McDougals Ahoy
( A Short Story by R.A.Krishna)
(This work is the copyright of the author and may not be reproduced, duplicated, printed or published, in print or through electronic media, without his permission)
President Wesley Douglas put a weary hand on his brow and asked his Secretary of State “What on earth is going on in Mars?” “Nothing we cannot handle Wes” said Raman his advisor and friend. Both gentlemen had been friends from college, the African American and the Indian whose family had been in the country for more than ten generations. With whites reduced to a minority and being addressed by pejorative such as Cauc, after Caucasian, America was a different place altogether. Hence, the African American and the Indian in the august presence of Lincoln and Jefferson.
Douglas was worried about what his sponsors, a group of companies led by the McDougal Corporation, would say with his next campaign for re-election to the Presidency only one year away in 2092. Ever since, 2015 Presidents were given only three-year terms and were expected to produce results within the first year itself. The Government could no longer afford the high costs of administration and every aspect of government activity had been taken over by the Corporations. Each department was given to one of the corporations to be run as a profit centre. There was a bit of trouble when several bureaucrats chose to commit suicide en masse rather than go through the painful process of relocation to bureaucratic Siberia. Nonetheless, the human race is adaptable and it was surprising how quickly things calmed down.
The American mission to Mars had gone in 2036 and it found intelligent life for the first time deep underground. Huge tunnels had been created, due to seismic activity in the planet, and the present inhabitants of Mars had got Oxygen within these tunnels, which preserved life. By tapping the sun’s energy on the surface and by a device, which let the sun’s energy flow direct from the source, they were able to create artificial lighting or a 'virtual sun' by which, they were able to grow plants for their food even there. The Martians had migrated from another planet and had therefore remained undetected by the various missions flown to that planet from Earth.
The Martians, who resembled human beings, were robust people as they lived entirely on grains, vegetables and fruits grown organically. They were extremely wise in their behaviour and had graduated from the kind of animal thinking that plagued Earth even at this stage. They were always blessed with abundance and did not have nor need any medium of exchange. Most things that were rationed in Earth, were there for the asking in Mars and there was no concept of lack there. From Earth, several missions had gone to Mars and most had been sponsored by the big Corporations who ran everything on Earth. The big names were Lepsy Cola, Loca Cola (derived from the Golden Oldie "Living La Vida Loca") and McDougal's, all of which were the successors to the erstwhile brands of the 20th century. With pollution having spoiled most of earth, it was necessary to find an alternative source for supply of farm products to be made into the food products sold on Earth. Mars seemed a promising source, as people there lived a simple life and had not yet managed to pollute the planet. McDougals, the food processing kings of earth were looking to source their entire farm produce from Mars from the huge virtual dome they had made over 60,000 sq. km. The CO2 heavy atmosphere of Mars created a conducive ambience for the purpose. The oxygen let off by the plants during the day could be recycled at night. They were also looking to tap the Martian markets and wean the Martians off food such as grain, vegetables and fruits and introduce them to their beef burgers, chicken nuggets etc. The big snag was the difference in the concept of value by the Earth based corporations and the Martians. Since the Martians had no wants beyond their immediate needs of food and shelter, the difficulty lay in making them want anything. However, in the best tradition of Dollaria (formerly USA) Multinationals, McDougals felt that creation of wants was only a matter of time. Since the Martians were unable to offer money, MC were looking to get produce in exchange for their burgers and fries.
