Page 60 - Effable Encounters

Kids’ Krusade for Krissendom

agree, Colonel—but it is my assessment you seek; perhaps someone
in your establishment has had the courage to look outside the
Beltway for alternatives.”
The officer’s face remained intentionally noncommittal. “Go
ahead,” she said. “I’m certain you have the best interests of the
victims at heart.”
“Yes,” replied Dr. Easton. “At least in the short run. A real
Children’s Crusade is possible, indeed likely, today owing to the mass
psychological experiment in altering consciousness being carried out
in the name of technological and economic progress, a new
revolution carried forward by its own dynamic of efficiency, fueled by
neoteny. I refer to electronic media, Colonel: the means by which our
huge population is conditioned from infancy to buy, as it were, both
products and ideas. I call it an experiment because, as is the case of
pollution of the environment by synthetic chemicals, the effects will
be determined empirically; scientists may debate the level of
impending harm, but early effects are already visible and may be
easily extrapolated. One may see the increasingly effective attempt to
abrogate the constitutional separation of church and state as a sign of
the resacralization of daily life. That is combined with the commercial
media’s inherent dynamic driving content down to the lowest
common denominator in a death spiral dovetailing with neoteny. It is
no accident that reactionary fundamentalism has overpowered
progressive rationalism in this country, despite the supposed increase
in access to information afforded by computers and video. The Old
Left is almost gone, and the New Left is on the threshold of
moribundity. Who is going to provide the wake-up call to America as
we go forward? A generation functionally or willfully ignorant of its
origins?”
“Our immediate problem—Rod: how can this be dealt with and
explained to the public?” Sarah was cooling as fast as Rod was
warming to the topic.
“Yes. Sorry.” The doctor’s voice and body language unsuccessfully
emoted regret. “As for explanations, I can add nothing to the
ingenious scenarios your own counter-intelligence experts are
doubtless concocting. I expect the official story will be a terrorist
operation perpetrated by an enemy already set up for just such
occasions. This will have a temporary chilling effect on the gullible

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