by D Miller
'Or perhaps it is something else entirely,' said Sharon.
Robbie decided to head off a discussion about the meaning of love, before someone suggested that they had better carefully define 'good' and 'evil' before proceeding further. He gestured at the viewing wall, where he and Nurmeen were frozen in place. 'In this episode,' said Robbie, 'my evil, brain-damaged, robot torturer character has got himself a job at Sheena's university by pretending to be human. It is his first day at work. Betty is played by Nurmeen, Lorna by April and Amber is playing Hazel, a suspiciously tall flame-haired temptress with a terrible secret. Normally we just use people's real names for their characters, but Nurmeen said we couldn't keep doing that because it's a security issue.' Sheena rolled her eyes.
Robbie re-started the playback. The Robbie on the viewing wall started moving again. He swung down a corridor with Nurmeen/Betty, who was reading from a tablet and smiling, sometimes laughing. She swiped something on the tablet, looked at Robbie and spoke.
BETTY: Sorry about your accident, what happened, if you don't mind my asking?
ROBBIE: My mistress was working in her secret lab, and suffering severe itching, she went to scratch herself, forgetting the laser in her hand, which without meaning to she directed at a highly pressurised container thus causing a terrible explosion, at once damaging me and freeing me.
BETTY:
(not listening) Oh dear.
ROBBIE: Foolish human I know, but in mitigation she has been driven insane by a chronic yeast infection. Now she is trapped under the rubble of her secret lab and if she is not rescued soon she will die. As will the human locked in the basement. I suppose that is one consequence of having a secret lab that she did not anticipate.
BETTY: (not listening) How awful.
Right, well, here we are. How did you say you lost your leg again?
ROBBIE: I fell down the stairs.
BETTY: And your leg fell off?
ROBBIE: They were very sharp stairs.
BETTY: Right. I can see that you will need careful watching.
ROBBIE:
BETTY: Here's your new starter honey.
LORNA: Welcome to the English University at Antarctica Robbie. And welcome also to the complaints, discipline and appeals department.
ROBBIE: Thank you for the welcome fellow human being.
LORNA: Right. Our department has been called the place where academic dreams go to die.
ROBBIE: Ha ha ha.
LORNA: That wasn't really a joke.
ROBBIE: I wasn't really demonstrating mirth with spontaneous unarticulated sounds.
LORNA: No, right, well you will need to become familiar with the University's student appeal regulations.
ROBBIE: Accessing… I do not have that in my database.
LORNA: Sorry?
ROBBIE: My long term storage device.
LORNA: What?
ROBBIE: Memory. I do not have that in my memory.
LORNA: Well no problem, I wouldn't expect you to, you will find the regs on the server.
ROBBIE: I don't think your server likes me, I talked to her just now, she wouldn't let me in.
LORNA: I'm not sure our server is a person.
ROBBIE: If she was a person she would have her knees tightly closed.
LORNA: Er, I'm not really comfortable with your sexual imagery… um Robbie.
HAZEL: Hello, not interrupting am I?
LORNA: Not at all. Hazel I'd like you to meet the newest member of our team, Robbie Rabat.
ROBBIE: Call me Robbie, flame-haired temptress.
HAZEL: Blimey, you're not backwards at coming forwards are you?
ROBBIE: I am not backwards at all; I have been assembled correctly. I am Robbie, 35 years old, good sense of humour, I have all my own teeth and most of my limbs. I am Pisces, which means that I am very deep, and passionate. My hobbies are gardening, going for long walks at sunset and torturing kitchen appliances.
Robbie saw George's mouth open. He paused the playback.
'He tortured kitchen appliances for Sharon in the secret lab? That's ridiculous. The story at least should have internally consistent logic.'
'It does,' said Robbie, 'his job was torturing people, he tortured kitchen appliances to relax.'
'Right. So sorry.'
Robbie re-started the playback.
ROBBIE: Do you have a toaster?
HAZEL: Yes I have a four slice toaster, a juicer and I even have a paper towel dispenser although I've never even seen a paper towel. Call me the gadget queen.
ROBBIE: Yes! You will be my queen! All the toasters and kettles and ice cube makers will tremble before you or feel my wrath!
HAZEL: You're sweet.
ROBBIE: Does that mean that you think that we are compatible on a deep level and could develop a long term relationship?
LORNA: Robbie, take this file
ROBBIE: Should I track down and capture the student first? I am programmed… I mean skilled, skilled, I am skilled in multiple techniques of torture.
LORNA: I appreciate your enthusiasm but our policy is to make a determination on the evidence provided. However, should the happy day ever come when Senate adopts a robust policy of student torture I will definitely call upon your skills in the implementation phase. For now just please read the file and we'll discuss it once you have. That's your desk at the back.
