* * * *
The studio was full to overflowing. Word of the “gladiator” interview with Mandy Fields had spread like wildfire. The condemned girl’s interview would be watched by hundreds of millions of people across the globe. It would be translated into seventy-six languages and with no delay. Live. Just like Mandy liked it.
The African American sat in a plush interview chair among the stage lighting. A small coffee table, three other chairs and a backdrop depicting a serene wooded mountain side completed the stage. A raucous crowd filled the stands. Armed guards roamed through them. Soldiers walked the perimeter outside, and already a score of people had been arrested. One had been killed as the individual’s SIC had indicated a third offence.
John stood to one side in the darkness of the backstage. A sniper had been set up next to one of the cameras aloft. If Neesha so much as twitched wrong, her brains would be blown out in front of the live audience. A group of the audience no doubt hoped for that very outcome. Manari had carefully coached Mandy on what she could ask. He had made it very clear, and though the headstrong talk show host had resisted, the threat of having her entire show pulled from the networks had properly subdued her.
Neesha walked in to the roar of the crowd. Some clapped, some jeered, and some chanted. Neesha soaked it all in, allowing only a small smile to escape her lips. She sat down in the designated seat and crossed her legs in a feminine way. To John, the entire pose looked somehow incongruent. He sighed. He didn’t want to be here. He would rather be at home, but he felt somehow responsible for Neesha. He had insisted on coming.
When the crowd died down, Mandy began. “Neesha, thank you for joining us. We are also pleased to have two other guests.” She pointed to the side and said dramatically, “Welcome our first special guest, a psychologist who has worked at several universities around the nation and is a specialist on violent behavior. Our second guest is a criminologist attached to the Secretary of Defense staff and who helped develop the new Ts2 technology.” She began clapping so the audience did as well. John just watched, recognizing a setup.
Mandy’s smooth voice then said, “Their names have been withheld to protect them from retribution from Neesha’s family—or in the unlikely event she survives her ordeal on Celebes Island.” A few catcalls, that no doubt would be scrubbed immediately from the live broadcast, reached John’s ears.
Still smiling from ear to ear, Mandy then turned to Neesha, whose brows had lowered in anger at such an absurd announcement. “Tell us, Neesha, are you a violent person?”
“Define violence,” Neesha snapped. “I have a strong personality—a strong character. Some,” and she gestured to one of the army officers in the crowd, “have chosen to interpret that as violence. Just because I refuse to let people bully me doesn’t make me a violent person.”
Mandy shifted on her seat and leaned forward. “People want to know why. We hear that you planned to murder your own mother. That sounds violent to us.”
“She’s not my mother!” Neesha snapped. She looked ready to explode out of her chair. A red dot played over her chest, bringing the camera’s attention to the sniper’s aim. Neesha noticed and visibly calmed down. “Look. I just don’t let people run my life. I am my own person.”
“That is interesting, Neesha. But we have some interesting sound bites from some of your friends at the school you attended. Shall we play them?” Without waiting for permission, the voices of several young people began playing over the speakers, telling everyone what a bully Neesha was.
“Lies! I don’t even know these people!”
“And your mother? The one you say is not your mother?”
Neesha ground her teeth. “She took me. All she wants to do is control me.”
“What do you mean by she ‘took’ you?” Mandy asked.
“The government calls it adoption. But I didn’t pick her! I didn’t want to go! And if she isn’t going to let me be, then why adopt me to begin with? I’ll tell you why. She just wants a slave—someone to do her bidding!”
“You’re insane!” someone shouted from the audience. “Teenagers today are the problem. You are all out of control! You’re all anarchists!”
“To blazes with you!” Neesha shouted.
“To blazes with you!” the spectator shouted back. “You’re nothing but a bunch of murdering dogs—just look what punks like you did in Tampa. Look how many were killed!”
“You want someone to die?” Neesha roared back. “Come down here, and I’ll kill you myself!”
Once again the sniper’s spotting light blossomed on Neesha’s chest, hovering right over her heart. She saw it and froze, trying to calm down.
“Perhaps our young guest needs to take a break,” Mandy suggested. She snapped her fingers and two assistants—both, no doubt, worked for Manari—appeared. One held a plastic cup of water that had the name of the show imprinted on it.
