Chomsky: The Sitcom Episode 6: "Lobes of Omission"

This is the latest episode in my proposed HBO seriesChomsky: The Sitcom. Once again, the series draws inspiration from the wonderful memoir by Bev Stohl. However, I emphasize that the characters in the series do not intentionally resemble any real individuals. Stohl has emphasized Noam's deep humanity, which she witnessed as his office manager for about a quarter of a century, organizing his lectures, book signings, and interviews with humans of every walk of life. Her memoir is warm, funny, and intelligent.

CHARACTERS:

• NOAM CHOMSKY: The weary public philosopher.

• BEV: His loyal, toughness-personified office manager.

• GLENN: The neurotic intern.

• LAURA: Bev's partner, a psychologist.

• MYSTERY MAN (APPLEGATE): The squatter in Building 20.

• ISHY & TOBY: Yuppie joggers.

• GEN Z HATER & BOOMER SUPPORTER: Bookstore attendees.

• HENRY KISSINGER (DEEPFAKE): An AI avatar.

• JEFFREY EPSTEIN (DREAM): A nightmare figure.

• CHORUS: Disembodied voices.

Chomsky: The Sitcom

Episode 6: "Lobes of Omission"

SCENE 2: EXT. STATA BUILDING - MORNING

[Noam walks toward the Stata Building, looking exhausted. He pauses to glare at the "drunken" angles of the building. Two joggers, ISHY and TOBY, trot into the frame wearing high-end spandex.]

ISHY (Slowing down) Well, look who it is. The private calendar keeper.

TOBY Don't engage, Ishy. He's radioactive.

NOAM Morning. Lovely day to run away from the consequences of late-stage capitalism.

ISHY (Stopping completely) Reality? You want reality? Here.

[Ishy reaches into his backpack and pulls out a signed copy of Manufacturing Consent. He doesn't hand it to Noam; he plops it onto the pavement at Noam's feet.

TOBY (Pulling out his own copy of Hegemony or Survival) Yeah. Consider our consent withdrawn.

[Toby plops his book down. It lands with a heavy thud on top of Ishy's.]

ISHY How's that for a deep structure? You and the financier.

NOAM It was a matter of moving funds! It was technical. It was...

TOBY (Jogging away) It was a flight log, Noam! Why didn't you tell us?

ISHY (Calling back) Judas!

[Noam stares at the books on the ground. He steps over them and enters the building.]

CUT TO:

SCENE 3: INT. BUILDING 20 STORAGE ROOM

[The MYSTERY MAN (Applegate) is in his lair, surrounded by junk. He has set up a crude stage with a mousetrap on a table. He wears a velvet doublet.]

NOAM (Entering) Hello? Applegate? I need a quiet place. The joggers are throwing my bibliography at me.

MYSTERY MAN (Spinning around) Soft! The fair Ophelia! You are just in time, Noam.

NOAM In time for what?

MYSTERY MAN I have prepared a piece. A "Mousetrap," if you will. To catch the conscience of the King.

NOAM (Sitting on a squeaky chair) Well. I'm not a King. I'm a linguist.

MYSTERY MAN (Ignoring him, discordant accordion music plays) The play is the thing!

[Mystery Man puts on a grey wig and holds up a doll dressed as a professor.]

MYSTERY MAN (Singing/Reciting) I have a plane, a private plane. It flies to islands in the rain. The Professor says, "I need to move some money for a tax-free groove." The calendar is marked in red, With secrets that are never said!

[Mystery Man dances closer to Noam, dangling the doll in Noam's face.]

MYSTERY MAN Did you know? Did you see? Or were you as blind as blind can be? Guilt is a ghost that eats the brain. Like architecture causing pain!

[He snaps the mousetrap. SNAP!]

NOAM (Unmoved) Is that it?

MYSTERY MAN (Suddenly dropping the character. The music stops. He looks grave.) No. That's not it. Stop the rhymes. (He points a finger at Noam, channeling the voice of Chris Hedges) You weren't fooled by the "Gegnome," Noam. You were seduced.

NOAM (Uncomfortable) I was seeking technical assistance.

