quakers rock

 

BOMBING THE QUAKER ZOOM (first draft)

 

CAST:

Mr. Zoom

Jeremy Textwether

Imazum Bommer

Emily Genzee

Joe Jones

MR. ZOOM: Good afternoon (evening/morning), audience. I am Mr. Zoom. I am here because Zoom has developed new software that can tell us what you THINK. Now don’t look surprised. Surely you have opened your Facebook thinking about shoes, and found a shoe ad right there waiting for you? It’s the same software. Thought-to-text, we call it. And it’s incredibly accurate, I warn you. In this play you will see how people are THINKING. You will not only see the script, but the voices you hear are actually their THOUGHTS. I will be watching to monitor how well it works. And, to be quite honest, we don’t CARE what people think. We chose Quakers for our test run because we figured they were all thinking wholesome things, so they wouldn’t mind if they found out we were watching!

 JEREMY: My name is Jeremy Textwether. I am the clerk of Centerville Ohio meeting. We have to go on zoom because of quarantine. Some of our elders, like Hesitant Elder, refuse to get on zoom. So some people feel like it’s not a perfect meeting already. I am running the zoom and I do my best, but I’m not very good at the controls – sometimes I turn off the sound or the camera accidentally, that kind of thing.

 IMAZUM: My name is Imazum Bommer. My purpose is to disrupt the meeting. I will be perfectly quiet for a few minutes, like maybe five, and then I’m going to shout out all the bad words I know – like WTF, long version. Or MF long version. Or OMFG long version. That kind of thing. That will show those Quakers!

EMILY: My name is Emily Genzee. What I don’t want people to know is that I had a beautiful flowerpot, on the mantel, and it fell right before the meeting. It made such a huge mess that now I’m embarassed to show everyone my living room because they will be horrified by the mess. But the problem is, the only zoom background I can find is that swirly decorative kind and I can’t find any Quaker gray or plain kind of background. So now I have to decide whether to attend meeting or not.

JOE JONES: I am against wearing fancy clothes or using fancy backgrounds because it goes against the Quaker testimony of simplicity. I go to zoom meetings all week and these people use these fancy backgrounds, and I can’t take it. When I come to Quaker meeting I want to settle in to silence and have plain, relaxing things to look at.

 (MEETING STARTS. EMILY  HAS A FANCY SWIRLING BACKGROUND. JOE IS CLEARLY IRRITATED. IMAZUM HAS A DEVIOUS LOOK ON HIS FACE LIKE HE’S WAITING FOR HIS CHANCE.

 MR ZOOM: I wish I could just tell everyone how to use this technology; it’s not that complicated. For example, this Jeremy guy can just control everyone because he’s the host. If he wants someone’s sound off, he can turn it off.  Like right now, I think he has a few people’s sound off, but he doesn’t even realize it. They can turn it off, or he can. So he doesn’t even have to worry about zoom bombing. All he has to do is pay attention. And this Hesitant Elder guy, who’s he? Somebody who refuses to come to a meeting because he can’t handle zoom? Ridiculous!

 JEREMY: The problem with being a clerk of this meeting is that I have to pay attention all the time. I have to let people in, or be prepared to turn their sound off or something. But the other problem is I don’t quite get all the technology. So sometimes maybe I should turn off the sound but I don’t quite realize that, or I forget how to do it. It’s all very confusing. So I find it hard settling in to ordinary silent worship. I can see Hesitant’s point, that the technology just makes it all too difficult.

EMILY: I’m very worried about what people will think. Imagine if I showed them my messy living room floor? I couldn’t bear that. But, I’m afraid also that they won’t like my swirling zoom background, like maybe it’s unquakerly. What should I do? Whatever I do I don’t want to say anything, because it’s silent worship and we should only say things that we know are inspired from the silence. If I just said, “A flowerpot fell and broke on my floor,” what kind of message would that be? The problem with zoom is, since you’re doing it from home, you have to worry about your home!

JOE: I can’t bear that swirly zoom background. Emily has a lot of nerve coming to meeting with a swirling zoom background. In fact I feel like I should just say this, but it’s a rather negative thought, and I’m afraid it will be judged as not the appropriate kind of message we should have at Quaker meeting. But it is something that needs to be said. Actually I feel like strangling her. But I’d never say that. I am trying to be a good Quaker, not one who just hurts somebody that does the wrong thing!

JEREMY: We may have the kind of meeting where nobody says anything. I’m prepared for that! I just hope we can have the right atmosphere that is conducive to feeling the Divine Spirit and delivering a message that needs to be heard, You know, maybe I should say something to Margaret about a swirling background being unquakerly. But I think in the end everyone has to make up their own mind about what to do.

IMAZUM: (shouting): WTF long version! MF long version! OMFG long version! (all the other zoomers, five of them, remain deadpan like they haven’t heard a word. Mr. Zoom looks around trying to figure out what’s going on). HEY! You F-ing Quakers aren’t even F-ing listening to me! OMFG long version!

 (Note: although you could have him shouting the long version of these words, it would be scandalous, so I recommend actually saying out “WTF long version” etc. since everyone will know what happened anyway)

 MR. ZOOM: What is happening here is this. You have been listening to everyone’s thoughts. But all of a sudden this fellow wants to shout, so he shouts. But he’s on mute. Jeremy Textwether has put him on mute without even remembering that he did it. But Imazum doesn’t know that; all he knows is that if he clicks unmute nothing happens. Eventually he will figure out that nobody has heard a word he said.

JOE: This young Imazum fellow seems to be very agitated about something. Perhaps he too is upset about the swirly background! But if he has a message for the meeting, we can’t hear it, because he appears to be on mute.

 IMAZUM: What kind of meeting is this, where you want to contribute something but you are put on mute? Who do they think they are, putting me on mute? OMFG long version! WTF long version!

EMILY: I am feeling at peace about everything, of course, I am not bothered by a swirling background. I go to lots of zoom meetings, and I figure, if one time you don’t want everyone to see your living room, you shouldn’t have to let them see your living room.

 JEREMY: We will now hold hands virtually (Everyone shows hands as a sign of meeting being over) as meeting is over. I hope you had a pleasant experience and we would like to know how you experienced meeting. I am sorry Hesitant Elder couldn’t make it. He expressed apologies for not attending. He just couldn’t handle the zoom technology I guess.

 

 

 

 

CURTAIN CALL