Neesha nodded, not trusting herself to say anything. At this point, she needed to get away from that red dot that played over her heart. They escorted her off the stage.
When they disappeared off the camera, Mandy turned towards the psychologist. “Doctor, is violent behavior an inherited gene or is it a learned behavior? It seems so many of our young have turned to violence during these trying times.”
“The answer is not so clear cut as we would like to think,” the psychologist explained. “Our nervous system has a huge impact on our behavior, but we can’t rule out the environment either. Neesha seems to be a classic example of this disorder. She never knew her biological parents and was instead raised by a woman who she has a pathological distaste for. Studies have found that long-term exposure to violence in a society becomes something more than merely a behavioral issue. It becomes a pathological issue—a disease if you will. Indeed, I would say that such a disease can then be transmitted genetically.”
“Wow! So you’re saying that some of these children inherited their violence from their parents?”
“In a way. Long-term exposure to violence may eventually lead to physical alterations in both mental pathways as well as emotional desensitization. This can create biological mutations that some have labeled as the ‘violence gene’—especially the coding of Monoamine oxidase (MAOA) and Tryptophan hydroxylase (TPH) enzymes. Each of these enzymes has a direct impact on neurotransmitters of the brain, thus impacting behavior. Research has determined that people with a single nucleotide substitution on the TPH gene, creating an A779C mutation, are more violent than others. So yes, violence could be a physical problem.”
“That is some explanation, Dr. Can you break that down in simple terms?”
“Probably not. We are still researching the issue. However, positive experiences of care and love and the practicing of positive behavior can counteract such imbalances in the brain. In other words, I believe a violent person can be ‘reprogrammed’ so to speak. The University of California is even now doing experimentation along these lines.”
“This is fascinating,” Mandy replied. “You believe that we can recondition our youth to not be so violent? You think we can make them a viable part of society again?”
The psychologist nodded. “I do. These anarchists feed off each other. Violence begets violence. This is the nature of behavior. Love will beget love. The brain can recover if exposed to the right stimulus. Studies have shown that a person’s violent thoughts don’t always translate into violent actions.”
The crowd had begun to grow restless through the conversation. At this, people began to boo and jeer. A few even flung a few profanities at the psychologist. Mandy, ever the one to test which way the wind blew, picked up on it. “It seems, Doctor, that many would disagree with you. Having suffered excessive violence at the hands of these anarchists, it appears that many don’t believe they can or should be rehabilitated.” She turned to the criminologist. “What do you think, Warden—you don’t mind me calling you that, do you? I know you aren’t a warden, but I need to call you something.”
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The criminologist shrugged. “It is fine with me.”
“Thank you. Let me put the question another way. Our good doctor here is implying that there is a significant difference between what a person thinks and what a person does. Can the Ts2 technology distinguish between the two? Is there a risk of convicting innocent people? I mean, we all know what Neesha intended to do—or thought about doing—killing her mother, but she didn’t do it. Can she be considered guilty?”
“She is not innocent at all,” the criminologist stated. “The Ts2 is very accurate, able to distinguish intent from angry thoughts. The intent to commit a crime has a different, measurable effect on the brain. The Ts2 measures this, detects it. There are several phases to committing a crime. The execution phase can be accelerated by unexpected factors or delayed in the same way. Nevertheless, the brain has turned towards a crime, and the brain reflects that intention clearly for the Ts2 to pick up. Specifically, the scanner picks up on the TPH enzymes associated with violence and aggression. Activity in that part of the brain is like a signature, a manifesto if you will, of a person’s intentions. The anarchists attempting to take over our nation are young, true, but they are bent on destroying everything positive in our culture. I can say emphatically that they cannot be rehabilitated. They are past restorative measures. Punitive action is all that we have left if we want to return this country to stability and prosperity.
“Hang them! Hand them all!” someone else yelled from the audience.
John listened and shook his head. It seemed the anarchists weren’t the only ones bent on violence. This entire “game” of sending these youths to die smacked of violence. He turned away. He couldn’t stand to listen to any more of this. He returned to his hotel room where he spent the night sitting in a chair, thinking.