Life was difficult for the McDougal Corporation as chickens and cows were not breeding because of radiation, contamination from Chernobyl and other such disasters, the last of which was the missile disaster that polluted the waters and land of most parts of Europe and America. The Internet hackers had indirectly been responsible for the disaster. After hackers had got into all the major E Mail sites such as Yahoo and Hotmail in 2000, they had got bolder and infiltrated the sites of establishments such as NASA, nuclear reactors and other such sensitive sites. The whole world was net enabled by 2005 and everyone depended on the Internet for their existence. Homemakers used the Internet for whiling away leisure time, that had grown in leaps and bounds, to surf, chat, play games with assorted strangers and for other purposes. It was possible to power appliances through the Internet. Microwave ovens, washing machines, dishwashers, TV sets, Stereos and every other device and its mother-in-law was net enabled. Soon however, the plague of hackers came to the homes of people, to those of the rich at first and then to every home. It became intolerable when washing machines and stereos came on of their own accord. It was difficult to get a night's sleep when it was rudely interrupted by the whirr of the washing machine or the loud boom of 1990s disco music. When the hackers were infiltrated by terrorist groups, the ICBM disaster happened in 2065, when Seoul and Shenzhen were wiped off the map by nuclear missiles that had been stored by the US Govt. and were controlled through the network. Someone managed to hack the President's password and activated the missiles. This led to reprisals by what was then called the People's Republic of China and the Democratic Republic of Korea. The nuclear carnage that followed led to large areas being rendered inhospitable for cultivation or any other use in Europe and America.
The White scourge, a disease that attacked those with a lower level of Melanin, had wiped off a large portion of the Caucasian population in the USA, or, as it was now called, Dollaria. Apparently, a diet of hamburgers and fries was not sufficient to create resistance from diseases. Whites became a minority and had a difficult time coping with their new-found status. The Corporations had a contingency plan, however, and a number of Indians and Hispanics as also African Americans had suddenly been inducted to the top echelons of the companies. The WTO had paved the way for American companies to swamp the markets of countries such as India. After these companies had patented the local foods such as idli, dosai and chapathis, no one was permitted to make these in India or any other part of the world. In 2022, the Indians could get no food except burgers, fries, pizzas and burritos. Even orthodox Hindus were unable to eat their traditional vegetarian food and had to start eating alien food with a liberal portion of meat to survive. Several orthodox Indians preferred to starve rather than eat the food available. The patenting of foods had led to riots in 2018, when the Indian Govt. under pressure to enforce patents had started shooting at sight anyone trying to make idlis or chapathis at home. In 2020, all the other Indian foods, which were listed in detail in " The Complete Glossary of Indian Cookery", were patented by a consortium of American and European food companies. The legal battles that resulted had been decided in favour of the corporations by the World Trade Organisation, the head of which retired comfortably with the substantial 'speed payment' made to him by the patent holders. His successor had the task of enforcing the patents and had managed to pressurise the Indian Govt. headed by the candidate put up by the Dependable Industries Ltd., to pass a law banning the preparation of food items patented anywhere in the world without a licence from the patent holders. DIL had managed to get several patents passed on as consideration for this law from the American consortium and had started a chain of dosai franchises all over India. Since the franchises were a monopoly and no Udipi restaurant could make this item, there was a hefty profit margin in it. Most of the owners of Udipi hotels had perforce to seek employment in the franchises which were owned and managed by the relatives and cronies of the controlling family of DIL.
By 2021, the entire chain of dosai franchises had been spun off as a separate company and the controlling family of DIL had become richer by $ 32 billion by the sale of this unit. The buyers were none other than the American consortium who decided against continuing this line. The line was revived only in 2032, when extreme obesity and high incidence of cardiac disease led to the corporation reviewing its policy of burgers and fries only for India. Apparently, medical studies in the 1990s had led to the conclusion that the traditional American diet quaintly termed then as 'junk food' was a health hazard. With the population of India having reduced considerably due to heart and other diseases caused by the change in dietary habits and the prevalence of the internet that led to Indians being stay at home creatures, there was a need to reverse the trend.
