Year 2244.

A bright sunny day greeted Sam. Birds sang somewhere in the trees, and dirty dogs wandered along the muddy roads.

Sam was probably one of those stray dogs in some way.

Abandoned old shacks, rusty appliances, various types of garbage like rotten boards, bricks or who knows what else were lying around here and there.

Nearby there was a huge depression filled with dark stinking water. But it was clearly not a lake. The right angles of the pit and the concrete walls sticking out of the water hinted at something else, although Sam could not understand what it was and why it was there.

Some may think that this description resembles scenes from a post-apocalypse, but the truth is that no post-apocalypse ever happened. There have been many abandoned villages and small towns around the world, especially in 3rd world countries.

No props for post-apocalyptic films were better than these abandoned lands. Even in cities, people often lived literally up to their ears in shit, let alone the outskirts of these same cities.

Sam scratched his beard and stared at this inarticulate underwater construction in the water for a while, then moved on.

He got used to call these lands wastelands. No one lived here; it was rare to meet at least one living person.

The exception was a few fields that still occasionally came to be sown or harvested, but these did not come across very often.

This wasteland were the outskirts of city X. And not particularly remote outskirts. In the summer, Sam stocked up on what he could find tens of kilometers around; for example, a corn field was almost the main source of food and supplies for the winter.

He didn't always live like this. He once had his own home and a job that he loved, but the state took everything away. Wars in one form or another were everywhere in the world. Well, almost everywhere, but most often in 3rd world countries with dictatorial regimes.

About ten years ago, a war began in the country, even before the war it was not easy to live, and even more so after. He was unlucky to be born in such a country. His small business was forced to close due to the new laws passed.

Formally, country X was at war with country Z, but in reality both countries were at war against their own population. It was simply a genocide.

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The borders were closed and the country's population was held hostage by the state. The loss of the business hit Sam hard, however, he was still able to earn a living, but the country could not bear with it.

One day, at the behest of the government, banks simply blocked the credit cards, thereby completely eliminating the opportunity for Sam to earn any money.

No matter how much he saved, the money gradually ran out and the debts for the house grew. Ultimately, the house went to the state and Sam himself became a homeless beggar and went to the wasteland.

In civilized European countries there were various shelters and places where food was distributed for free. However, this country would rather throw away the excess as dog food than feed its own citizens.

Sam had never seen a huge amount of humanitarian aid from all over the world in his life, and none of his friends had ever seen all the food and other stuff that was sent to them as help.

Considering the amount of declared humanitarian aid that was sent, hundreds of stadiums could be filled with this humanitarian aid. Now he knew that all this supposed help was just bullshit.

Politicians in other countries simply earned themselves a few extra points by doing this or used other schemes.

The officials of country X happily took apart everything that came from outside and sold it to their own population and god knows what else they did with it.

Huge surpluses rotted in warehouses and were simply thrown into the trash. They would rather let it rot and throw away than help their own citizens.

Of course Sam had another option.

Everyone had another option. Just go to war. It's that simple...

This was the main message of all laws depriving people of rights and freedoms. They had to lose everything, having lost everything they would have no choice but to go die. And it worked...

The vast majority of people were poor, and they also had various obligations to their families, or they were subjected to endless propaganda on the Internet or TV, most likely both.

Finding a regular job was almost impossible. Crowds of armed soldiers walked everywhere and forcibly took people from the streets, workplaces, public transport, and so on. The only way to become an exception was to pay and few could afford this.

People were beaten and driven to war like cattle and it worked. The pitiful isolated voices of protest were ruthlessly suppressed and hushed up. Moreover, not only the country itself was kept silent, the world community ignored what was happening.

While Sam had the Internet, he did not see any news about the real state of affairs in his country, either from official foreign media or from popular bloggers.

The country's population was systematically destroyed and the power of the state systematically grew fat and strengthened.

On the other hand, in his youth, Sam also did not hear anything about most of the senseless wars in the world, and he didn’t care until it actuallly affected him.

So now he roughly understood why no one gives a damn, it’s logical.

Kindness and empathy were very useful tools, but they were used only if they brought profit. At best, only if kindness did not cause any losses.

Surely many would argue with his conclusions proving that the world is beautiful and all that shit. So for such people, Uncle Sam had only one message.

"CENSO RED"