We should have looked at ourselves - simply taken a step back, breathed, and looked at ourselves with a clear mind. And then corrected our course. But we never did.
So it was only after the disease had started to leave a clear mark in the statistics that we could no longer deny that something was happening. That we were changing.
We first noticed it in kids. Maybe they are more receptive, more vulnerable. Or maybe we worry more about them.
We thought our chemistry could cure them. But it couldn’t; and those kids grew older, and still had it. And soon it became clear that no one was safe.
The officials tried countermeasures. A warmly smiling face in one corner of every screen, hourly ‘Good Paroles’ and those compulsory shows for everyone to watch; ‘Positive Transmissions’, as they called it. But electronic workarounds appeared almost immediately, and then came those underground channels. And most of all, there was daily life. A repeated direct exposure turned out to be even more contagious than electronic exposure from a screen. These were mad times.
I mean, how can you avoid contamination if you can’t really tell who has it? Most of us already lived and worked in these big overcrowded cities – how could we avoid direct exposure? We couldn’t - and the additional stress made us only more vulnerable.
We couldn't leave. We depend on each other, and surviving alone without resources seemed impossible. But for me everything changed when they started looking for me; when I had do hide.
Those huge, endless cities. Without them, none of this would have happened. Small groups; that’s what we’re supposed to be in, that’s what our emotions are sized for. But the cities grew faster than our capacity to live in them. They have always produced the weakened crowd that bugs fed on, and they provided the right substance for the outbreak of this disease, too.
What a strange disease. At first, nobody believed that simple behaviour could be infectious. We knew that bacteria, viruses or even proteins could transmit diseases – but behaviour? By the time we figured that out and the officials started their countermeasures, it was probably too late.
Maybe it was a lost fight from the beginning. After all, the disease was a part of us. It was us. It grew out of our nonverbal communication system. This ancient system is used by all creatures, but in us it is drowned out by the continuous palaver of our restless brain.
Our brain, our particular intelligence, consciousness, our verbal language --our words; we thought all this was advancement, progress. In reality, it was simply a specialisation. A specialisation necessary to protect us from what had become our greatest threat: our own race, our own complex society. It was a specialisation necessary to understand ourselves.
In exchange, we lost something crucial. We became disconnected from all other life.
We took it as a sign of our superiority that no other creature learned our language. But we were the only ones to be drowned by flood waves or volcano ashes; the other creatures understood, knew what was coming, and left. But not us; we were too busy trying to understand ourselves. The others were connected, but we were alone. Why would they want to learn our words?
Yet, without words, our ancient communication system continued communicating, shaping our societies, our lives. All this unnoticed by our new consciousness. We were disconnected, even from our own body.
Our body communicated whatever was in us. The stronger the emotion, the stronger the signal. And of all creatures, we have the strongest emotions. They grew big with our brain.
Big brains, big cities. Suddenly, in some of us, this communication system started to emit much stronger than before: anger, stress, fear, frustration. Prolonged and repetitive exposure to those would make you resonant, and once you were completely tuned in, you became an emitter yourself. Neighbours to neighbours, parents to children, passengers to passengers, colleagues to colleagues. It was just a question of time that a critical mass was infected, that a stable, steadily growing reservoir for the disease was formed.
‘Balancing Food Supplements’ the officials called what would be their last resort. But in truth it was a euphemism for a population-wide psychotropic treatment. Resistances developed quickly. And, more dangerously, before long our attention dropped, fading away with media coverage shifting to a new war a new financial crisis a new scandal. And everything slowly returned to normal. A completely different ‘normal’ however. ‘Normal’ is what the majority is doing, feeling, thinking. And the majority was infected.
The disease spread and became global. Different strains affected different cultures, but the result was just the same. Transmittable aggressive and antisocial behaviour. Despite the ills it created, this new status quo slowly became accepted as the face of our modern society, the sign of progress.
We so deeply believe that we advance, that we progress. Yet in a way we only progress like algae in a pond; we grow and grow until we suffocate ourselves. But for now, out there, everywhere around you, my people still grow. They will grow until they fill the last spaces available. And soon they will be here. And they will find ... you.
