An actual monitor. Not even embedded. Fixed to the wall like some antique on display in a museum. Which in a way it is. Minuscule, too. Two square meters, at best.

How is anyone supposed to learn anything, with obsolete equipment?

This is such a farce.

Garnalag is pissed off. They forced her to attend.

Didn’t accept her perfectly legit ReaFo. It was her third Reason For Absence in a row. This kind of series never looks good. But Lafu Xia Ten got away with four consecutives. Discrimination at work. If she was called Lafu Xia, she would have gotten away. But she’s a Garnalag…

First they don’t accept her ReaFo. Next they assign her a location at the other end of the city.

Getting here took her a full forty five minutes. With a state of the art e-skel set to max. And at the end of this marathon sprint, what does she find? A decrepit building. Obsolete technology.

Brooding never got anyone anywhere. Time to cheer up. The young man on the seat to her left looks like companionship in adversity.

Garnalag opts for a conventional starter:

“Makes you wonder where they put all our taxes, doesn’t it? This must be the most antiquated information device still in use on the planet. Just being confronted with this should count as the history lesson. I mean, I don’t expect a 3D-Chamber. But a virtual immersion wall, that should be feasible, shouldn’t it?”

The frown on the young man’s forehead signals irritation. Perhaps even displeasure.

Garnlag stops short. Harder and harder to engage, young people. As if they were inhabiting some slightly detached parallel universe. Easy to see, hard to reach.

“Well said. First they rob us of our nation, then they rob us of the fruits of our labor, and what for? To treat us like simpletons. Civilup or down my ass. There’s perfectly no point, to this whole exercise. ‘Thanks for your attendance, and for no longer starting wars’. Hand back our guns, I say, just hand back our guns, and then let’s give you some proper ‘thanks’…”

A flag-kisser. The fully blown dinosaur warrior version. What wrong has Garnalag done, to be seated next to one of those? He quotes the ritual closing words of Civilup gatherings in an effeminate voice. To highlight whom he considers responsible for his plight.

Garnalag is no fan of the mandatory Civilization Upkeep.

No one is. You don’t like to attend high rise safety drills, driver license confirmation courses or carer supervision. Same for Civilup. Nearly as bad as taxes. Or pedlane speed limits.

You moan, you groan, you’d love to be elsewhere.

But that doesn’t turn you into a bloody flag-kisser. They are… Big ‘Yuck’ factor.

Thinking about flag-kissers is like focusing on the content of a toilet. Before the flushing. You don’t want your eyes wandering that way. Nor your nose. Never mind your soul.

A whole planet of 1.5 billion adults has to attend at least one Civilup module per quarter. A full three mandatory hours of wasted time. Plus the trip. A full four times a year.

A galactic amount of resources is spent on staff, venues and training materials. Sports events are missed and shopping trips rescheduled. Lawns remain unmown and dishes uncooked. More people die in pedlane collisions on their way to Civilup than from heat strokes.

A whole panoply of human miseries, and why? Because a couple of bloody machos use their right to free speech to keep some bad old flames alive.

Garnalag notices how closely the young man to her left watches her reaction to the rant on her right. She stares back, not hiding her turn to be irritated.

Daring insinuate she might sympathize with a flag-kisser is an insult. Why not call her a gerontophile, while he’s at it? Males, forever the clumsy brutes.

Garnlag is well aware the nuisances are not at fault. Not really, personally.

Nurture by erroneous parentals transforms innocent boys into aggressive adult males. Bad upbringing, on top of an unfortunate natural proclivity for high testosterone levels, turns good seeds into weeds. Males are perfectly capable of restraint. Empathy, even. Given the chance, they will improve. In the due course of time. Can’t be relegated to second class citizen status forever.

Garnalag endorses the progressive approach. It’s the right thing to do. Otherwise, you’ll have to watch your back forever. Perfectly fine rationale. Especially when considered from a boardroom perspective, with a maximum one diversity male around. But…

Garnalag is no sexist. She’d never threaten to alert an Enforcebot without a serious reason. Despises colleagues who harass males for fun. She’s definitely no sexist.

Even got close to intervening in favor of a harrassed male, once.

It all happened in Clafang Ran Tlo’s office. Garnalag had joined her for a teleconference. The window cleaner was busy next to them. The clumsy brute splattered some water right onto the desk. Some drops even hit the screen. And Clafang Ran Tlo to lose her countenance. Performed the scissors gesture. Very unambiguously. Twice.

Garnalag got within an inch of intervening. Their remote interlocutor got in first and resolved the situation. With a joke about how one needs to be careful how one snips one’s fingers, in the era of facility staff empowerment. Zero sexism. Very professional.

Wit is so elusive. Garnalag will come up with a perfect retort. Tonight. Over dinner. Or at bedtime.

Now she’s lost for words. Reduced to stare ahead, without any hint of a smile.

Luckily, something’s finally happening in her line of sight. The screen lights up. The familiar voice of the tutoress purrs: “Welcome to Civilization Upkeep Module 2. Dear citizens, thank you for taking the time to contemplate once again…”

This equipment insults the senses. Zero immersive experience.

