Revolution: Chapter One

 

(Image: Ideogram)

Chapter 1 – The Gathering Storm

By the middle of 2026, South Africa had reached the edge of systemic failure. The optimism that had once accompanied the democratic transition had long since evaporated; the state had become a weary machine running on inertia, its parts grinding against one another without direction. The July 2021 unrest—remembered for the burning of malls, the looting of distribution warehouses, and the paralysis of the security forces—was widely recognised, in retrospect, as the first visible crack in the post-apartheid order. At the time it was treated as an aberration, a tragic spasm of poverty and politics; five years later it was understood as a warning that had gone unheeded.

The years that followed brought no recovery. Economic stagnation hardened into decline. By 2026, unemployment officially exceeded forty percent, with youth unemployment nearer to seventy. Factories that had once exported manufactured goods to the region stood silent. Mining companies had disinvested after years of policy uncertainty, load-shedding and labour militancy. The agricultural sector, starved of rural infrastructure and tormented by farm attacks, produced barely enough for domestic consumption. Every closed workshop or abandoned mine meant more job losses, more anger, more disillusionment.

The once-vibrant townships and small towns of the industrial heartland sank into despair. In Gauteng and KwaZulu-Natal, informal settlements multiplied on every patch of open ground. Basic services faltered; water systems collapsed; refuse lay uncollected. The state’s ability to enforce the law had eroded to the point where criminal syndicates operated openly, collecting protection fees, running illegal electricity connections, and controlling minibus routes. For millions of citizens, government existed only as an occasional announcement on television.

Business leaders, academics, and community organisers alike spoke privately of a country sliding toward chaos. The ANC government had become a monument to patronage. Cabinet posts were expanded to absorb factional demands, state-owned enterprises served as instruments of enrichment, and procurement contracts were traded like political currency. Affirmative-action and empowerment policies—originally conceived as instruments of justice—had degenerated into bureaucratic barriers that rewarded connections rather than competence. The result was not transformation but paralysis.

By 2025, rolling blackouts had entered their fifteenth year; municipalities owed Eskom hundreds of billions; railways were stripped of cables and stations; ports clogged with unshipped goods. Disinvestment became a torrent: manufacturing output fell to its lowest level in a century, and each factory closure produced another wave of the unemployed. A growing black middle class, frustrated by collapsing services and shrinking opportunity, began to turn openly against the government. In university common rooms and boardrooms alike, talk shifted from reform to survival.

It was in this atmosphere that a group of concerned citizens began meeting informally under the auspices of a civic foundation. What started as discussion groups soon evolved into something more deliberate. Participants included senior academics, business executives, civil-rights advocates, and retired officers of the police and military. Among them was Dr Harvey Jacobs, a respected political scientist and social commentator whose essays had long argued that South Africa was approaching a crisis of legitimacy. Jacobs was widely regarded as incorruptible, intellectually formidable, and—rare among public figures—both coloured and universally trusted.

Jacobs warned that the social fabric was unravelling faster than the government could respond. The unrest of 2021, he said, would look like a rehearsal for the conflagration to come if unemployment and hunger continued to rise. In his view, the country faced a binary choice: either the existing political order would collapse into violence, or a new leadership would have to emerge to impose order and initiate structural reform. His audience, initially sceptical, began to concede that conventional politics offered no path forward.

Over the next several months, discreet meetings multiplied. Representatives from Afriforum, business chambers, religious councils, and university faculties joined in. They called themselves, with cautious irony, the National Renewal Forum. Their discussions centred not on ideology but on survival: how to prevent South Africa from descending into a failed state. Members mapped the country’s power structure, identifying within the SANDF and police those officers who were professional rather than partisan, and who might act to protect the public if the civilian administration imploded.

Outside the Forum’s quiet deliberations, the national mood darkened. Protests over service delivery turned violent; municipal offices burned. The government, paralysed by factional rivalry, attempted to deflect blame onto “foreign agitators” and “racist elements.” Inflation eroded wages; the rand slid below twenty-five to the dollar. International lenders demanded austerity; the government responded with slogans. When, in August 2026, the Electoral Commission announced that municipal elections would likely be postponed for “logistical reasons,” the reaction was explosive. Opposition parties cried foul; the press warned of constitutional crisis. The Forum saw confirmation that the government was clinging to power by decree.

