Baseline Bob Show Episode 7 Visit to Rehab

Baseline Bob Show Episode 7 Visit to Rehab

By Hannah Dvoryanin

 

He’s suffers from a myriad of overuse and repetitive strain injuries such as carpal tunnel syndrome, shin splints (medial tibial stress syndrome), golfer's elbow (medial epicondylitis), tennis elbow (lateral epicondylitis), Little League elbow, climber's fingers, balanceboard fracture of the base of the fifth metatarsal, comms-thumb, P.A.D.D. finger, mouse arm disease, Rubik's wrist, cuber's thumb, stylus finger, raver's wrist, Emacs pinky, and even trigger finger (stenosing tenosynovitis).

 

He suffers from Non-tendo thumb, Player-station thumb, and gamer's grip, with blistering, paraesthesia and swelling of the thumbs that can lead to stress on tendons, nerves and ligaments in the hands, and further onto lateral epicondylitis, tendinitis, bursitis and chronic carpal tunnel syndrome.

 

He has eye strain related myopia, black rings in the skin under his eyes, muscular stiffness in his neck and shoulders, caused by a tense posture and frequent sleep deprivation.

 

He suffers from lower back pain, neck pain, and other prolonged posture related discomfort.

 

He has eye strain of his cornea, pupil, and from mass viewing sessions of electronic devices.

 

Watching television and video games for too long causes him headaches and dizziness.

 

He does not suffer from Runner’s Nipples or Surfer’s Ear.

 

Who can live with such torturous pain every day?

 

That’s right, Kids….IT’S BASELINE BOB!

 

The Imperium Holo-net’s favourite picaresque morality fable celebrity, BASELINE BOB!

 

<Cue the Baseline Bob Theme Song>

(Kids, it’s mandatory to sing along)

 

It’s Not Your Show,

It’s The Baseline Bob Show,

And Not Your Show,

Which is why it’s called

The Baseline Bob Show,

And NOT called Your Show.

Because It's

….The….

….Baseline….

….Bob….

….Showwwwwww….

 

<Cue pre-recorded studio audience applause with children cheering>

 

BARITONE VOICEOVER MAN: "HEY KIDS! Today Baseline Bob is going to visit Applied Crypto Memetic Enterprises (ACME)."

 

Baseline Bob, quite cross: "Why am I here? I have more important things to do. We live in dark times, deeply ingrained problems, perplexities and dangerous tendencies; exhortations, moral and otherwise, that under the pretext of upholding old truths degrade all truth in meaningless triviality."

 

BARITONE VOICEOVER MAN: "HEY KIDS! Baseline Bob is not feeling quite himself, so we're hoping the nice people at Applied Crypto Memetic Enterprises (ACME) can maybe lend a hand."

 

Baseline Bob looks about, trying to figure out where the voiceover man’s voice is coming from, "We have more important issues than these banal entertainments. The ever-increasing numbers of stateless persons and refugees continues to be an intractable problem. Millions of people experiencing statelessness, we need to show them what it means to lose one’s home, one’s language and one’s occupation. The comity of peoples has gone to pieces because it allowed its weakest member to be excluded and persecuted."

 

BARITONE VOICEOVER MAN: "Don't worry kids, the good people at ACME will fix Baseline Bob us as good as new, then we can all have some pie."

 

Baseline Bob shouts to anyone who might be able to hear, "Almost every significant political event has resulted in the multiplication of new categories of refugees. There are now millions of people in refugee camps with little hope that they will be able to return to their homes or ever find a new one. The calamity of the rightless is not that they are deprived of life, liberty and the pursuit of happiness, or of equality before the law and freedom of opinion, but that they no longer belonged to any community whatsoever. The loss of community has the consequence of expelling a people from humanity itself. Appeals to abstract human rights are meaningless unless there are effective institutions to guarantee those rights. The most fundamental right is the 'right to have rights'."

 

BARITONE VOICEOVER MAN: "Baseline Bob is having a breakdown. Kids, make sure and report your parents if they start talking like this. But don’t worry, the good people at ACME will make them feel better too."

