Great Expectations

Today I found this book in the school library. It's called "Adventures of the Year 2000," and introduces French children of the late eighties to the dazzling high-tech utopia which was to be their reality in just twenty short years. Naturally, the book is both hilariously dated and a little bit sad - promises of unity between men and robotic dog-walkers both being devastatingly unrealised.

On the first page there is a run-down of the criteria for a "citizen of the year 2000," an aspirational checklist which encouraged readers to make friends of different skin colours and to "respect when somebody dresses differently to you," an especially ironic suggestion considering France's burqa ban. However, perhaps the most touching of them all - and the one that brought a tear to my eye - read as follows...

11. Do you like violence? (Yes/No)
If you answered yes, then you are not ready to be a citizen of the year 2000. A citizen of the year 2000 cannot like violence.

Robotic dog-walkers seem a far closer prospect in comparison.