For many of its members the idea of intervention—once unthinkable—began to seem unavoidable. They reasoned that the constitution’s mechanisms had been captured, that the courts were intimidated, and that the police no longer served the people. If South Africa were to survive, the corrupt edifice would have to be dismantled from outside the political system itself.

Jacobs, though cautious, concluded that moral responsibility demanded action. He believed that a temporary assumption of authority, carried out with restraint and directed toward restoration rather than domination, could avert civil war. “If we fail to act,” he told his colleagues, “the streets will act for us—and they will not act rationally.”

Thus, as winter turned to spring in 2026, the first outlines of what would later be called the September Intervention began to take shape—a coup conceived not as conquest but as rescue, born from despair and the conviction that a nation on the brink could still be saved from itself.

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(Written with help from ChatGPT)

c

Revolution

 

Revolution is a gripping political chronicle of South Africa’s rebirth after a 2026 coup that topples a failing government and sparks an age of reform. Led by the principled academic Harvey Jacobs, a coalition of soldiers, scholars, and civil rights leaders rebuild the nation on fairness, discipline, and Ubuntu.

From collapsing institutions and mass unemployment arises a technocratic government that dares to do what others feared: print money to create jobs, merge ministries to end corruption, and replace chaos with competence. As industries revive and crime falls, new schools, hospitals, and homes rise across the land.

Through Jacobs’s televised addresses and the Council’s policy debates, Revolution traces how moral leadership, economic imagination, and social renewal turn a country from despair to dignity. Five years later, with growth surging and democracy beckoning, Jacobs faces his final test — to relinquish power or extend reform.

Told as a historical chronicle, Revolution is both cautionary and inspiring — a vision of how nations may rebuild themselves through courage, reason, and moral conviction.

Misadventure on the Mountain

 

This is a largely true account, devoid of embellishment. It is about a hike undertaken in the Kogelberg Biosphere by an elderly man and a not so elderly woman. The events were related to me by the man, who I have known for over half a century, and I can vouch for the veracity of his words concerning recent events, not enough time having elapsed for him to edit his memory.

At the age of 74 he is driven by the dread of physical decline to set himself challenges that test his strength, athleticism and endurance. He surfs, cycles, kayaks, and recently completed a one-mile swim in Fals Bay. Admittedly, he needs to swallow anti-inflammatory medication prior to any of these events.  This enables him to dismiss complaints from his overworked joints.

Casting about for another opportunity to defy the relentless advances being made by osteoporosis, spondylosis of the lumbar spine and sarcopenia, he learned of a mountain hike in the Kogelberg Biosphere that sounded like it was not for sissies. Twenty-five kilometres in length, it started at the Palmiet River and climbed over the intervening range to Rooi Els. When he suggested the walk to his wife, she said that this was a two-day hike that was too long to complete in a single outing. He could count her out on this one.

He knew a couple who were keen hikers, and when he suggested they accompany him the man shook his head, judging the distance in twelve hours to be beyond his capability. His wife, however, agreed to take up the offer. A strong-willed woman in her sixties, she was physically fit and had the assertive self-assurance of a successful business person.

It was 7.30 and getting light when they set off after being dropped at the start of the trail. The old fellow was feeling confident and full of vigour, having popped an Arcoxia and two Tramacet half an hour earlier. The late winter vegetation was in prime condition and they made their way through a variety of proteas, ericas, restios, pelargoniums, salvias and heath. The woman led the way, hardly bothering to use her walking pole, while he followed close behind, wielding his two sticks for stability and leverage. The path was clear but narrow and not well-worn. They gained height at a steady rate, the gradient being undemanding, and the views on both sides were increasingly rewarding.

When, after three hours, they stopped for a drink of water and a snack on energy bars, he was grateful for the chance to take the weight off his feet and rest on a shelf of rock. The respite was brief, however, for she soon shouldered her backpack and urged him to do likewise. There was still a long way to go.