 

Baseline Bob snaps, "Stop that. Systematic institutional lying endangers factual truths. Because factual truths are contingent and consequently might have been otherwise, it is all too easy to destroy factual truth and substitute alternative facts. Freedom of opinion is a farce unless factual information is guaranteed and the facts themselves are not in dispute."

 

BARITONE VOICEOVER MAN: "That’s right Baseline Bob, one of the most successful techniques for blurring the distinction between factual truth and falsehood is to claim that any so-called factual truth is just another opinion. What happened so blatantly in so many totalitarian regimes is being practiced by leading mainstream politicians with great success — creating a fictional world of alternative facts. The result of a consistent and total substitution of lies for factual truth is not that the lies will now be accepted as truth, and the truth defamed as lies, but that the sense by which we take our bearings in the real world — and the category of truth vs. falsehood is among the mental means to this end — is being destroyed.

 

Baseline Bob stops, and looks confused, "You sound like you’re agreeing with me."

 

BARITONE VOICEOVER MAN: "That’s right Baseline Bob, because you’re absolutely right. The possibilities for lying is boundless and all too often met with little or no resistance. When fact-checking clearly and definitively shows that a lie is a lie, people seem unconcerned and indifferent. What convinces masses are not facts, not even invented facts, but only the consistency of the system of which they are presumably a part. It doesn’t matter whether you’re right or not, Baseline Bob."

 

Baseline Bob sits down and asks meekly, "It doesn’t?"

 

BARITONE VOICEOVER MAN: "Not at all. People who feel neglected and forgotten yearn for a narrative — even an invented fictional one — that will make sense of the anxiety they are experiencing, and promises some sort of redemption. Authoritarian leaders exploit these anxieties and create fictions that people want to believe to suit their own ends. A fictional story that promises to solve one’s problems is much more appealing than facts and “reasonable” arguments."

 

Baseline Bob looks up, almost plaintively, "But we could restore the personal dignity of politics, our personal agency and capacity to act, we can always begin something new. There is a vital need to take responsibility for our political lives."

 

BARITONE VOICEOVER MAN: "It's way too late for that, Baseline Bob. Too many people are already seduced by nihilism, cynicism, and indifference. The lying, deception, self-deception, image-making and those in power destroyed the very distinction between truth and falsehood.

 

Baseline Bob sounding more confident, "The defense of the dignity of politics is necessary to protect the opportunity to participate, to act in concert and to engage in genuine debate with our peers has been too diminished. We must resist the temptation to opt out of politics and to assume that nothing can be done in face of all the current ugliness, deception and corruption. We must all accept responsibility for our political lives and honestly confront and comprehend the darkness of our times, without losing sight of the possibility of transcendence, and illumination."

 

BARITONE VOICEOVER MAN: "That’s right Baseline Bob, that’s why you’re visiting Applied Crypto Memetic Enterprises (ACME). They will cure you of those pesky notions, and then we can all get back to our regular production schedule, and we have some nice pie. Hey Baseline Bob, have you noticed the door locks from the outside?"

 

Baseline Bob surprised, "Eh, wha?" pulls on the door vigorously, somehow disbelieving it’s locked.

 

ACME Sociomemetic Tech-23 opens the door and Baseline Bob rushes thru it, "Welcome to Applied Crypto Memetic Enterprises, Baseline Bob, we are all fans of your show here."

 

Baseline Bob looking quite frantic trying to find another exit door or a window, or secret panel, "Let me out of here."

 

ACME Sociomemetic Tech-23 nods sympathetically, "Soon enough, soon enough. First, I have to go thru my contractually obligated exposition."

 

Baseline Bob sighs, resigned to the inevitable weekly contractually obligated exposition. Covers his eyes wearily and waves the tech to continue.

 

ACME Sociomemetic Tech-23 smiles for the camera: "Theoretical Sociomemetics studies influence of memes upon individuals within a group context, including studying the way in which cultural ideas, symbols, conditioning, prejudices, cultural beliefs, social conditioning, roles and responsibilities, are determined and perpetuated by society, peer groups, and social organisations. Practical Sociomemetics deals with use of subliminals, persuasion, propaganda, disinformation, psychological warfare, psychomanipulation, word framing, advertising, madverts and peer pressure to create a desired mindset."