Civilup II is about malnutrition and lack of access to healthcare. How these blights used to affect some seventy percents of the global population. Before taking into consideration the mental stresses associated with a precarious life.

Fifty years ago, a shocking amount of suffering was considered acceptable. The sights and sounds of so much despair should be heartbreaking.

Not with this equipment. Doesn’t feel real enough.

Takes Garnalag less than half an hour to make up her mind. She will contact Civilup central. An upgrade of the program is required. Urgently. Just the basic basics should do. Virtual immersion walls. And the corresponding reprocessing of the material. You need the victims to speak to the audience in current lingo, if you’re aiming for identification.

This won’t cost a fortune. Sure to work wonders, on the customers.

Amazing, the level of luxury some ancients achieved. The food now on display on the screen looks alluring. Reminds Garnalag she had to skip breakfast to arrive on time.

Not that she would have had ham or cheese.

Garnalag does make a packet, in advertising, but that kind of delicacy is beyond her means.

Bloody animal welfare fanatics. Nowadays, cow milk has to be fairly shared between calf and client, driving dairy product prices sky high. And no pig can be slaughtered before having frolicked around the farm for a happy six years of joyful mating.

This is disgusting. Just when Garnalag is seriously getting into a foodie mood, the course switches back to health issues. Cholera and plague.

Interesting to hear that these medieval curses were still around at the beginning of the century, though. Who’d have thought?

Tananarive really has come a long way. Hard to believe today’s spa destination used to feature slums. This fast motion rush through the evolution of the cityscape leaves you breathless.

“And they lived happily ever after. Sex no-no, drugs no-no, and don’t you even start dreamin of rock’n roll. But they lived happily ever after. Who the fuck do you think you’re kiddin?”

The falsetto voice. That did it. Having spent the rest of the session to figure out what happened, Garnalag reaches the conclusion the voice must have been the trigger.

She doesn’t even know if it was her own discreet alert that summoned the Enforcebot.

They all heard the flag kisser. In her row, up front and behind. At least a dozen people were inconvenienced by his remarks. Some of them will have joined her in doing the needful.

It’s never pretty, to watch a man raise his arms in anxious capitulation. Looks so meek. The images always go viral. Big boy afraid of small toy. Better than LOL rats.

An Enforcebot is anything but a child’s game. A five pound metallic spider, equipped with a domineering temper, sharp claws and a taser designed to bring down a bull, is not to be messed with. Everybody has seen enough footage to know what not to do.

Today’s nuisance was no exception. On hearing the telltale clatter approach, the flag kisser went quiet. Was already in process of standing up when the Enforcebot reached his seat and went: “Sir, would you kindly proceed to the exit, please? For a little civility feedback, please?”

Garnalag held her breath. Would their flag kisser aspire to martyr status?

Sometimes, the wilder kind of mad men pretend compliance, only to kick at their captor once it comes into range. A very, very bad idea. Retribution follows, fast and hard.

Garnalag braced herself for the worst. She shifted her weight as far to the left as possible, ready to dive out of the combat zone if necessary.

Luckily, her nemesis followed his orders without a comment or hint of resistance.

As usual on such occasions, the whole audience focused on the lesson still unfolding on the screen and through the loud speakers. You don’t know if and how an Enforcebot will react, in case it noticed a lack of diligence. Better safe than sorry.

Garnalag listened to the pair of them exiting through the back door. Next, she spent the rest of the lesson arguing with herself.

You can’t let this kind of guy get away with aggression. There’s tons of science to prove, beyond reasonable doubt, that antisocial behavior gets worse if left unchallenged.

It’s also true he stayed verbal.

And there are reports, unconfirmed reports, of Enforcebots using violence, unprovoked and unnecessary violence, in the course of civility feedback. Some hotheads even talk of torture.

But men, especially large ones, are a walking threat. To women. And civilization.

On balance, you need to act. Garnalag was right to press that button.

“Thanks for your attendance, and for no longer starting wars.” The tutoress is done. To the sound of the hymn for the three Ps, the references list unfolds on the screen.

Garnalag likes the melody. It’s a fast paced blend of Malagasy, Tamil and Celtic traditions. She doesn’t care much about the lyrics. No issue with Pragmatism, Polyethics and Peace as such. Of course not. But as a marketing professional, she can’t help identify waffle when it hits her.

Tradition demands to stay seated until the screen reverts to dark. Small talk over the credits, fine. But you don’t rush out. This is about civilized behavior. And important. You display respect.

Witnessing an Enforcebot intervention has a chilling effect on any congregation. Reminds you of the price to pay for a less violent society. Raises doubts and questions better left unsaid.

Today’s crowd is no exception. No small talk. Most people remain unusually still and quiet.

“Apologies, for my dad making a mess. He doesn’t mean bad. Would never actually harm no lady. Mom kicked him out a couple of years ago. Because of his big mouth, especially under the influence. This sent him crossfading worse, which got him sacked. And now… He’s not well, and tends to end up in trouble. Apologies…”

Garnalag is lost for comments. But at least the session is now closed. Time to hurry back to her life. Bloody lessons. She’ll have to think of a good ReaFo.