Mack Reynolds - Equality - In the Year 2000

Julian slumped in his chair. “This has been the cross I’ve borne all my life. How often have you killed an eight-year-old child, Raymond? I do it vividly about once a month.”

“I’ll get right on it.”

The doctor put a call through to Vienna with Julian watching, hardly daring to breathe. To be cured of the exhausting, terrifying dreams that he’d had as far back as he could remember!

Leete turned to him and indicated the phone screen. He had been speaking into it in Interlingua and using medical terminology with which Julian was unfamiliar.

“Doctor Oswaldo Schon wishes to speak with you.”

The face in the screen was typically Germanic, thin with very intense blue eyes.

“It is very interesting to speak to you, Mr. West,” Dr. Schon said in excellent English. “Some time in the future, when you are more adjusted to your new environment, I would enjoy an opportunity to discuss medical practice of a third of a century ago.”

“It would be a pleasure, Doctor,” Julian replied.

The other asked him a series of questions which didn’t seem to probe too deeply. Evidently it wasn’t even necessary to see the patient in person. Finally, he asked to speak to Academician Leete again. The conversation swung back to Interlingua, and Dr. Leete took several notes before switching off the phone.

He turned to Julian. “Evidently a very routine matter. I’ll see about the prescription immediately and treat you before evening.”

Julian expressed his great relief, then said, “I’m surprised at how many people speak English—even this Austrian.”

Leete chuckled. “He wasn’t speaking English; he was speaking Interlingua. The computer translated his Interlingua into English for you, and your English into Interlingua for him. You could talk to an Eskimo if you wished, and his tribal tongue would be translated into English for you.”

Julian shook his head. “They were just beginning to experiment with computer translaters when I went under.” He shifted in his chair and said by way of changing the subject, “There have been a few questions that have accumulated that I wanted to ask you about.”

“Of course.”

“Edith mentioned the other day that if someone wanted to read pornography, he could do so until his eyes dropped out. Would that apply to everybody? Even to a six-year-old child?”

“Why yes, certainly. A six-year-old usually can’t read any too well, even with our modern means of education, but if he was interested in books on sex, pornography or otherwise, I suppose he could look at the pictures.”

Julian was unhappy with that answer. “As a doctor, don’t you think that would be bad for the child?”

“Why? There’s nothing wrong with sex, and the sooner the youngster finds out about it, the better. The old arguments against freedom to portray sexual scenes were that they aroused sexual passions. So what? A photograph of a well-presented meal can arouse the appetite. Children become curious about sex at a very early age. They begin sex play with each other or with themselves almost as soon as they can toddle around. When 1 was a boy, grown-ups would discourage this. Which stopped the child not at all. If anything, it increased his curiosity. As a rule, he picked up most of his sex education in the streets, discussing the matter with other youngsters no more knowledgeable than he. Do you know that until I was almost fifteen I believed that masturbation would cause your eyes to go weak and your brain to deteriorate, especially if you did it too often? Not that it stopped me for a moment!”

Julian laughed. “I believed the same thing but at that time in my life I imagine I must have averaged about three times a day. My father had some illustrated books that he had picked up in Paris. One day he caught me masturbating while I looked at them and gave me a good walloping.”

“Why? Obviously you were learning more about the sex act than you would have talking about it with your schoolmates. Actually, we don’t call it pornography very much any more. But the International Data Banks are full of material on sex, fiction and otherwise.”

“I guess it makes sense at that,” Julian nodded. “Another thing… With a situation as we have today in which ninety-eight percent of the population has full-time leisure, won’t the people deteriorate? Look at the Roman proletariat with its free bread and circuses. The Roman citizen had the equivalent of our Guaranteed Annual Income. And the Empire collapsed.”

Leete nodded agreeably. “Wasted leisure can be a curse rather than a blessing. Right from the beginning we realized that preparing a student for a job was no longer the basic problem, since so few were needed. So we set our education sights on training our youth for leisure and happiness. Of course, each of us receives training in a field in which we might be chosen to work; but at the same time we also develop ourselves in a half-dozen or more other fields. For instance, since Edith was about ten she’s had a strong leaning toward gardening, plants, that sort of thing. It finally wound up with her being chosen on Muster Day to go into agriculture. But she also has a very keen interest in anthropology, archaeology, history, ceramics, and music. Believe me, if she is bounced out of her job, or when she reaches the age of retirement, Edith is going to have no trouble whatsoever in filling her leisure time. Education is the thing.”

Julian said slowly, “I suppose you’re right. Without it, a third of a century ago, a working man often didn’t know what to do with his free time. He’d spend a fantastic amount of it watching television, and you can probably remember how bad that was. When I die, I want—”

Dr. Leete choked. “Die?” he almost shouted. “Julian! You… you’re not contemplating suicide? I know you are unhappy about some of the changes that have taken place and the difficulties you’re having acclimating yourself. But suicide isn’t the answer.”

“Oh no, you misunderstand. I meant eventually, through natural causes. When I’m older.”

Leete shook his head. “You know, during the past few weeks we’ve had a continual quiz program going on. You ask a hundred questions and by the time we’ve answered, or half-answered them, we wind up saying we don’t have that any more . Things like money, banks, cities, pollution, population explosion…”

“What’s that got to do with my realizing that death—”

“Jule, we don’t die any more.”

He gaped at the older man.

Leete said hurriedly, “That isn’t exactly the way to put it. Of course, everything dies sooner or later. One day the solar system will cool. One day, probably, the galaxy itself will slow down. What I meant was—”

“What do you mean you don’t die any more?”

“Julian, we keep telling you, human knowledge is doubling every eight years. They defeated cancer shortly after you went into stasis. Heart, kidney, liver diseases are now a thing of the past. So are all contagious diseases. You must realize that medicine is at a point thirty-two times in advance of your period, and even in your time they were making fabulous breakthroughs.”

Julian shook his head dumbly. He’d had some wild curves thrown him in the past few weeks, but this one won the game.

Leete said, “Don’t you realize that some of the teeth in your head are new? That you’ve grown new ones? While you were in stasis, we took out all your bridgework, even all your teeth that had been filled, and seeded your jaw. You grew the new teeth while in hibernation.”

It simply hadn’t occurred to him. All his life he’d had the best of dental care, of course, but he’d had bridges, cavities. He ran his tongue around his mouth. His teeth were now perfect.