Around one o’clock they stopped for a fifteen-minute lunch break before pressing on. They had reached the highest point of the trail and now it was mostly downhill, which was good for muscle fatigue but jarring on his knees and hips. The afternoon wore on and it seemed to him she was quickening her pace. He knew that without the support of his walking poles he would have been stumbling and unable to keep up.

It was midafternoon when she slowed and then came to a halt. For a while the track had been fading, and now there was no trace of it at all. Continuing in the general direction they had been on, they pressed on until she spotted a cairn of stones off to the left. Reaching it, they were relieved to find themselves on a path again. It led to another cairn, and then another, before abruptly disappearing. It was gone four and, although they could see the sea in the distance where Rooi Els lay, the woman estimated there was at least another five kilometres between them and their destination. And it would soon be getting dark.

Below them to their right they could see a gorge running towards the sea. Hoping they would be able to follow it, they made their way diagonally  through thick brush down the hillside until, no longer able to stand, they took to sliding crab like, holding on to bushes to slow their descent. At a rocky outcrop the woman stopped, and when he joined her, they looked down into the gorge and agreed that to descend any further was too dangerous. They would have to retrace their steps. He looked up at the almost vertical hillside, and it was at this point in his story that I asked him if he was starting to panic.

“Panic? Yes, I was more than worried. You could say I was beginning to shat myself. I don’t know how I found the strength to claw my way back up that precipitous slope.”

When he reached his companion, who was waiting for him on more or less level ground, he collapsed with exhaustion and relief. The light dwindling, they agreed they were in serious trouble, and it was at this point that she made her executive decision. If there was cell phone reception up there they would have to call for help.

Fortunately for them, the signal was strong, and she was soon making contact with the Wilderness Search and Rescue hotline. The operator told her to pin their location and remain where they were until help arrived, which would be in about three hours’ time.

The evening was cool but the wind was light, and they made themselves as comfortable as they could in the lee of some tall sugar bushes. It grew dark and the stars shone with intensity in a moonless black sky. Some two and a half hours later he was jolted from a semi-doze by his hiking companion. Not far off two lights were bobbing in the dark. She got to her feet and started shouting to attract the attention of their rescuers.

Members of the Mountain Club of South Africa, they first assessed the condition of their charges, and it was agreed that it would be possible to guide them down to safety without having to call for additional backup. Inexplicably, they had brought only one extra headlamp and , in a show of foolish gallantry, the old man forfeited it to the lady, and had to grope his way in the light from one of the mountaineers walking close behind him. Again, it was thanks to his trusty walking poles that he was saved from missing his footing, falling and breaking an ankle.

Well past midnight, they finally reached the end of the trail and found a reception committee awaiting their arrival. Apart from the main rescue vehicle, which looked like an ambulance, there were two emergency services bakkies loaded with all manner of gear. Eight personnel, plus the two mountaineers, had responded to their SOS. A paramedic gave them a thorough examination, declared them unscathed bar some minor cuts, scratches and bruises, and then they were transported back to a meeting point in Rooi Els. There they were reunited with their spouses, who had been waiting in a state of extreme anxiety. Thus ended their ordeal.

*

When I recounted this story to my son, who has met and interacted with his father’s old mate on a number of occasions, he listened with interest before commenting.

“So, they had cell phone reception?”

“Yes, lucky for them.”

“And they didn’t think of using Google Maps when they lost the path?”

I could tell from the tone of his voice his eyebrows were raised and he was shaking his head.

“I don’t know. How would that have helped?”

“They could have used the satellite option and zoomed in to find their way. Dead easy. I use it when I go hiking or exploring coastal and mountain tracks on my scrambler. Could have saved themselves and the rescue team a whole lot of sweat.”

“It’s all very well for you to be disparaging. They are not millennials like you. Not everybody is familiar with all this stuff.”

“That’s for sure. Anyway, it all ended happily. But he must have felt a bit of a fool, getting lost like that? Somewhat embarrassing.”

