With Progress And Social Justice For All

I arrive at LDYLAX airport, or “Laia” as it’s informally nicknamed by the locals, at noon, when none of its happy passengers are using it; the norm is now to fly at night, and it has been ever since the mid-2030s popularization of the nocturnal lifestyle. There are some hundred other people on the flight, and we are all promptly herded off of the plane, just as we were herded onto the plane after our checking interviews. We would all rather be sleeping, as we have at this hour for years. We would all rather be anywhere but where we’re going.

“Literal human trash,” one of our escorts says, sneering, as we are prodded with sticks towards our destination. I’d take the comment for an aberration if I didn’t know better. On the LED screen behind us, our plane is designated as “SCUM”. The escorts’ sticks look something like the ones used to pick up litter, too.

An enormous poster on the interior wall of the airport looks down on us as we march, slowly, sadly, through the airport: “END SLUT-SHAMING! Fuck someone new today!” We would if we could, especially if it would get us out of this. But instead we follow the colorful tape lines on the floor, out of the nearly empty building, into the nation’s capital, Las Demonias Y Las Angelas. There we stand in the sun in a large section of the sidewalk, waiting to be picked up. I try to work my way to the back of the crowd, to be picked up last, but someone grunts at me, and my guilt compels me not to be a coward.

There are a few thousand of us waiting outside; a few hundred were on my plane. We are mostly male, but there are some women among us. More than nineteen in twenty are apparently white, but there are several Asians, and in the distance of the crowd I can spot one black man. The people around him seem intrigued and puzzled, trying to figure out what he did to get himself here. One man tries to sit down, and he is immediately struck and killed by an escort.

I was born at the worst of times. I got to see the tale end of what will likely be called the “Golden Age Of America” by future historians; I got to see enough of it to know that life doesn’t need to be like this. I learned enough history to serve as a warning, but until society came crashing down, I didn’t fully understand those lessons. Nobody did. In my adolescent years, no-one would have believed what was brewing even then. Nobody would have believed this would happen. A bus pulls up, and, as I am towards the front of the crowd, I step aboard when I am commanded to.

“Solidarity Will Set You Free,” the side of the bus says.

My bus starts to move, and soon it is racing through town. The streets are largely unoccupied, as the citizens are sleeping. We are traveling south, towards what used to be San Diego. I can remember when it was San Diego. I visited San Diego when I was a child, and saw the zoo there. I wouldn’t see that zoo again. I wouldn’t see San Diego again. But I would travel to the same land, on this bus.

When did you really know we were fucked? For some people it was when the new constitutional amendments started passing. For most, it was the burning of Disneyland. For me, though, it was a little before that, before things went overtly to shit, because I could recognize the writing on the wall. It really became unmistakable when 4chan lost the “war” (calling it a war seems silly now, with all that’s happened since) and resurfaced with an entirely opposite community. I’d always hated 4chan, (well, /b/, at least) for its openly sociopathic spirit. But it was a constant, which would only hurt unlucky, unwitting individuals, a sort of communal being of limitless power. Nobody could bring down 4chan. Until Tumblr did, and watching it fall was surreal and terrifying.

Of course, one thing led to the other. Youths in Rapunzel masks organized and torched Disneyland. Widespread public denial and disassociation was replaced within days with support and vindication of the perpetrators. As my bus passes through Orange County, I’m sure that some of the nondescript apartments we pass stand where the park formerly stood. I loved that park. All of my best memories were there, long before this came to pass.

The next wave of politicians were nearly all too young to be legally eligible for their positions, but there were too many of them to disqualify; they stood together and wouldn’t allow such a thing. Our government rapidly began to shift and reform. For my entire life I have disliked the direction our government was moving in, but after the general acceptance of the burning of Disneyland everything began to rapidly accelerate. Our nation hardly still qualifies as a republic or a democracy, though “democracy” is now in our name, on the request of the Mexican states when they joined.

A younger man next to me with cracked sunglasses puts his hand in my lap, and I whisper “What are you doing?”

“They treat you better if you’re queer,” he says.

“They have all of our sexualities on file,” I say. “They wouldn’t believe a sudden change now.”

“Well, we’ve got to try,” he says. I put my arm around him, feeling a little less sorry for him than I feel for myself. A few minutes later our bus arrives at the barbed-wire gates of an enormous complex that used to be a city; its initialism SDPC stands above the gate in enormous sans serif letters. Below it, smaller: “San Diego Privilege Con”.

The woman who greets us all deep inside the complex, when we get out of our bus, speaks to us all together with a megaphone; her uniform indicates that she’s a step above the escorts. “I don’t know how you’ve all done it,” she says, “but one way or another you have lost your most basic human right: your right to customized pronouns! You all only have one set of pronouns from here on out, and they are as follows: It! Its! Itself! You will refer to each other as such! Misgendering is a serious offense, but if you all want to knock yourself to the front of the line, then be my guest!” I strain not to roll my eyes. Our priorities seem to be very different.

Any other countries out there, countries that could still be considered first-world, must look down on us for obvious reasons, though I don’t know what such countries might exist, as our internet has been cut off from the rest of the world, so that it may be closely centrally monitored. It is several days with dirty water and no food, living in a space the size of a sleeping bag, before I am finally called individually, by a number burned by laser onto my genitalia. I am marched, with no other prisoners, through an enormous building featuring many classical stone columns, and etched into each of the enormous arches I walk under are the five central phrases of our state:

“CHECK YOUR PRIVILEGE”

“STAND WITH THE DISENFRANCHISED”

“BURN OPPRESSIVE SYSTEMS”

“YOUR IDENTITY IS EVERYTHING”

“KEEP NO ALLIES”

As we exit the entrance of the building and enter the winding hallways, I still see the enormous glorified slogans, but they’re much smaller, on archways the size of normal doors. These are the more specific state phrases, the ones that keep causing trouble whenever an otherwise lockstep official accidentally calls them the lesser phrases and has to be terminated:

“DIE CIS SCUM”

“SMASH THE PATRIARCHY”

“WHITES ARE TERMITES”

“CONSENT IS YOUR QUEEN”

“ONLY CURVES ARE BEAUTIFUL”

“END ABLEISM”

“NO BLURRED LINES BETWEEN RIGHT AND WRONG”

“CULTURES ARE NOT COSTUMES”

“REPRESENT!”

I finally arrive in a small room with a fancy desk. My escorts leave. The lady behind the desk, whose piercings I can’t count, who has a thoroughly Gothic outfit, who has black hair with red highlights, tells me to sit down, and I oblige. I have no choice or words.

“Let’s review your file,” xe says, flipping through a manila folder. “It should be easy. You were designated as male at birth. You chose against all ethics to retain that identity, as a rapist. Your ancestry is predominantly white, and even if it weren’t you are white passing. You have expressed an interest in female-bodied persons. Raised and remained Christian. You really have zero points in your favor. You have all of the privilege. Ooh, this is promising – you were placed on the autism spectrum. Do something autistic for me.” I scream. “Unconvincing and stereotypical,” xe concludes. “Before the abolition of the two-party system you were a supporter of the Repuglican party. You were not a member in any social justice societies as an adolescent, despite your school’s possession of two such organizations, one of which has been accredited since by our government. Multiple women in your area have reported that you made them feel uncomfortable, and frankly, you’re already making me feel uncomfortable as well. My diagnosis: die in a fire.”