MYSTERY MAN The ruling class offers nothing without expecting something in return! You know the predatory nature of capitalists, Noam. You wrote the book on it! And yet... you sat at the table. You let the vampire in because he offered you a "tax-free groove." That is an unforgivable stain.

NOAM (Standing up, clutching his arm slightly) I... I have to go. The acoustics in here are terrible.

CUT TO:

SCENE 4: INT. GLENN'S OFFICE

[GLENN is pacing frantically among his stuffed gnomes. BEV is stress-eating yogurt. LAURA (Bev's partner) is reading from a tablet.]

GLENN It's trending, Bev. It's trending hard. "Chomsky" and "Epstein" are in the same hashtag. This is bad for my internship. I'm going to be cancelled by association!

LAURA Calm down, Glenn. We're looking at Vale'ria's open letter. It might be a way out.

BEV Yeah, listen to Laura. She's analyzing the text.

LAURA (Reading) Okay, this phrasing is actually workable. "Unknowingly, we opened a door to a Trojan horse."

BEV That's good. That's poetic. It frames Noam as the victim of ancient Greek warfare, not a guy looking for tax advice.

LAURA And she says Epstein acted "solely as a financial advisor" to help with "inconsistencies in his retirement resources."

GLENN (Stopping) "Inconsistencies in retirement resources"? That is genius! It sounds so boring that people will stop reading!

LAURA Exactly. It frames the whole thing as a pension error. Like he forgot to carry the one.

BEV (Pointing at Glenn) Run with that, Dibs. Noam wasn't "encircled" by a predator. He was just an old man confused by the erratic nature of the stock market!

GLENN (Typing furiously) "Noam Chomsky: Victim of the 401(k) Industrial Complex."

LAURA (Reading further) She also says they express "unrestricted solidarity with the victims."

BEV Good. Solidarity is his brand. Stick "unrestricted" in bold. That should hold them off at the book signing today.

CUT TO:

SCENE 5: INT. MIT STUDENT CENTER - BOOK SIGNING

[NOAM sits alone at a long table stacked high with copies of The Myth of American Idealism. There is no line. The room is empty except for GLENN, who is nervously arranging pens, and two people standing ten feet apart: A GEN Z HATER (dyed hair, holding a phone) and a BABY BOOMER SUPPORTER (grey ponytail, tie-dye shirt).]

NOAM (Looking around) Well. It seems the manufacturing of consent does not extend to book sales today.

GLENN It's the algorithm, Noam! You've been shadow-banned.

GEN Z HATER (Stepping forward, phone recording) We aren't here for books, Gnome! We're here for accountability! Why did you want to hack the code?

NOAM I am a linguist. I cracked the syntax of the human mind, not...

GEN Z HATER (Interrupting) The "Gegnome" Project! We saw the emails! You and the Pedophile were going to mutate adult stem cells to create a master race of super-talkers!

BOOMER SUPPORTER (Stepping in front of the table) Hey! Back off, junior! The man is a national treasure!

GEN Z HATER He's a gatekeeping girlboss for the oligarchy! He left us naked in the eveling sun!

BOOMER SUPPORTER (Regurgitating the spin) He was encircled! It was a Trojan Horse!

GEN Z HATER Trojan Horse? He flew on the jet!

BOOMER SUPPORTER (Quoting Vale'ria's letter verbatim) It was an inconsistency in his retirement resources! He was seeking technical assistance regarding a private financial matter! Have some respect for his pension!

GEN Z HATER Respect? For a guy who hung out with the "patron"? (He bends down and rips off his chunky sneaker.) This is for the signals intelligence!

[The Gen Z Hater hurls the sneaker. Noam, seasoned by decades of academic warfare, ducks casually to the left. The shoe hits a stack of Manufacturing Consent.]

NOAM (Mildly) Your aim is as poor as your grasp of nuance.

BOOMER SUPPORTER You assault the Prophet?! (The Boomer rips off a heavy orthopedic Birkenstock.) Eat ergonomic cork, you fascist!

[The Boomer hurls the sandal. The Gen Z kid ducks. The sandal sails over his head and shatters a bust of Bertrand Russell, known to have carried on with TS Eliot's wife.]