“He didn’t sound embarrassed. Totally unabashed, in fact. I think he sees it as another accomplishment, being successfully rescued.”

“And it hasn’t knocked his confidence? Maybe he will slow down and start acting like  an old man?”

“I seriously doubt it. Even now he is probably planning his next escapade.”

Inspiration

 

“Do you know the word ‘unguent’?”

“Yes. Unguentum. Ointment. Why do you ask?”

“I was reading The Wasteland again. Or, rather, listening to it. A brilliant delivery by Alec Guinness. In it, Eliot describes the perfumes on a woman’s dressing table as opulent, coming from unguent, powder and liquid. I like the word unguent, but it strikes me as somewhat archaic. I mean, who uses the term these days? How come you are familiar with it?”

She was drawing up her weekly shopping list and not particularly interested in what I had to say.

“If it says ung on a script, it means ointment, and not a cream.”

“Ah, I was forgetting you’re a pharmacist.”

I thought about this for a bit, and felt a little resentful.

“This is humiliating. It means there are millions of doctors, pharmacists and nurses all over the world who know this word. It makes me feel I have been living in ignorance.”

“Don’t worry about it. You don’t know everything, even though you think you do.”

She got up, opened the fridge, stood looking into its interior for a few moments before closing the door and resuming her seat at the table.

“It’s remarkable how all these medical terms have persisted. They are all rooted in Latin or Greek, aren’t they? And who studies Greek or Latin any more? I know you took Latin up to Matric, and I did it to Standard 8, so we have a useful background. But younger generations? The abbreviation for prescription is Rx, isn’t it? But what the hell does it stand for?”

“Recipe. From recipere, to take, or receive.”

“And the x?”

“That was to show it was an abbreviation, I think. See how much sherry is left, please.”

I got off my ass and went to the dresser.

“Only one and a half bottles left. Better stock up. You know what happened in Covid.”

“You should stop dopping it the way you do. The price keeps going up.”

“The odd tipple helps to keep me sane. A little wine now and again, prn, is a lot cheaper than psychiatric medication.”

“Don’t talk rubbish.”

I thought it wise not to dwell on the topic of  my alcohol intake, and instead went back to pharmacy lingo.

“I like prn. To be taken as needed. Pro re nata, right? But what is that literally?”

“Google it.”

“Here we are,” I said after exercising my thumb. “For the thing born. Now that’s obscure! How the hell did they get to that?”

She was looking for specials in the Spar supplement and adding items to her list. She doesn’t believe in using the notebook on her phone, but prefers to write on a sheet of scrap paper or on the back of a used envelope. Miniscule neat handwriting produced by wielding a mechanical pencil with a B lead, HB being just that bit too hard and light, apparently. I marvel at the speed at which she jots things down. It shouldn’t be surprising, though, considering it is a skill that has been practised every day for more than six decades. And to think there are children growing up hardly able to read cursive, let alone write it! What will they do to communicate if, one day, the Internet is sabotaged and they can no longer type on their electronic devices?

“This is arcane. An esoteric code only comprehensible to a select coterie. Tds. Three a day. I would never have guessed. And po? By mouth. Per orum. Alright, So pr is per rectum. Kind of makes sense.

“Look, if you are bored, why don’t you go and listen to a podcast, or something? Aren’t you writing? Writer’s block? What you probably need is a mental laxative, pr.”

“Very funny.”

But not so funny. I got up and went to the study and sat in front of the computer. I had made a start on at least three ideas, but failed to develop them further than a few lifeless lines before giving up. I needed inspiration. Maybe if I started on something, anything, the juices might start flowing. But what? In desperation I typed ‘Unguent.’ Then I proceeded to record our recent conversation.

When I got as far as her suggestion that I listen to a podcast, I paused. What I had been listening to was a 5-part feature called ‘The War Game.’ It was based on the premise that if Russia decided to invade the UK, the Brits would be in serious trouble, having downgraded their military capability since the end of the Cold War. The recent reports on how depleted South Africa’s armed forces had become, made me think of our own vulnerability. Maybe imagining an invasion of South Africa could stimulate my creative urge and provide material for another piece of fiction? It was worth a try. I typed ‘Revolution,’ and sat back to think about a plot and structure.

