A Dismal Future

This isn't about my finals, but about a dream I had last night.

Last night, I dreampt I was unceremoniously brought into the far future by accident. Some scientist was experimenting with someone and was as shocked as I was to find me in the future. He was so shocked he didn't do a thing when I walked right out of his lab onto the streets.

Now, this future I was in wasn't the gritty, black techno utilitarian utopia that we see in movies like the matrix, but was more like the white, glistening future the 50s and 60s suggested, with a little more sense of reality.

The city I was in would have been beautiful, were it not for the blistering number of advertisements invading the personal space of my mind. Apparently advertisers figured out how to project their crap directly into the sensory centers of the brain. The upshot of this is that the city was so completely and utterly full of advertisement you couldn't even close your eyes and plug your ears and be free from it. How on earth the people of the world dealt with bikini babes enticing you to buy something no matter where you looked I have no idea. All I know was that it was something akin to watching fifty channels of the most obnxious commercials imaginable simultaneously.

After some time, I learned that by focusing somewhat the commercials could be blocked and I could actually think again. Then I was able to actually notice much of the city around me.

People were pretty oblivious of everything, thanks to the commercials. Anything that wasn't necessarily important had been plastered with the advertisements, leaving only things you were about to collide with to actually be seen. Somehow people managed to navigate through this sea of stupidity daily without thought. Maybe the "without thought" part is how it worked.

Cleared of the insurgent attack on my psyche, I almost freaked out when I noticed an advertising poster on a wall somewhere. My immediate reaction was to concentrate very hard to make it go away, until I realised this was a physical reality. Some company involved in reclaimation of inheritances and whatnot was down on its luck enough and near enough to bankruptcy that it actually had unearthed the now ancient and unused method of using posters. This was completely unnoticable to anyone who was being assaulted by the advertisements.

After all the ages that passed, my one government bond I received for some outstanding newspaper delivery had gone beyond maturity. I was pretty filthy rich. In fact, so much so that the cut the company got was so large it not only pushed them back into the market, but they made the greatest quarterly gain in history and were #1 for their profession.

With some of this money, because noone could possibly spend the money I had in twelve lifetimes, I bought a cafe. One of those elitist places that you climb down a narrow set of stairs from the sidewalk on a semi-used city street to get to. It was run down, but I fixed it up.

For advertising, I put posters everywhere. That meant that only people with the capacity for thought could possibly discover my cafe. Elitist cafe indeed.

Sure enough, there were at least a few people in the city who could think. Thusly, my cafe was dubbed "the Underground". This was probably both because you had to descend into the place, and because it sounded elite.

Eventually, the government got wind of something going on. Apparently there were rumors of an underground resistance movement going by the name underground. It was probably started by unthinking people hearing about my cafe from thinking people. In any case, a private investigator was hired to find us and discover our plans.

It took him a long time, the poor guy couldn't find any clues because of all the advertisement. Apparently sleuthing is far easier in the future because people are all stupid and unoriginal. Dealing with someone who actually thought was tougher than normal.

Eventually, this guy focused so hard on finding where my group was "hiding out" he blocked out the advertisements by accident. Since I had posters all over the place, it didn't take him long to see one and check it out.

He found me and my clintelle enjoying ourselves in our ability to think and discussing various things. I was still dressed in my typical manner, though not the same exact set of clothes I'd come to the future with. It was probably all custom made.

Anyway, it was obvious from the outset that this cafe was in no way a resistance movement. Nevertheless, he still began to ask me about it, thinking I was just a minion or something. When he found out I was in charge, he was befuddled. It seemed really silly that the all powerful government couldn't find a place that wasn't intentionally hidden to begin with. The glowing neon sign probably could have clued them in.

In any case, I explained to him who we were, and how we were most definately not a resistance movement. What confounded him was my continual references to "my time". I had forgotten that I hadn't explained to him that I was from the past. The clientelle had long accepted this, as apparent from my strange ideas and mannerisms. It took some time to convince the investigator.

Apparently I'd also come in contact with a historian particularly interested in my time period. He'd drilled me with all sorts of questions, which I answered as I could. Thankfully, I can assure you all that Britney Spears does eventually die and stop singing, and her music is forgotten. Anyway, I didn't learn much history from the historian, but some necessary cultural aid.

What I didn't learn from the historian, and what I learned from the private investigator, was why the historian had pestered me almost entirely about Darwin and Creationists. I wasn't too happy with what I learned.

I confused the investigator specifically with a reference to World War II. Apparently by this point so many had happened they ceased numbering them and named them. He began to rattle off a list of them, the Great War, the Nazi War, the Darwin War...

I cut him off there and asked about the Darwin War. Somewhere deep inside I knew exactly what must have happened, but the 99% of me that believed in hope for humanity refused to listen.

War really went downhill, fast. The Darwin War (World War III) was basically caused because the whole Evolution vs Creationism debate got out of hand. They literally started a war over it. The end result was the status quo that was now in place currently, wherein the american continents were rich, affluent and secular, while everywhere else was quite poor, and largely Christian. Livable, and maybe not as bad as third world countries today, but definately a few millenia behind.

I was about ready to explode at that point. For anyone who knows me, the whole debate is utterly ludicrous in my mind. The continual claims from both sides they've proved the other side wrong, the arguments disguised as "level-headed" debates, the bias, it all drives me nuts when I don't see there being a problem between science and religion in the first place.

It got worse.

It really, really went downhill after that. While no wars after that point really changed much of importance in the end, there were vast conflicts over incredibly stupid things.

There was a war over which of two fashion magnates was hipper, there was one over the length of pants, and there was one over an ill timed sneeze during a governmental meeting. As the list of wars went on, I became more and more livid at the utter and complete stupidity of mankind.

This scared the investigator significantly.

Another apparent difference between now and then is that then, violence was pretty fully controlled. Between not thinking, and the constant advertisements, and probably some minor mind control, violence was extremely uncommon. Only people who could think could express it, and people in this world still weren't apt to. At least this was true in richville.

That probably explains why the investigator backed away slowly as I turned red and began to beat my fist against a wall. I eventually started ranting about the stupidity of mankind. I don't know how long I went on about it, but eventually I resolved to start a revolution that would get everyone thinking. I also convinced the investigator that religion and science were not mutually exclusive.

Anyway, he gave a report to the government, not explaining how he found us, but telling them we didn't intend on overthrowing anyone.

It was true!

Anyway, I woke up right then, before I laid any plans. Weird dream eh?

Should probably write a book on it.