GEN Z HATER (Dodging) Boomer cringe!

[The Gen Z kid throws the other sneaker. Noam leans right. Misses.]

NOAM (To Glenn) Glenn, are we logging these projectiles?

BOOMER SUPPORTER (Throwing his other sandal) Unrestricted solidarity!

[The Gen Z kid ducks again, but slips on the first shoe. He crashes into the Boomer. They grapple on the floor, rolling around in a pile of unsigned books.]

GEN Z HATER (Choking the Boomer) He wanted to clone himself!

BOOMER SUPPORTER (Pulling the kid's hair) He was overly trusting! He didn't perceive the strategy!

[While they wrestle, Noam sighs, picks up the Gen Z kid's thrown sneaker from the table, uncaps his pen, and signs the sole.]

NOAM (To Glenn) Well. Put this on eBay. We might as well resolve the inconsistencies in my retirement resources.

CUT TO:

SCENE 6: INT. NOAM'S OFFICE

[Noam sits at his desk. He looks paler than usual. [BEV enters.]

BEV Noam, the DARPA interview is linked up.

NOAM (Rubbing his temple) Why did we agree to this, Bev?

BEV Because they threatened to audit your inbox if you didn't. Just get it over with. It's about "Living Forever."

[Bev leaves. Noam turns to the large screen. On it is an interactive Deepfake avatar of HENRY KISSINGER. The avatar glows with a blue digital sheen and speaks with a heavy German accent.]

KISSINGER AVATAR Dr. Chomsky. It is... fascinating to see you again. Even if I am merely code and you are merely... carbon.

NOAM Well. I see DARPA has decided that death shouldn't be an impediment to war crimes.

KISSINGER AVATAR Ve are discussing "Living Forever," Noam. The technology is here. Digital consciousness. You and I could debate for eternity. The dialectic never ends.

NOAM (Dryly) That sounds like a description of Hell.

KISSINGER AVATAR But think of the survivability! The continuity of leadership!

NOAM Survivability? You want to talk about survivability? Let's look at the Doomsday Clock. It is seconds to midnight.

KISSINGER AVATAR Ah, the clock. Tick, tock. But why let a little thing like midnight stop us? With this technology, the elite can survive even the mushroom clouds.

NOAM That is exactly the problem. The three threats to human survivability: nuclear war, environmental catastrophe, and the destruction of democracy. And you want to add a fourth: the immortal tyrant.

KISSINGER AVATAR (Glitching slightly) Ve... Ve... Ve did what was necessary... But Noam, forget biological survival. I am talking about digital legacy. Ve have the patents. Meta has paved the way.

NOAM I do not want a Facebook account, Henry.

KISSINGER AVATAR But imagine! An AI trained on your specific "signals." It will simulate your social media activity forever. Even after your carbon body fails, "Noam-Bot" will be there to critique American imperialism.

NOAM A machine posting in my name?

KISSINGER AVATAR It will respond to comments! It will "like" posts! It will provide "comfort" to your followers who miss you. You can manufacture consent from beyond the grave! We will keep you posting forever, Noam. You will never be allowed to be silent.

NOAM (Horrified, clutching his chest) That isn't comfort. That is a "Ghost Bot." It is the ultimate alienation of labor-- the labor of being alive!

KISSINGER AVATAR (Glitching worse now, voice stuttering) The content... must... flow... necessary... necessary...

NOAM (Voice rising, agitated) Necessary? You speak of necessity while the species marches toward the precipice? We are looking at the end of organized human life! The clock is not just ticking, Henry, it is--

[Suddenly, Noam gasps. His face goes slack. His hand flies to his chest. He tries to speak, but only a wet, choking sound comes out. His eyes widen in total horror as he realizes the silence is coming.]

NOAM It is--

[Noam slumps forward. He freezes. The room is silent.]

[CUT TO BLACK.]

[NO CREDITS.]

(Press Play to hear TS Eliot reading an excerpt from East Coker (Four Quartets):

https://youtu.be/Y6RLjBwHX-8 )

[SILENCE.]