The Boulevards of Extinction. Andrew Benson Brown

upon going through customs they faced communication barriers.

      Schadenfreude looked around, frowning . . . everyone was so happy. So deliberate. Not even an unfortunate accident to raise his spirits. So he stubbed his toe and laughed.

      Ressentiment, correcting his upward glance, had learned to laugh at his inferiors for the sense of obligation they imposed. He gave careless orders, then waited for them to laugh at him—this is how he learned to admire himself again.

      Esprit, long used to subjugating handlers to his method, had lost the autonomy of ventriloquizing his genius through prodigies. The prodigies had learned much from him and wanted to become their own masters, refusing to be dominated by their talent. The only type of mind that would now consent to be inhabited by him was an esprit faux, so he resigned himself to flowing through those who lack the rationality to govern him properly. To maximize his influence he formed an esprit de corps of misaligned minds who proceeded to escort wisdom down the ladder, presenting insights the populace could recognize as its own. Every nitwit he sanctioned became a twisted wit who amused the company with puns on truisms and trivia questions for troglodytes. Esprit did not know the answers to the trivia questions or grasp the puns. Surely, this did not mean he had been mitigated into a Petite Esprit; on the contrary, he was too elevated for his new vessels—this is how he reestablished a sense of control. But deep down he feared the approaching day when they, too, no longer needed him.

      Desengaño had not always been seen as a vice. But when skepticism became the dominant attitude, he was suddenly reproached for being too sure of himself. He saw too much, it was said—this is how he stumbled. But he knew how to tell himself he still looked good after his accident. He put on glasses over empty eye sockets to feel the weight of his sight. If he could no longer be Argos, he would attach a knife to his cane to hear where he was going. If his other senses wouldn’t compensate with any Tiresian insights, he would shut himself indoors and metamorphose into Morpheus, sleeping all day, dreaming up new illusions and awarenesses.

      Virtù, with the welfare of the people in mind, flexed his disposition to public opinion polls. Fearing the determination to do what is necessary would be mistaken for the whims and cravings of a tyrant, he willed himself to do what he wanted so as to be seen as intrepid. When Fortuna dealt him a sex scandal, he responded with a board meeting and a blowjob to give him the courage of denial, a womanizing jazzman aspartaming his alibis with a sip of Diet Coke. To crush charges of warmongering he summoned all the eloquence dyslexia could muster, and rallied a martial spirit to invade territories where liberation would be immediate and internal collapse postponed until the next term. His achievements sponsored by election fundraising, he maintained the state by employing speech writers and resolved international crises by taking diplomatic missions to golf courses. Virtù’s new strategy: the good citizen as good man, the art of filling a moral void with a power vacuum. The princes of the world deposed, statesmen rise to bow.

      These vices had learned how to reason too much. They could no longer entice their common enemy—their only friend. For it was now up to man’s virtues to save the vices from oblivion, to nurse them back to their old forcefulness. Opposed to these new self-defeating vices and without the old evils to define themselves against, the virtues had no choice but to push themselves into their extreme forms and act as surrogates for vice: Salubriousness’s obsession with itself had driven it to the point of malnourishment; Amour became too intoxicated, Amicability too ulterior. Virtue wanted to revive the basic vices once again; the ambiguous modern forms of vice were too internalized to cause any real damage and took all the fun out of moral struggle. In the end the virtues didn’t have to do anything; the new vices simply faded away—no one knew how to pronounce their own bad intentions. Faced with holes to plug, the virtues proceeded to draw native vices out of their own degenerated states: Gluttony from malnourishment, Lust from infatuation, Greed from parasitism.

      Morality, like everything else, needs to occasionally repolarize itself to fuel people’s need for taking sides.

      The Anti-Hero

      One can stand alone only by dispensing with the customary character traits. Heroes are a dime a dozen—I want you to be more singular than that. With a book that is a leviathan, I will make a goldfish of conscience—in proportion to its minuteness it will glow brightly and dazzle everyone.

      Seneca formed a prudent person by heavily taxing Britannia, bringing about Boudicca’s revolt, and writing epistles about prudence in place of a diary of greed; Homer fooled the entire world into thinking he was a single great bard instead of a lineage of unknowns; Scaevola thrust his hand into the flames to make Porsena think he was willing to risk all—the truth was, he had always been left-handed; Judith beheaded Holofernes because she ended up not satisfying him in bed; Castiglione became a great courtier: first his ambassadorial incompetence in the Spanish court led to the sack of Rome, then he instructed everyone on how to be an ideal Renaissance gentleman.

      Flourish talents you lack and conceal your vices—you’ll be thought a hero, all the while putting real heroes to shame. Let idealism and courage be practiced by the others—everyone is contending for dominance in those attributes, and they only end up badly. Nor should you languish or actively practice evil: even if you are one of the few capable of becoming competent in evil, it is just too much work to stay on the bottom. As an embodiment of amoral sense, you will practice the evil of just letting things happen, saving a few good effects of bad outcomes for yourself and letting the bad effects fall upon whom they may. Most are only indifferent to great evil; but you must be indifferent, too, to everyday goodness. Let no act of kindness go noticed.

      Ignorance is the origin of everything that is thought great. Aim your wit below the belt: if it is too keen it will strike heads, and people will look up to see what flew over them.

      Enflame hearts on an open grill, and their owners will invite you to dine on their compassion. Don’t reveal your lack of interest until after you eat their heart.

      Having good taste means scorning the popular and the avant-garde alike. Praise what has been previously praised but is now obscure to all but the learned. Instead of Shakespeare or Baudelaire, claim Ronsard as the poet laureate of your gray soul. Be a member of the savant-garde.

      Make the best out of what is worst, then yawn as you say of the best: “It is only the best,” or of the worst: “It is just worst.”

      Always remember: no matter how much of a scoundrel you are, a well-written book will secure your good reputation.

      Life Bonds

      Plastic surgery—a beauty more natural than natural, a hyper-natural beauty; the perfection of nature, its correction where mutation and adaptation went wrong. Cosmetic reconstruction makes an aesthetics possible that not only enhances our form but reshapes our function as well. When the human look becomes passé, we can xenograft behavioral templates from those species closest to us: baboon facelifts to turn every smile into an act of aggression, bonobo sex-drive surgery to redirect our warmongering.

      Like bodies, society too may be reshaped internally to prevent the failure of its parts. In annexing the dogmas of religion, kosher prohibitions are sidestepped with pig organs; pork no longer passes through us but is made part of us: larynx implants that will make rabbis and imams oink their sermons, bovine breast augmentations in Hindu women to prevent dairy shortages and encourage grazing past toddlerhood.

      In preventing crime, primate liver transplants for alcoholics may decrease the longevity of drunk driving.

      When these alterations go out of style, more distant species can be turned to: rhinoceros rhinoplasty, giraffe neck lifts; for amputees, praying mantis limb-reattachment.

      Republicans versus democrats: elephant trunks versus donkey ears—incompatible sense organs would impede bipartisan agreement no less.

      Business models: pack rat trading, gross margin wolfing, financial foxing. One does not graft parts here so much as substitute higher mammals for purer ones.

      The rejuvenation of family values: filling children full of cotton to make them as charming as their stuffed animals. “Life” becomes a criterion of cuteness and obedience.

      After assimilating