 

My Hairdresser

 

I have been going to the same hairdresser for 41 years. If, on average, she has cut my hair every two months, it only requires a simple arithmetic calculation to multiply six by forty-one, and arrive at the number of times she has given me a haircut. 241.

Unqualified, she has never aspired to pursue hairdressing as a profession, and styling is of little concern to her, beyond keeping the appearance of her non-paying client tidy enough to avoid him being mistaken for a homeless man who sleeps under a bridge.

Her equipment is basic, consisting of nothing more than a pair of scissors and a comb. The scissors were replaced once, some time ago. She still has the same pink comb she started out with, only it has lost several of its teeth, as I have, as a consequence of ageing and general wear and tear.

When she began four decades ago, I still had a full head of hair, and my beard was long and heavily luxuriant, like that of an Old Testament prophet’s. Over the years, however, my hairline receded so far I was reclassified as bald, and now she has only the sparse growth about temples, ears and back of neck to contend with. As for the beard, it, too, requires less attention. This is because no hair grows von the barren slopes of my left cheek, the area having been blasted by six weeks of radiation at the end of 2022. Surprisingly, nobody has ever asked me, ‘Why is your beard lopsided?’, or, ‘Are you trying to make a fashion statement?’

Her technique is somewhat unconventional. She requires me to remove my shirt, regardless of the ambient temperature, be it a comfortable 25 degrees in summer, or ten above freezing in winter, and seat myself on a low stool without backrest in the centre of the room. Starting with my head, she runs her fingers through what hair there is, and snips of the protruding growth, thus reducing everything to a uniform length. Then she tackles the sideburns, using the pink comb instead of her fingers to achieve a similar but closer trim. Before moving on from the head, she snips off the spiky little strands that dare to break through the naked dome of my skull. With a rapid bouncing motion she dances about on the lunar surface, snapping at wayward tendrils before finishing with a few puffs from her leaf blower. Very funny. I am sure she would regard me as more manly  if I had never been smitten with baldness.

Next, she tackles the moustache, which is inclined to overhang my upper lip and interfere with core functions like eating and drinking. Hanging a shaggy curtain in front of one’s mouth can also restrict the ability to derive shared erogenous pleasure from the lips, which should remain exposed below the double curve of the vermillion border, not known as Cupid’s bow for nothing.

Finally, the beard. She sighs at the daunting prospect of trying to balance the two sides of my face, and sets to work. Who can blame her if, on closer inspection, my physiognomy is so asymmetrical it verges on the grotesque?

When she tells me to stand up for fine tuning, I do so with immense relief, having had to hold an upright posture on that stool for fifteen minutes or more, all the while being told to keep my head up, and to stop slouching, scratching and fidgeting. To alleviate the boredom and discomfort of sitting there, I sometimes engage in desultory conversation with my hairdresser, or I allow my mind to wander. On occasions her close physical presence has led my thoughts and imagination into situations that result in a feeling of incipient tumescence, and I have to force myself to concentrate on mundane tasks that await my attention, like cutting the grass or chopping wood.

As for the fine tuning, this entails turning my head to the left and to the right several times so she can trim a few hairs here and there. She stands back and appraises her handiwork. I am instructed to bend my head forward before tipping it back to expose the throat and underside of chin. Eventually, to complete the outlandish ritual, I must rotate 360 degrees clockwise and 360 anti-clockwise. Only then can I hurry out to the garden, where she cleans me up with a brush from the broom cupboard. Like a shy maiden, I protect my nipple from the sharp ends of the bristles.

I put my shirt back on, thank her for her pro bono services, and declare that my hair and beard feel so much better. For the next day or two I catch her looking at me admiringly. “You look so handsome!” she says, and we chuckle at her choice of adjective.