 

ACME Sociomemetic Tech-23 continues: "Memetics is an accepted part of everyday life. People in the colonies live out their blissful lives contentedly knowing that most of their decisions, actions and thoughts will be influenced in some way by artificially induced means. Memegeneers, while commonly a source of suspicion and sometimes even fear, hold a huge amount of power over those within their influence."

 

Baseline Bob looks up, "Wait a second, that is about societal programming at large, that has nothing to do with me personally."

 

ACME Sociomemetic Tech-23 looks quite sober and serious, "OH, but it does, Baseline Bob, it does very much indeed. The extent of certain kinds of memetic propagation, the effectiveness of protections against cryptomemetics and the actual amount of influence the memegeneering programs have on an individual basis are subjects that are of huge interest and importance, but are generally little understood. As well as these macro-subjects, there is constant movement and mutation within the memetic environment. Counter Cryptomemeticists are dedicated to identifying and investigating any new and potentially harmful memes that emerge from this maelstrom. The Brain Eating Witch Meme for instance."

 

Baseline Bob, "Wait, no. I never talked to her."

 

ACME Sociomemetic Tech-23: "Most of us here were all happy enough to be serving the World State on our little Social Preserves. Social Preserves are carefully frozen at a particular stage of development, and where those who are most comfortable with that society and who do not wish to change go and live while the rest of society moves on around them. The Social Preserves inhabitants live mostly normally, but certainly contentedly, with their society memetically controlled to deliberately avoid change. To those from outside this might seem to be a horribly manipulative over-controlled autocracy, but to those inside, it is the most comfortable environment for them. In some cases we freeze the society of the inhabitants at the point of what they consider it to be its greatest achievement. The Brain Eating Witch changed all that. We are beset by free thinkers, we have not enough Freethinker exile islands to house them all."

 

Baseline Bob, "I know nothing about her."

 

ACME Sociomemetic Tech-23: "Oh, but you do, directly or indirectly, that is how meme’s work. There are countless expressions everyone uses but have no actual reference to give them meaning. No one sells hotcakes, but we all seem to know what 'selling like hotcakes’ mean. You have been infected by the Brain Eating Witch Meme."

 

ACME Sociomemetic Tech-23 continued: "Our best VR Reality Show Stars are Social Criminals. Drop-outs, deviants, dissidents, from every clade and race and sector of society. Usually we keep them on freethinker exile islands and some primitive preserves. They rebel from principle, pathology, memetic conditioning, psychotropic nanodevices, or any other number of reasons. Their rebellion is allowed, even encouraged, as long as it doesn't get out of hand. These social criminals, recalcitrants, and unassimilables, create fodder for tabloid-type Reality VR-tainment for the nearbaseline and baseline masses. The idea is not to get the criminals we deserve, but to get the criminals we want. He was our best source of promoting societal promoting memes and she turned him into an actual criminal. Also, a fantastic dancer. And now you. Look at you, you've evolved a social conscience, a free thinker. We can’t have you exposed to children that way."

 

Baseline Bob was both curious and scared, "What is to become of me?"

 

ACME Sociomemetic Tech-23 smiled, "Don’t worry, Baseline Bob. Modern Rehabilitation is quite benign. The rehabilitation approach to criminal management assumes that a tendency to criminality in a particular person can in fact be changed."

 

Baseline Bob looks confused, "Criminal Management? I haven’t committed any crime."

 

ACME Sociomemetic Tech-23 gave Baseline Bob a patronizing smile, "Oh, Baseline Bob, not now, but soon. It's a good thing we caught you did, else the Retribution Justice Lobbies and other Crime Absolutists start getting all upset about how we’d not be punishing you enough or that rehabilitating you weakens the justice system. By rehabilitating you before you commit crimes, there is no justice to weaken."

 

Baseline Bob looks confused, "But you're going to punish me, even though I have not committed a crime."

 

ACME Sociomemetic Tech-23 continues his patronizing smile, "YET! You have not committed a crime, yet. And we’re not punishing you, we’re rehabilitating you."

