The Circle

all the gays and lesbians came out publicly
     at once. Then whoever is persecuting them, and all those who tacitly support this
     persecution, would realize that to persecute them would mean persecuting at least
     ten percent of the population—including their sons, daughters, neighbors and friends—even
     their own parents. It would be instantly untenable. But the persecution of gays or
     any minority group is made uniquely possible through secrecy.”
    “Okay. I hadn’t thought of it that way.”
    “That’s fine,” he said, satisfied, and sipped his tea. He ran his finger over his
     upper lip, drying it. “So we’ve explored the damage of secrets within the family and
     between friends, and the role of secrecy in persecuting large classes of people. Let’s
     keep on our quest to find a use for a policy of secrecy. Should we look into politics?
     Do you think a president should keep secrets from the people she or he governs?”
    “No, but there have to be some things that we can’t know. For national security alone.”
    He smiled, happy, it seemed, that she’d said what he expected her to say. “Really,
     Mae? Do you recall when a man named Julian Assange leaked several million pages of
     secret U.S. documents?”
    “I read about it.”
    “Well, first of all, the U.S. government was very upset, as was much of the media.
     Many people thought this was a serious breach of security and that it presented a
     clear and present danger to our men and women in uniform here and abroad. But do you
     remember if any soldiers ever actually were harmed by these documents being released?”
    “I don’t know.”
    “None were. Not a one. Same thing happened in the seventies with the Pentagon Papers.
     Not one soldier got even a splinter due to the release of these documents. The main
     effect, I remember, of these documents being made public is that we found out that
     many of our diplomats are gossipy about the leaders of other countries. Millions of
     documents, and the main takeaway was that U.S. diplomats thought Gadhafi was a kook,
     with all his female bodyguards and strange eating habits. If anything, the release
     of the documents just put these diplomats on better behavior. They were more careful
     about what they said.”
    “But national defense—”
    “What about it? The only time we’re in danger is when we don’t know the plans or motives
     of the countries we’re supposedly at odds with. Or when they don’t know our plans
     but worry about them, right?”
    “Sure.”
    “But what if they
did
know our plans and we knew theirs? You’dsuddenly be free of what they used to call the risk of mutually assured destruction,
     and instead you’d arrive at mutually assured
trust
. The U.S. has no purely nefarious motives, right? We’re not planning to wipe some
     country off the map. Sometimes, though, we take surreptitious steps to get what we
     want. But what if everyone was, and had to be, open and upfront?”
    “It would be better?”
    Bailey smiled broadly. “Good. I agree.” He put his cup down and again rested his hands
     in his lap.
    Mae knew she shouldn’t press him, but her mouth got ahead of her. “But you can’t be
     saying that everyone should know everything.”
    Bailey’s eyes widened, as if pleased she’d led him to an idea he coveted. “Of course
     not. But I am saying that everyone should have a
right
to know everything, and should have the
tools
to know anything. There’s not enough time to know everything, though I certainly
     wish there was.”
    He paused, lost briefly in thought, then returned his focus to Mae. “I understand
     you weren’t very happy about being the subject of Gus’s LuvLuv demonstration.”
    “It just caught me by surprise. He hadn’t told me about it beforehand.”
    “Is that all?”
    “Well, it presented a distorted impression of me.”
    “Was the information he presented incorrect? There were factual mistakes?”
    “Well, it wasn’t that. It was just … piecemeal. And maybe that made it
seem
incorrect. It was taking a few slivers of me and presenting that as the whole me—”
    “It seemed incomplete.”
    “Right.”
    “Mae, I’m very glad you put it that way. As you know, the Circle is itself trying
     to become complete. We’re trying to close the circle at the Circle.” He smiled at
     his own wordplay. “But you know the overall goals of completion, I assume.”
    She didn’t. “I think so,” she said.
    “Look at our