In the Lavatory with AI

 

 

Mister Albert Russel is Daddy’s boss. He sometimes comes on a Saturday to drink beer, eat chips and watch TV. This is when his wife hosts her Bible study group. Tonight, he is sitting with Mummy on the couch. I am on the one-seater sofa, and Daddy is in his ergonomic recliner with adjustable footrest. Johnny is in his room, either slaughtering zombies or watching porn and masturbating.

In the flickering light I can see Mister Albert Russell has placed a hand on Mummy’s thigh just below the hem of her short skirt. She giggles and pushes his hand away. Daddy is staring at the screen and looks like death warmed up. The actors appear menacing. Which one will make the first move?

Another giggle and then a gasp. He has probably got his little finger into her panties.

“For God’s sake, Mummy!” I shout. “Stop behaving like an old prostitute.”

“Oh, shut up, you little online slut! I’m surprised you are not out sucking some stranger’s cock again.”

Mister Allbert Russell gets to his feet and says he is going to the lavatory. Mummy also rises and follows him.

“What’s Mummy doing with Mister Albert Russell in the lavatory?” Johnny demands as he enters the living room.

“What do you think she’s doing?”

“Jesus! My own mother! In the lavatory! Daddy, do you want me to fuck him up when they come out? What the hell are you doing on your phone in this time of great crisis?”

Daddy holds up a hand as if to say, just hold on a moment.

After a few more minutes he finally looks up.

“I am getting some advice from AI on how to handle this distressing and embarrassing situation. I have described what is happening and asked for a possible way to arrive at a satisfactory outcome.”

“And what do they say?”

“I will read it to you. ‘Daddy, although visibly shaken, gestures for calm. "No violence," he says firmly, his voice cutting through the tension. Mummy looks torn, her guilt palpable. But instead of further confrontation, Daddy suggests a family meeting the next day. They sit down together, discussing boundaries and honesty. Mummy tearfully admits her mistake, apologizing to everyone. Mister Albert Russell's visits cease, and while trust is fractured, the family decides to work on rebuilding it. Through therapy and open communication, they navigate the aftermath, focusing on healing and forgiveness.’

“Fuck that shit!” Johnny says, as he hunches his shoulders like a gorilla and pumps up his biceps. “What about justice and retribution? What about revenge?” He strides from the room in a way that suggests he will be coming back with serious intentions.

Mummy and Mister Albert Russell reappear, both looking flushed and a little glassy-eyed. He picks up his jacket and is putting it on when Johnny comes in holding his cricket bat as if he is about to use it as a weapon. Mister Albert Russell feels inside his jacket and produces a pistol that looks like a toy.

“Keep back, or I will shoot you in the groin!” he shouts.

Johnny swings his bat and knocks the gun from the outstretched hand. At the same time there is a bang like a fire cracker and mummy screams and clutches her left leg just below the hip. There is a trickle of blood running down her leg. Johnny raises the bat on high and whacks it down hard on top of Mister Albert Russell’s head, causing him to collapse and lie prone on the carpet. Daddy has fallen back in his recliner and looks as white as a corpse.

“I hope he hasn’t had a heart attack.”

“No,” I say. “He has just fainted. You know what a wimp he is.”

“Well,” says Johnny, surveying the scene with satisfaction. “Justice has been served and the miscreants have been taught a lesson. This is a far more satisfactory conclusion to the sordid story than that AI crap.”

 

When asked to summarize and analyse this short story, this is what  it  responded with:.

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Summary

The story unfolds in a dysfunctional family setting during a Saturday evening. Mister Albert Russell, the father's boss, is visiting. While the family watches TV, it becomes clear that Mister Russell is making sexual advances towards the mother, who reciprocates. The narrator, a child in the family, reacts with disgust, leading to a heated exchange of insults. The mother and Mister Russell disappear into the lavatory together, prompting further outrage from the narrator’s brother, Johnny.

The father, passive throughout, seeks advice from an AI on his phone about how to handle the situation. The AI suggests a calm, therapeutic resolution involving family discussion and healing. Johnny, however, rejects this approach, demanding justice and retribution.

