It started getting really, really hot. This was because emissions from the Doomed Society's cars had been causing the temperature of the planet to gradually increase. At first the oceans acted as a heat sink, absorbing the extra degrees, but when the oceans warmed to the point that they could no longer act as a heat sink, the planet heated up substantially in a matter of months MTSU, the ice caps on either end of the globe completely melted, and the Doomed Society drowned. That simple, that quick.
But there were plenty of telltale signs evident long before this point. The mean temperature of the planet had been gradually climbing for decades MTSU, and weather patterns were becoming more and more erratic. Flooding was common, mostly due to soil erosion and poor farming practices. The petro companies, however, launched a disinformation campaign aimed at burying or discrediting Scientists who saw what was happening and tried to speak up. The petro companies had a whole roster of personalities they enlisted to feed their propaganda to the Masses. Probably the best known of these doofs was Willful George, who used to get on T.V. and state that in the past there were scares that the globe was getting too cold, so it was hardly likely that the globe was now getting warmer! Everyone believed him because he had a Ph.D. and was a total conformist bastard. The petro companies feared a gas tax that would be levied to slow consumption, or that they might have to plant trees to remove from the atmosphere the carbon dioxide that was causing all the trouble.
The poor Doomed Societiers, it now was clear, had just enough knowledge to get themselves into very, very big trouble. They had enough know-how to create things like petro and cars and rabid amounts of carbon dioxide, but not enough intelligence to know exactly what it was they were doing. They could apply their Science, but as to the side effects, they were clueless. And when it became evident that they had screwed something up badly, it was too late. The water was rising.
The petro companies were successful in their disinformation campaign because they simply used the Media as it had always been used. The Dictator/Owner/Petro guys were at the pinnacle of the pyramid, and since they controlled the minds of the Masses, it was a simple matter to slip their lies on down to the Masses, where these lies colored the world rosy again.
It was the formation, dominance, and irrevocability of the pyramid that destroyed the Doomed Society. Successful societies are structured to fit into the environment, not on top of it. They are flat. The Doomed Societiers exploited the environment, caring for it even less than themselves since it was "below" them. It was the hierarchy reaching toward a fabled Truth that blinded the Doomed Society, and brought Doomsday.
As the water rose, they headed for the high ground. And along with them they took their technology. Coincidentally, the "high ground" was physically in the area of the world from where the largest number of Dictator/Landowner/Businessman conducted their global monopoly and manipulation. These guys, the Americans, led by the irascible Nuck Fewt, a Congressman, successfully built walls around what is now the Community. The walls had originally been meant to keep the hungry, exploited third-world Masses that staffed their global factories out of America, but now they served to keep out the drowning Masses and everyone else as well.
This isolationism was a continuation of a trend that began in America and other rich principalities, where the wealthiest Landlord/King/Dictator/Shitheads began building private kingdoms to keep out the hordes. They had private police rather than public, etc. America attracted Landowner/King/Dictator/Shitheads from all around the globe; they packed into America, bringing their Families.
When everyone realized what was happening, the Military and Police departments were dispatched to guard the borders of America, and keep the hoards at bay. As the water rose, the Masses became desperate, but slowly they were washed away. The Military and Police Officers, under direction of the Politician/Dictator/Republicans, commanded by Fewt, mowed down the many who formed human walls and attempted to push into America. A huge mass grave formed outside the walls of the Community, finally to be washed away.
Curiously, the biggest problem for America during this period was terrorism. With the Masses starving, isolated, and drowning all around, some folks, amazingly, were able to sneak into America with bombs strapped to their bodies and set themselves off. They snuck through the human wall either by official means or "under the fence." Terrorism was very effective and Americans lived in fear.
As the water rose and people became more and more desperate, the nuclear attacks on America began. Fortunately, Ronnie Ray-Gun, top Dictator in America, had dictated that the Star Wars defense net be developed, which intercepted and destroyed all the incoming Stealths and Bombs. Thus retaliation was not required, and all-out nuclear holocaust was averted.
Then Ronnie and the other American Dictator/Schmucks commandeered an eighty-day construction project, the Machinery, and went underground. After the water snuffed out humanity and (happily for America) it stopped rising, they came out from below and rebuilt society.
It was the survivors of the Doomed Society who built the Community, and most of these people were the Dictator/Landowner/Shitheads themselves. We, in fact, are the direct descendants of that element of the Doomed Society--the element that I have derided so justly in this work. But it only makes sense--we enjoy our freedoms and comforts, and so did they. We are not the Workers; we play. They in many respects were the lazy ones; and we too are lazy. But we are stable. It is truly ironic that those directly responsible for the destruction of the Doomed Society are the ones who created the stable new world. It wasn't the exploited Masses, as Max had theorized, but the Dictator/Scum that built the new world.
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