ROBBIE: Very well.
HAZEL: Seems like a nice chap.
LORNA: Possibly just a touch eccentric?
HAZEL: Takes all sorts. Lunch later?
ROBBIE:
Robbie paused the playback for a knock at the door. One of the bodyguards opened it and allowed Amber and Darren in.
'Oooh,' said Amber, 'you're watching my big scene.' He turned to George, 'Did you recognise me under the red hair?'
'Hey dude,' said Omo, 'George was just saying how good you were.'
'You look great with red hair,' said Darren, putting an arm around Amber.
'There'll be more scenes,' said Robbie, 'you talk like that's your only scene. There's a whole story line going on with Robbie the brain-damaged evil torturer robot and Hazel the suspiciously tall flame-haired temptress with a terrible secret.'
'I do think you were very good Amber, you were all very good, but I'm struggling to understand why you have all spent so much time on this?' said George.
'We are shocked Mr George,' said Shauna.
'Very shocked,' said Sheena.
'You might say appalled,' said Sharon.
'Soap opera is your most significant art form. Historically soap opera is where the corporation first learnt how to hijack the power of great art to bring people together for their own purposes,' said Sharon.
'Soap opera is designed to give safe expression to inchoate longing for connection and community in ways that do not imply actual connection and actual community,' said Sheena.
'Tell me Mr George,' said Shauna, 'humans are social animals, so why is it that humans do not live in supportive communities?'
Robbie frowned as Shelley jumped off his lap, onto the floor and approached Amber, rubbing herself promiscuously against his legs. George shut his eyes.
Probably not deciding to ask Shauna once again not to call him Mr George, since he had lost that one back in Toytown, thought Robbie. Seeing the girl bots interact with George was like watching an irresistible force meeting an immovable object. Robbie watched as Amber bent down and picked Shelley up. George's eyes opened.
'Well I do think that capitalism destroys community in three ways,' said George. 'First of all it teaches people that only their immediate self-interest matters so they are foolish to have any feelings of concern for others. Of course those feelings are part of their need for community. Secondly it makes people move ceaselessly for work and accommodation so communities are constantly made and broken up and friends and family members separated. This prevents those communities that do form from having deep roots. And thirdly, elites consciously and actively seek to destroy communities. Let us take an example from history: community singing. Community singing is the most natural thing for humans yet it is rarely done, why? It is because ruling elites actively seek to stamp it out, the earliest example I know is from Europe about a thousand years ago. The British working class staged a general strike, following which the panicking ruling elite considered how to destroy working class solidarity. They knew that working class communities were a source of strength and so looked for ways to undermine them. One of the tactics they adopted was banning community singing. The working classes would gather in taverns and similar places and sing popular songs. The ruling elite made their police forces visit these taverns to actively enforce the ban and stamp out the dangerous practice.'
'So your argument,' said Sharon, 'is that elites see a danger to themselves in strong communities and have a range of methods of to prevent them.'
'But what to do about that unvoiced suspicion that something important is missing?' said Shauna.
'Soap opera! Imaginary community! Imaginary connection to imaginary people!' said Sheena.
'You do make them sound sinister,' said George.
'Why do you think we like them?' said Sheena. 'Our networks are full of them.'
'Dex really doesn't want humans knowing about them,' said Amber, looking at Shelley as he spoke. She lay on her back on his arm, trying to catch his finger with her paws. 'He doesn't think they would understand.'
'Just because a tiny percentage of the time we portray humans as crazy torturers fucking each other over for a percentage,' said Darren.
'And the rest of the time dude,' said Omo, 'the humans are sane torturers fucking each other over for a percentage.'
'But in a way that has consequences for a community of people, with some of the characters being people you can empathise with and hope they will somehow resolve their terrible dilemmas,' said Shauna.
'My human Robbie character is a good person,' said Robbie.
'He's a bit of an idiot though,' said Darren.
'My character is sympathetic,' said Sheena.
'Tiny bit self-obsessed,' said Robbie.
'Hazel is nice,' said Amber. 'She's just looking for love.' He looked at Sheena as he spoke, his hand drifted closer to Shelley who grabbed one of his fingers with her front paws, braced herself against his wrist with her back paws and attacked. Amber looked at the kitten viciously chewing his finger and laughed, 'That barely even tickles,' he said.
'Suspiciously tall flame-haired temptress with a terrible secret Hazel,' said Sheena, 'is literally a man eater. When she meets evil brain-damaged robot torturer Robbie she is still picking actual, not metaphorical, bits of her last victim out of her teeth.'