When the mother and Mister Russell return, Johnny confronts them with a cricket bat. Mister Russell produces a gun, but Johnny disarms him, accidentally resulting in the mother being shot in the leg. Johnny then knocks Mister Russell unconscious. The father faints, and Johnny declares that true justice has been served, dismissing the AI's advice as unsatisfactory.

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Psychological Analysis

Family Dysfunction and Emotional Detachment

• Parental Roles: The parents are emotionally absent and morally compromised. The mother is unfaithful and verbally abusive, while the father is passive, seeking external (AI) solutions rather than confronting issues directly.
• Children’s Reactions: The children display a mix of cynicism, anger, and detachment. The narrator is observant but powerless, Johnny is violent and reactive, and the family dynamic is marked by a lack of healthy communication or support.

AI as a Surrogate for Human Agency

• The father's reliance on AI reflects a psychological retreat from responsibility. Instead of engaging with the crisis, he seeks a sanitized, external solution, highlighting a modern tendency to outsource moral decision-making to technology.
• The AI’s advice is rational, non-violent, and focused on healing, but it is perceived as inadequate by the family, especially Johnny, whose need for immediate, visceral justice overrides reasoned approaches.

Escalation and Catharsis

• The story’s climax—violence and chaos—serves as a cathartic release of pent-up frustration and helplessness. Johnny’s actions, though extreme, are portrayed as a more "satisfying" resolution than the AI’s suggestion, reflecting a psychological craving for direct action and retribution when faced with betrayal and powerlessness.

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Moral Analysis

Betrayal and Responsibility

• Moral Failings: The story is rife with moral lapses—infidelity, disrespect, and violence. Each character fails in their moral duties: the mother betrays her family, the father abdicates responsibility, Mister Russell abuses his position, and Johnny resorts to violence.
• Justice vs. Forgiveness: The AI’s advice embodies modern ideals of restorative justice—dialogue, accountability, and healing. In contrast, Johnny represents a more primal, retributive sense of justice, where wrongdoers are punished directly and physically.

Technology and Morality

• The story critiques the idea that technology (AI) can resolve deep-seated human conflicts. While AI offers a theoretically sound solution, it is emotionally unsatisfying for the characters, who crave immediate and tangible consequences.
• There is an implicit warning about over-reliance on technology for moral guidance, suggesting that true resolution requires human courage and engagement, not just algorithmic advice.

The Limits of Rationality

• The narrative exposes the limits of rational, therapeutic approaches in the face of raw, emotional crises. While the AI’s solution is idealistic, it fails to account for the intensity of human emotions like rage, shame, and the desire for vengeance.

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Conclusion

"In the Lavatory with AI" is a darkly comic exploration of family dysfunction, betrayal, and the inadequacy of technological solutions to human problems. Psychologically, it delves into the effects of emotional neglect, powerlessness, and the need for catharsis. Morally, it contrasts restorative and retributive justice, ultimately questioning whether rationality and forgiveness can prevail over the messiness of human emotion and the craving for retribution. The story leaves us with a sobering reflection on the limits of both technology and reason in resolving the deepest crises of the human heart.

 

Memory Project: My Green Spectacle Case

 

I recently chanced upon this spectacle case when rummaging through a bottom drawer filled with miscellaneous junk. The sight of it got me thinking about the history of my accursed affliction.

At the beginning of 1958 Alan was enrolled at Chaplin High School and entered Form 1. Towards the end of Standard 5 he had already begun to have difficulty seeing what was written on the blackboard, and high school proved a challenge. The optician he was taken to was unable to correct his myopia with glasses, and he was referred to a specialist in Bulawayo. He was diagnosed with a hereditary condition affecting the retina and was told that there was no treatment currently available.

If the condition was hereditary, both my parents probably thought, it couldn’t be from their side of the family, there being no record of it, as far as they knew.  They would have been unaware of Mendel’s experiments with peas and his rules governing the inheritance of traits. They would have known nothing about recessive genes and the way a trait can skip many generations until the carriers of a faulty code meet and mate.

At the start of 1963 I also moved up to Chaplin and went into Form 1. It was in the maths class that I discovered my eyesight had deteriorated, leaving me unable to follow the explanation of algebraic equations on the board. Thus began the relentless onset of Stargardt disease, an autosomal recessive gene disorder for which there is still no treatment.