The other reason for interest in Mars was for growing newer strains of grain free of radiation, pollution and miscellaneous perils of earth life. The Corporation was also concerned that the patent laws applied only to Earth and this left it open to the risk of other corporations opening franchises in Mars and manufacturing foods and other items there for sale on Earth. With the costs of transport having come down considerably after expiry of the patent on the Solaric, a device that cost barely $2 and could be fitted on to anything, there was the possibility of anyone being able to go to space. The Solar power device, had been developed independently in 2008 by a maverick scientist called Tomas Bjorkmann of Denmark who had declared his intention of giving his patent free to anyone who wanted it. Bjorkmann died mysteriously in an accident. His relatives sold the patent to the Solarus Corporation, who reintroduced the same device at a cost of $50,000 in limited editions. The Governments had decided that there was too much risk of people clogging the skies and had introduced a highly selective passport system to regulate space traffic. Now however, with a lot of pressure from the populace, the restrictions on space travel were about to come to an end. The Solaric was expected to boost the prospect of travelling in space and make the entire process simple and cheap. Business risks were therefore far greater towards the end of the 21st Century than earlier. The century had seen the rise and fall of several businesses. The Internet revolution had come and gone. Most of the servers had closed down due to lack of custom from people who were scared off by hackers who got into homes and into bank accounts electronically. There was no safety from such attacks. The hand powered washing machine made a comeback in 2075 and this was followed by other 'dumb' machines that could be used by anyone without working them through the net. William H. Gates and other software developers, who had exited their businesses of making proprietary software when the net rendered their businesses obsolete, due to alternatives being available free, were contacted at the vacation spots where they had gone to settle down. The purpose was to get them to once again build systems for stand alone computers. Gates refused initially and then demurred. A think tank of old timers such as Gates, Jobs and others got together to revive the systems before the Internet. Slowly, they were able to bring about a semblance of order in computer systems harking back to the days before the Net. Paper money was reintroduced instead of electronic smart cards that did not work without electronic networks.
NASA resumed space flights in 2070 after a prolonged hiatus caused by the missile disaster. The missions to Mars focused on the possible commercial use of land on that planet. On the fifteenth such flight in 2075, Lewis James, the Marketing Director of the McDougal Corporation was struck with the idea of building a virtual dome over Mars to keep the atmosphere contained and grow plants on the Martian soil. Finally, only 60,000 square kilometres of the terrain was found hospitable for agriculture and poultry farming. Soon McDougal's was able to implement its idea and source the entire requirement of chickens, cows and potatoes from Mars. Since MC was the sole supplier of non-contaminated foodstuff on Earth, it was able to monopolise supply of food on Earth. Mars was another story. The Martians told James that they had no interest in the products offered by MC and instead offered James their famed hospitality and good vegetarian food. The idea of killing living beings was abhorrent to the Martians and they tried repeatedly to convert James to their vegetarian ways. Sadly, company policy forbade James from eating anything but beef burgers and chicken nuggets, apart from the occasional milk shake. Pansha, the Martian Chief liked James but found it difficult to understand his company policy. He even offered James a permanent home in the Martian underground, but James refused saying his heart belonged to Earth. As slaughter was not permitted on Mars, the livestock had to be transported to Earth in a live state. This created logistic problems before one of MC's engineers thought of a slaughterhouse spaceship. The only snag was disposal of animal waste. The solution offered was to dump this on one of the moons of Mars (as the Moon near Earth had already been riddled with toxic and nuclear waste).
So what was the problem that President Douglas was worried about. It was the protest made by the group of Martians led by Prousha, who wanted their Chief to banish the animal killers of Earth from their planet. Somehow, they were able to get wind of the slaughterhouse spaceships and the pollution being caused by them to the Martian Moon's surface. All the blandishments offered by MC officials to the protesters were in vain. Since the Martians did not have any concept of value, as all their wants were being met, there was nothing that could be used to bribe them. This situation was totally new to the officials of MC and to people of Earth, who had got used to wheeling and dealing as a way of life. Finally, the Martian Chief had no alternative but to send the McDougal Corporation away. The loss on this heavy investment in Mars made the Corporation file for bankruptcy. Tim McDougal, the last Chairman of the McDougal board was not too shattered at the closure. His statement at the Press Conference after filing for Chapter 11 proceedings was " So we lost in Mars as far as food is concerned. Hey we still have Jupiter and Saturn for starting a new food venture. And come to think of it, there is plenty of scope for selling clothes in Mars. No one wears them there at present. We shall introduce Lockey and Nevis to them!"