 

Baseline Bob, "But,…"

 

ACME Sociomemetic Tech-23 cuts off Baseline Bob’s sentence, sure that it was meaningless blathering, "People become criminals because of influences from their environmental, especially memetic influences that are deleterious to society at large. Criminals can be thought of in the same way as a person afflicted by a memetic pathologies, in need of treatment. Suitable methods of rehabilitation were hampered by a lack of understanding of psychology, cognitive neuroscience, sociology and memetics, and a variety of different approaches for different types of crime and criminal including mandatory work for the community, targeted education, simulated social environments, personal therapy, psycho-neural reprogramming, and variable sentences wherein inmates could not leave even after their temporal sentence was carried out until they were approved as rehabilitated."

 

ACME Sociomemetic Tech-22 steps in and interrupts, "Experimental programs often showed success in lowering recidivist rates for petty crime compared to the mass jails which most often acted as breeding grounds for further criminality instead of deterrents. Exceptions from this process include crimes caused by pathologies such as sociopathy, psychopathy, psychosis etc as the rehabilitation process could only help those who were willing to learn rather than those who acted due to a pathologically induced imperative. Hey 32, VR-Suite 5C is ready when you are."

 

ACME Sociomemetic Tech-23 nods and waves off T-22 and continues for the camera, "Greatest strides in rehabilitation came when advances in neuropsychology and direct brain interfacing gave rise to psychoware technology. By mapping the psychome of an individual, it became possible to effectively measure their moral values and behavioural tendencies. Simplistic uses of this technology create a strong association between a specific criminal activity (e.g. violence) and feelings of revulsion, fear and disgust. Correspondingly desirable behaviors (e.g. cooperation) can be wired to pleasural stimuli. Beyond these basic applications, more fundamental value associations can be altered in an individual causing a cascade of changes in their psychology that results in a subconscious belief in doing the right thing, as defined by the treatment."

 

Baseline Bob looking horrified, "That sounds like brainwashing."

 

ACME Sociomemetic Tech-23 in a correcting tone, "Rehabilitation. Re-ha-bil-i-ta-tion. Rehabilitation. Commonly tachydidactic courses are given alongside rehabilitative treatments in order to grant facilitative skills such as effective language faculties for better self-expression. But in your case, we are going straight to rehabilitative psychoware."

 

ACME Legal Suit-55 steps in, holding a clipboard, "Commonly rehabilitative psychoware are drawn out over time rather than performed as a single procedure as many societies view radical breaks in psychological continuity as a form of identity death. But legal just reviewed your contract with the network, Baseline Bob, turns out you signed that away when you became part of the Baseline Bob Show as conditions of your parole."

 

BARITONE VOICEOVER MAN: "Hey, Suit, read the contract. o-Day ot-nay ention-may e-thay arole-pay."

 

ACME Legal Suit-55, looks thru the 3 binder set of Baseline Bob’s contract, "Oh really? Sorry. Can we remove that?"

 

ACME Sociomemetic Tech-23 gives the thumbs up.

 

Baseline Bob, "What? arole-Pay! Identity Death?! Contract."

 

ACME Legal Suit-55 waves Baseline Bob Network Contract Binder Number Three at Baseline Bob, "Don’t worry about it, Baseline Bob, says here you’re going to be okay. And pie."

 

ACME Sociomemetic Tech-23, "We’re going to hook you up in the virtual rehabilitation methods we pioneered, include psychomodding, tachydidaxy, empath augmentation, Aesopica Fantastica lessons (virtual stories to teach morals) and probation programs. Probation programs operate by installation into the criminal's exoself and act as personal guardnets; directly interfering with motor functions if the probate attempts a crime. In certain snowflake zones, crime is virtually impossible due to physical and social constraints. Preemptive memetic engineering ensures that you won’t resort to crime or adopt criminal mindsets."

 

ACME Legal Suit-55, "Critics argue that tachydidaxy, empathy therapy, and other rehabilitation methods work by educating the criminal to the point where they can choose to become a better person whereas neural reprogramming takes any freedom of choice from the process. If they don't change, it is because they fundamentally disagree with the moral code of society and they shouldn't be forced otherwise, though should still be punished for their crime."

 

Baseline Bob, "But I didn’t commit any crime."