According to Mendelian rules my parents, as unwitting carriers of the dodgy gene, had a 1 in 4 chance of producing offspring with the disorder. For their first child to be afflicted was unfortunate, for the second to get it was 1 in 16 bad luck, but for the third to have it was a 1 in 64 blow that could lead one to suspect that a malevolent force was deliberately victimizing the Martin family. Jean’s turn came four years later when we were back in Fish Hoek.

Stargardt disease has been a handicap and then a disability. For the first 30 years, while it made life difficult and put me at a disadvantage, I was able to lead a fairly normal life. Then, in the last 25 years it has disabled me in two important ways. Not being able to read or drive have made it almost impossible to work and earn a living. I am now heavily dependent on my wife and, to a lesser extent, our two children.

I feel very little pity for myself, and have never asked stupid questions like, Why me? As a rational atheist it would be pointless cursing God, or Providence, or Fate.  Nor do I believe that having to cope with this lifelong affliction has made me a stronger character. Stoicism and an ironical cynicism have helped, but I regard myself with a certain amount of self-loathing, and feel that I have probably got what I deserve.

The spectacle case was originally one of my mother’s. A section of the material covering it is torn and reveals the aluminium beneath it.  The glasses did little to correct my myopia, and being excessively self-conscious I never wore them. I have not yet decided whether to throw the case in the dustbin, or to preserve it as an interesting artefact of historical interest, and drop it back in the drawer along with the other now useless relics from the past.

There can be no doubt that my parents were blameless in transmitting the dodgy gene to all three of their offspring. However, in my case, I stand guilty of having risked the possibility of subjecting my children to an incurable hereditary disorder. At the time, I knew there was a chance they could inherit my disability, yet I went ahead and committed premeditated reproduction, not once but twice.

That was some 40 years ago. Now, with a better understanding of recessive gene disorders, and having experienced the effect of Stargardt disease, I would urge anyone who knows they might be a carrier of the faulty ABCA4 gene to take advantage of modern genetic screening before condemning a child to the kind of crap I, and my siblings, have had to contend with.

 

 

 

I asked perplexity.ai to explain how Stargardt could be passed to all three of a couple’s children, and this is what it told me:

 

Stargardt disease, an autosomal recessive disorder, requires both parents to pass a mutated ABCA4 gene to their offspring. While the typical inheritance pattern predicts a 25% chance per child, all three offspring inheriting the condition is statistically unlikely but biologically possible. Here's how this can occur:

Genetic Mechanism

1. Carrier Parents: Each parent has one functional ABCA4 gene and one mutated copy. Since carriers don’t exhibit symptoms29, they may be unaware of their genetic status.
2. Inheritance Odds:
• 25% chance a child inherits two mutated copies (one from each parent) and develops Stargardt disease.
• 50% chance the child becomes a carrier (one mutated copy).
• 25% chance the child inherits no mutated copies24.
3. Statistical Probability: While each pregnancy is independent, the probability of all three children inheriting two mutated alleles is 0.253=1.56%0.253=1.56%4. Though rare, this outcome is possible due to random assortment of genes during reproduction.

Factors Influencing Outcomes

• Allele Severity: Some ABCA4 variants are "mild" and may not cause childhood-onset symptoms, complicating predictions about when or if symptoms manifest.
• Incomplete Penetrance: Rare cases may involve environmental or genetic modifiers affecting disease expression, though this is less common in Stargardt disease.

Real-World Context

Most autosomal recessive disorders like cystic fibrosis or sickle cell anemia follow similar inheritance patterns. Genetic testing can identify carrier status, but without screening, families might only discover their risk after having an affected child67. For Stargardt disease, the estimated risk for offspring of carriers ranges from 1.6% to 3.1%, depending on allele severity combinations8.

In summary, while unlikely, the inheritance of Stargardt disease in all three children of carrier parents reflects the probabilistic nature of genetic transmission rather than a deviation from Mendelian principles.

 

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