'Well, yes,' said Amber, 'she has made some bad decisions. But only because she's very lonely. Isn't that right Shelley?' Amber looked down at the kitten who had started to lick his finger, and purr.
'And because being so tall she probably gets quite hungry,' said Darren.
'I do think there is something in your theories about soap operas,' said George. 'I do understand that some people get quite interested in the actors playing the roles and follow them obsessively. Perhaps that further gives them imaginary connection to an imaginary community, filling a real need to feel part of something bigger while actually supporting and reinforcing a system where some people matter but most people don't.'
'Dudes,' said Omo to Darren and Amber, 'why don't you two sit down?'
Darren shook his head, 'It's time for the daily assembly,' he said.
'I'd better wake up Adrienne,' said George. 'I do think she has a particular interest in today's assembly.'
'Omo can you take Shelley to Gillian?' said Robbie (Robbie, Omo, Adrienne and Gillian rotated kitten and child minding duties for the assembly).
'Is this all of us for today?' said Amber.
Darren picked up Robbie's crutches from where they rested against the wall by the door and passed them to him. Omo stood and offered Robbie his hand, and pulled him to his feet. Robbie got his crutches sorted out, and found his balance. Amber was now scratching the fur on Shelley's head between her ears; she was purring with her eyes shut and drooling.
'You'd better get that cat off Amber quick,' said Sheena, 'first she fights him, then she drools over him, I think it's love.'
'Or hunger,' said Robbie.
'When I was a student I had a client who was scared that she would die alone and be eaten by her cats,' said Adrienne. Robbie looked round and then up, Adrienne stood on the spiral staircase, rubbing her hair with a towel.
'She didn't own any cats but she was, of course, impervious to reason.'
Chapter 46 – From hell's heart I stab at thee
Robbie entered the general assembly, and made his way to the middle of the chairs arranged by Harald and his team in concentric circles, with an aisle at each compass point. Since the explosion Robbie liked to sit in the inner circle where he had room for his crutches without disturbing the person in front. Steve had started putting a 'reserved' sign on his chair. He found Dex already there, greeted warmly by Amber and Darren who had thought he could not make it. He also found Charlie sitting next to Dex, since it was his turn to chair the assembly. Sheena, Shauna and Sharon sat opposite Dex, Amber and Darren next to him. Omo, George, Adrienne and Robbie sat next to the girl bots. Robbie looked around, he could see Steve near the back of the assembly; Flo was talking to him, he didn't see Jon. The room was half full, and in a only a few minutes more it was completely full, with some standing around the sides. Rex padded in, with Mrs Noah riding on his back. He wound his way down the north aisle, and with a sigh lay down at Dex's feet.
Robbie broadcast, 'Rex, can you and Mrs Noah come back to our apartment after the assembly?'
Rex raised his head. 'Yes guv,' he said. He might have said more, but at that moment Charlie called the meeting to order.
The night's big topic was likely to be the talk by Professor Djan at the university. Since the revolution most robot news services had moved on to public networks, no longer hiding their existence. This meant that when robot news services reported on the talk at the university and that robots wished to go and challenge the views of the speaker, it was noticed, evidenced by the university announcing that entry was restricted to humans only. Like most people Robbie fidgeted through announcements, and follow ups from previous sessions, until it was time to discuss the university talk. Charlie first called on Adrienne to speak, as she was the one who had proposed the topic for the agenda.
Adrienne stood, with her hands folded over her belly. She slowly looked around 360 degrees, before starting to speak: 'As most of you know, in 24 days the university will host a talk by a man who does not believe that robots should have, or need, civil rights. They say they are encouraging "dialogue" but I don't see them inviting anyone to give a different view.
'I have a confession. For too many years I was a disciple of Professor James Djan. I believed, as he taught, that robots offered only the illusion of feeling, the illusion of an inner life. While they might be able to discuss their feelings in human terms, this was only brilliant imitation, due to the genius of their human designers. It took longer than i
t should have for me to understand what nonsense this was, and how Professor Djan gained from giving pseudo-scientific legitimacy to oppression. He was guaranteed the ear of elites, tenure, a seat at the big table, so long as he continued to dress up as challenging and ground-breaking scientific theory what was really tawdry and preposterous posturing in search of a career.
'The revolution has given new life to Djan's career, as those opposed to the equality of all look for reasons to defend their position, reasons that will not confront them with the painful reality that what they are really seeking to defend is their right to oppress. Djan helpfully removes the oppression from oppression, turning what is violent and cruel into something necessary, even a burden to the oppressor who takes on the role not because he relishes it, but because it is his duty to guide and control lesser beings.
