Page 151 - SurprisingTruthFinal

Nicholas Boothman
the Omission Buffer, they were legally allowed to use
polite omissions. They didn't have to tell each other the
statistical truth about divorce rates (a crushing 78%) or
all their petty complaints. They were allowed the
necessary, beautiful deception of simply existing
happily together.
The Big Secrets (Governance Fiction): The really
critical, global truths, like the true state of the economy
or essential defense plans, were locked away in The
Black Box. This prevented the paralysis of absolute
truth. Henry was the sole key holder, overseeing
auditors. The system wasn't totally secret; its honesty
was maintained by the perpetual threat that the public
could demand an audit if leaders got too arrogant.
Henry had not seen Lina or Vincent in twenty years.
Lina, the hacktivist, had disappeared entirely. Her
final act was to code the ultimate, incorruptible lie. Her
technical purity was now the very essence of the Filter
Protocol. She was the ghost in the machine, ensuring
the TTS remained fixed and immutable. Henry knew
that if he ever tried to modify the TTS for his own
comfort or power, Lina’s coded failsafe, the final echo
of The Truth Collective, would activate, handing total
control back to The Regulator.
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