The Exact Unknown and Other Tales of Modern China by Isham Cook

Author:Isham Cook
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: china short stories, china expat fiction, stories about everyday chinese
Publisher: Isham Cook

I’m sure all of you know what I want to say next: ideology is the big shell game. That’s correct. And you’re probably thinking, so what? What’s the problem? We’re doing fine. Nobody’s taking our money or cheating us. Life has been good to us. Well, let me ask you a question, said Cobalt. You male students in the class, why are you all sitting together in the back two rows, where you will continue to sit with absolute predictability in every class? Did the Department order you to sit there? Of course, not. Yet have you really chosen to sit there of your own free will? Let me guess, you’re close to the door and it’s easy to slip into class late without me seeming to notice, and you can be the first to leave as well. It’s cool to sit in the back where I can’t see you clearly—like wearing sunglasses. It’s easy to bury yourself in your cellphones and iPads. You’re used to it. You’re way outnumbered by the girls and embarrassed to take the stage closer to the front and try to compete with them.

It’s the only way we can compare the girls, said one, to general giggling.

Yes, you have a hundred logical reasons to sit in the back. Why not be more creative, sitting in a different place, along the far sides, for instance, or along the aisles, so the girls have to squeeze past you? Or why not regularly sit next to the most beautiful girls, as American college boys do? Why not choose a new girl to flatter each time and surround her in a tight square? It’s a large room with many empty seats. Why not arrange yourselves diagonal rows, like chess pieces? Something is causing you always to sit in the back unfailingly, like magic. What’s the trick behind the scenes that’s doing this?

The class was laughing by now.

The thing about ideology is that it’s sort of a con but there’s no conman. Recall that I never conned you or took your money when I showed you the shell game. The role I acted was that of the magician. The only money he takes is the entrance fee for his performance, and I didn’t even ask for that. Instead, I showed you the trick. It’s not a con because there’s no cheater, at least none you can point to or identify. The trick is the same in all three cases—whether I act the con artist, the magician, or the teacher and teach you its secret. Whether I play fairly or not it’s one and the same trick, requiring the same skill and dexterity. But even though it’s an honest trick, it’s still at your expense.

What’s happening is much more profound than merely being swindled out of your money. The big con is directing all of you to think and act alike. What is this trick that’s keeping the male students in the back, the most active females in the front, and

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