 

ACME Legal Suit-55, "Not yet. Please pay attention."

 

ACME Legal Suit-55 rolls his eyes and speaks sarcastically, "Simply reprogramming someone to act differently does not equip them with the necessary faculties to judge other situations and that a secondary effect of neural reprogramming to suppress the development of law by brainwashing all those who disagree into conformity. Liberals and their 'ideas', pff. We have ideas too you know. We have presented before parliament and countless courts of law our total success rates and reject the argument regarding authoritarian government by pointing out that law can change through democratic process without the need for people to break it. The system works. Progress is lovely."

 

ACME Sociomemetic Tech-23, "Progress is lovely."

 

ACME Sociomemetic Tech-22 from the other room calls out, "Progress is lovely."

 

BARITONE VOICEOVER MAN: "Progress IS lovely. HEY KIDS! Say it at home. Progress is lovely. Good job. Remember, the World State loves you. We now return you to the Aesopica Fantastica Virtual Reality Suite, where Baseline Bob is already wired up."

 

ACME Sociomemetic Tech-22 pats the drooling Baseline Bob on the head, "Baseline Bob’s all wired up. We not control all of his sensory inputs, and even his bodily functions. We had a little bit of trouble with the breathing tube and the catheters, but that will heal up eventually."

 

ACME Sociomemetic Tech-23, "We’re going to start Baseline Bob slow, with the Aesopica Fantastica, Xin Daodejing, and VRs of Virtue series of virtual reality didactic tool for the express purpose of teaching and reinforcing morals. Numerous source materials have been used as inspiration for the VR series: Tao Te Ching, Sun Tzu's The Art of War, Aesop's Fables, Plutarch's Lives, , Grimm's Fairy Tales, The Way to Wealth, The Book of Virtues, The Tao of Programming. These materials are updated and expanded to better fit the media VR format, modifying the setting and plot for the benefit of the audience. Often well known characters that appear in local folklore will be incorporated. This tradition can be seen in the continuing popularity of VRs including Anansi the Spider, Br'er Rabbit, and Daffy the Trickster Duck."

 

BARITONE VOICEOVER MAN: "And of course, the 2500 volume set of the Baseline Bob Show."

 

ACME Sociomemetic Tech-23 chuckles, "Of course. But we are going to have to wait until the rewrite phase for that."

 

ACME Sociomemetic Tech-22, "The VR contained in a given Aesopica Fantastica is constructed as an open world for instructing, informing or improving participants. Often an individual VR scenario will be focused on a single maxim or koan. These VRs allow the exploration of important life lessons in a controlled environment with minimal risk involved. Difficulty and conformity to reality change according to expectations of the target audience and can vary from painstakingly realistic to whimsical surrealist simulations. A VR concludes once the moral of the story is learned or reinforced.

 

BARITONE VOICEOVER MAN: "What happens if they never learn the lesson?"

 

ACME Legal Suit-55 looks up from reading the Contracts Binder, "Then, they continue following the same Virtual Reality Program until they die of natural causes."

 

ACME Sociomemetic Tech-22, "Which can be a long time because of how well we control their bodily functions. We have people in these tanks for 50 or 60 years."

 

ACME Sociomemetic Tech-23 snickers, "We have that one poacher guy on the Wile-E-Coyote VR for nearly 70 years now. You would think he would learn, at least once."

 

ACME Legal Suit-55, "The defacto imprisonment satisfies the always angry Retribution Justice Lobbies and Crime Absolutists Lobbies, who insist that criminals be punished."

 

BARITONE VOICEOVER MAN: "But Baseline Bob hasn’t committed any crime."

 

ACME Sociomemetic Tech-22, ACME Sociomemetic Tech-23 and ACME Legal Suit-55, almost in unison, “YET!!"

 

ACME Legal Suit-55, "It’s not our fault if he doesn’t want to learn a moral lesson, it’s his. We can’t be held accountable for his refusal to learn the moral lessons decreed by law. Subversive opinions view the technique as institutional brainwashing and indoctrination. Time and again these dissidents point out the technology is ripe for abuse. You’re not one of those, are you Voiceover Man."

