicans have to be careful not to offend by using the term.’

  ‘I’m feeling very very tired, Ryan, and soon I’m going to have to get back to my hotel, but please try to explain to me first about Whiteness Studies. All the other studies I’ve heard about are about making sub-groups feel better about themselves. I’d be astounded to hear that’s what Whiteness Studies is about.’

  ‘Of course Whiteness Studies sucks. It’s about making white people feel evil because they’re supposed to have invented racial difference so they could justify discrimination. And about making non-whites feel even more exploited than they thought they were. I took the first class and did the privilege walk. That’s when you all line up beside each other in a big room and the instructor calls out maybe thirty loaded questions about stuff like was your mother single, were your ancestors slaves and have you ever had your feelings hurt by an ethnic or gender slur. Any yes takes you one step back and no is one step forward. So in the end the white males were all way ahead of everyone else and the instructor gave us T-shirts that said “Sorry” and told us to wear them.’

  ‘You’re making that up.’

  ‘I’m so not. Our instructor was very proud of the T-shirts. Like she was proud of being female and African-American. I gave mine back and told her I was resigning from the course because I felt insulted. I tried complaining about racial harassment, but of course I was told my behaviour was inappropriate. So I said I had an issue with the instructor and that I’d pull out of college if they made me stay in the course, so they tried to make me take Masculinity Studies instead.’

  ‘Which is about inducing guilt and lowering male self-esteem, I presume.’

  ‘You got it. I’m taking it, because I want to stay in school for now, but it’s all about the need for men to be more like women and share their feelings and be consensual. Only good thing is it’s such a dumb course that as long as you play their game you can get straight A’s without doing any work.’ He snorted. ‘Not that most of their dumb-shit courses aren’t the same.’

  ‘So how did you come to start the VRC group?’

  ‘From reading Terry Goodkind and then through him getting interested in Ayn Rand, who was inspired by her belief in man as a rational being.’

  ‘I’ve just read a Goodkind.’

  ‘Did you like it?’

  ‘I’m reserving judgement,’ said Amiss cautiously, ‘but it certainly went with a swing.’

  ‘I liked him having heroes who confront and triumph over evil. But the real inspiration was Rand. Have you read her?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘She said that any alleged right of one man that necessitated the violation of the rights of another was not and couldn’t be a right. Well, my rights were being violated and I wasn’t prepared to put up with it any more. So I started talking to people about how they felt about what was going on and ended up with some people I could trust. Borrowing the idea of the Sword of Truth from Goodkind was maybe a bit kid-stuff, but it was fun. And having a secret name that no one could figure out was too. And passwords and all that. And then Lindy called me just to say “hi” and I told her a bit about how things were going on campus and she said why not talk to the Sentinel. Turned out her brother was at college with the editor. So that’s why I talked to them.’ He shrugged. ‘But when I’d done that, we didn’t really know what to do.’

  ‘So I gathered from Jack. But Warren Godber said there’s a nation-wide organisation that helps people like you fight injustice and censorship on campuses.’

  ‘Sure. FIRE. The Foundation for Individual Rights in Education. But we couldn’t agree on the right issue to go to them with. Especially because so many people had lost their nerve when Brendan and Lindy were thrown out. But we’re a bit braver since we met Lady Troutbeck. And of course things are different now the Provost and Gonzales are dead.’

  ‘They’re hardly better with Dean Pappas-Lott in charge.’

  ‘She’s so dumb she’ll be easier to deal with, I guess. We despise Dean Pappas-Lott, but we were afraid of Provost Fortier-Pritchardson. And totally petrified of Dr. Gonzales.’

  Chapter Twelve

  ‘Did you see what happened with Jack and the protestors, Betsy?’ asked Amiss, as he buckled his seat belt.

  ‘Oh, I did, Robert. I did. It was so scary. I wanted to run and help her but she’d ordered me to stick to the car. She’s so brave. She totally wanted to protect me.’

  ‘She’d have protected you better by not getting you to drive her there in the first place
, wouldn’t she?’

  ‘Hey, it’s my job to drive her. And really, like, totally, to look after her.’

  ‘I don’t think your duties extend to protecting her from the righteous anger of Islamists.’

  Betsy looked worried. ‘They’re not righteous, are they? I know we’re supposed, like, to respect their culture…oh, dear…I’ve promised Lady Troutbeck I’d stop saying “like”…but do you still have to do that when they don’t respect yours?’

  ‘No, Betsy. I wasn’t being serious. Anyone who wants to beat you up or kill you for disagreeing with them has a culture you can safely disrespect. So don’t panic. Islam OK. Islamism not OK.’

  She nodded. ‘That’s what I think, though you have to be totally careful where you say it.’

  ‘Have you seen Jack since she was taken off by the cops?’

  ‘Oh, sure. I drove after them and waited outside and then took her back to the hotel.’

  ‘How did she get out so fast?’

  ‘All she said was she was cross they’d confiscated her gun but she hadn’t been charged yet. She seemed quite cheerful.’

  Amiss yawned. ‘Good. Now can we head off to the hotel? I’m feeling shattered.’

  ***

  ‘What took you so long?’ asked the baroness, as she opened her door to Amiss.

  ‘Shower, phone call to Rachel, checking emails, that kind of thing,’ he shouted, over some piercing train noises from Horace, who had just been delivered by Marjorie and was excited.

  ‘You’re developing American habits,’ she grumbled. ‘I don’t know why anyone needs two showers a day. And I hate emails.’

  ‘Can you suspend the Luddite Monologues just for now and explain why you’re not manacled in a prison cell?’

  ‘Have a martini. I’ve made a jugful and it’s very very good.’

  ‘I’ll have a martini and an answer,’ said Amiss, throwing himself on the sofa and putting his feet on the coffee table. ‘Oh, please shut up, Horace. You’re making my head hurt.’