What am I supposed to do now?
(Signs of the Times is a work of fiction based on true events. Views expressed are the characters’ own. Viewer discretion is advised.)
It’s May. There’s a street fair going on. Thousands of students mill about on the University of Oregon campus. One of the wettest Aprils on leaves planter boxes and lawns, normally reserved for sunbathing, soaking wet. It’s warm today though. The smell of fried dough and cinnamon sugar lingers in the air.
There’s a public square of sorts, with an amphitheater that hasn’t hosted a production in many years. Unless you count public demonstrations against the school’s administration and the Eugene Police Department. In which case, there are many, many productions throughout the year.
But on a particular day in May, there is a young man hawking a virtual app in a physical space to a crowd of young, hungry, air-pod festooned Gen Z-ers.
“Chicken Sandwiches — Free Chicken Sandwiches,” he shouts.
A crowd of twenty or so students gathers around, indifferently scanning a QR code that’ll lead them to a download page for an app that aggregates ALL of your social media links. There are no ads. There’s also no privacy policy you can read before downloading. Free food versus data privacy. Trade your data for a 650-calorie meal. A trashcan nearby is close to overflowing with foil wrappers.
Meanwhile on the other side of the amphitheater, a series of cameras are arranged in what military strategists call a “kill zone.” It’s a completely surveilled section of this public space. The words “Being ‘woke’ is a good thing” are written on a whiteboard. A man with a microphone, polarized glasses, and a jaundiced face asks passersby to give their opinion on the whiteboard statement. Cameras roll silently as students enter and exit the direct and effective recording of their interactions with the microphone man.
Between the free chicken sandwiches and the media ambush stands three women. They stare at a phone propped up on the cement step of the amphitheater. They’re in the performance space. One bobs their head. Another tiptoes towards the phone. With the tap of the screen, they’ve snapped to attention. Chests, out. Spines, erect. Music plays on a Bluetooth speaker. They move in a choreographed dance. One of them falls behind as the two others complete a pirouette.
“Free Chicken Sandwiches!”
“You There — what’s your thought on wokeness?”
“In this world / It’s just us.”
A police officer stands by a pill disposal dropbox. His beard and glasses obscure his humanity. It’s Mental Health Awareness Month. He’s watching all this unfold, guarding the prescription drug disposal. But don’t worry — there’s a woman with a shaved head and a septum piercing sitting in a chair beside him. She’s handing out flyers on addiction and suicide.
“Get your free chicken sandwiches!”
“Do you think trans women are women?”
“You know it’s not the same as it was.”
A man wearing a gold chain, Yeezy Boosts, and riding a $1,500 monowheel zips by. His AirPods block out everything that’s happening around him. He weaves between folks with neon outfits that match the color of their hair in electrifying blues and greens. He clears the crowd, passing a red lawn sign staked in the ground. It says “This IS Kalapuya Land,” referencing the indigenous people who spent generations living on the land the university stands on today. Vaux’s Swifts dive and bank in the sky above, chasing the first hatching of caddisflies.
“As it was / As it was / As it was.”
More students enter, cross, and exit the amphitheater. Their Doc Martens, Steve Maddens, Nikes, Blundstones, and Timberlands tell a particular story about their identity. For the sales rep trading data for food, these shopping habits will be captured and turned into a faceless profile for a demographic marketers call Gen Z. For the social provocateur recording students, perhaps he will trade media and narrative for monetary gain. The policeman scans the scene. An N-95 mask lays on the sidewalk, baking in the sun and decorated by a muddy boot print.
In a few hours, 2,816 miles away, someone will leak a draft opinion written by Chief Justice Samuel Anthony Alito Jr., Jr. that declares Roe v. Wade is unconstitutional. Another 5,257 miles from Washington, D.C., in the once-bustling port city of Mariupol, Ukraine, tens of thousands of civilians lay dead. Some of their bodies are entombed in cement and steel rubble. A thick layer of dust coats their skin.
Others are still alive, trapped underground in the Azovstal steel plant. All-day long they hide from artillery shells the size of children fired from howitzers twenty miles away. As the explosions rock the underground tunnels, a soldier tweets “@elonmusk people say you come from another planet to teach people to believe in the impossible. Our planets are next to each other, as I live where it is nearly impossible to survive. Help us get out of Azovstal to a mediating country. If not you, then who? Give me a hint.”