 

BARITONE VOICEOVER MAN: "Oh no. Progress is lovely."

 

ACME Sociomemetic Tech-23, "Progress is lovely."

 

ACME Sociomemetic Tech-22, "Progress is lovely."

 

ACME Legal Suit-55, "The system works. Progress is lovely. Can we get on with this now?"

 

BARITONE VOICEOVER MAN: "Please do. We all want our Baseline Bob back, don’t we, kids?"

 

ACME Sociomemetic Tech-23, "This VR series allows participants the opportunity to see the consequences of their actions and how these actions affect their surroundings. By using VR technology, Aesopica Fantastica can adjust the subjective viewpoint of participants to see consequences that wouldn't normally be immediately apparent to a participant in real life. Usually these manipulations include the ability to view actions from the perspective of other individuals in the VR, slowing down time to pick up on subtle details, fast forwarding to a distant time point, and allow for repeating a scenario to see how variations in behavior affect the outcome."

 

ACME Sociomemetic Tech-22, "This manipulation of perception, a trait shared with other series, has been occasionally reported to trigger a momentary sense of disorientation, colloquially called VR vertigo."

 

ACME Legal Suit-55 nodding insistently, "But that’s uncommon, right?!" nodding very insistently.

 

ACME Sociomemetic Tech-22, slightly flustered, "Yes, right, uncommon."

 

ACME Sociomemetic Tech-22, "Besides the concerns of VR vertigo, extra care must be taken with design and maintenance of Aesopica Fantastica compared with other VRs. By the very didactic nature of the experience participants are highly susceptible to suggestions and stimuli while inside. If fidelity is not maintained, errors may accumulate in the didactic structure of the VR. These errors can manifest in many forms from undetectable to exo-toxic memes."

 

ACME Legal Suit-55 holding his hand up, "Hold on there. That was once. A shoddily created Jack and the Beanstalk operated in some remote colonies. Design flaws caused an increase in violent crimes against Goliaths and culminated in a terrorist plot to cut down a functioning space elevator. The occasional baffling system-wide fads of glass slippers and red riding hoods was never proven related to the VRs. The need for careful design usually necessitates Aesopica Fantastica be created and modified only by certified guilds and unions of VR builders or other reputable sources. Reputable sources like Applied Crypto Memetic Enterprises (ACME). Another method to ensure quality is that a participant can only enter an operating VR with active supervision."

 

ACME Sociomemetic Tech-23 gives the two thumbs up, "That’s where we come in."

 

ACME Legal Suit-55, "There are other adaptations such as the core VRs in the Virtual Interaction Assessment & Analysis Assay (VI-3A), employed as a psychological diagnostic test for early detection of aberrant and asocial behaviors. The VR series has also found use in introducing newcomers of all ages to the ideology of the colony, as in the integration of immigrants and refugees into society. A few colonies go further and require all inbound travelers to a system undergo a preliminary course of the local Aesopica Fantastica. It is having a little trouble passing thru parliament, but I am sure it will pass eventually. Progress is lovely."

 

ACME Sociomemetic Tech-23, "Progress is lovely."

 

ACME Sociomemetic Tech-22, "Progress is lovely."

 

BARITONE VOICEOVER MAN: "Progress is lovely."

 

ACME Legal Suit-55, "The system works."

 

BARITONE VOICEOVER MAN: "See that, Kids? Baseline Bob is going to be okay, or die trying. Tune in next week, and we can all enjoy watching the Baseline Bob we all know and love eat pie."

 

A special thank you to Hannah Arendt’s collection of essays, “Men in Dark Times,” who was the inspiration for Baseline Bob’s rants which ended him up in rehabilitation. It was an autoplay rogue Freethinker Dissident Intellectual Tachydidactic Program accidentally switched out for his porn fix that got Baseline Bob into this mess to begin with. Damn you, Brain Eating Witch! Attacking our beloved icons. YOU WILL PAY DEARLY!

 

Special shout-out to Mark Ryherd of the Orion’s Arm Project for providing much guidance about the VR and Ryan B for his thoughts on rehabilitation. I know this is totally not how they envisioned their ideas, but they are writer resources. You can’t control art, well, at least not yet.