Flesh & Blood - "The Obsolete Man"

The Obsolete Man

In the dated, Draconian, series from "The Twilight Zone" (1960's) comes one called, "The Obsolete Man"; a story of one--among others--fleshed-out of the system for, well, his flesh & blood.  Described by his judge as, "an anachronism", the central figure is sentenced to extermination.   


The crime:  possessing books; yes, he works at a library. 

This is Mr. Romney Wordsworth, in his last forty-eight hours on Earth. He's a citizen of the State but will soon have to be eliminated, because he's built out of flesh and because he has a mind. Mr. Romney Wordsworth, who will draw his last breaths in The Twilight Zone.

In the closing words of this series: 

Any state, entity, or ideology becomes obsolete when it stockpiles the wrong weapons: when it captures territories, but not minds; when it enslaves millions, but convinces nobody. When it is naked, yet puts on armor and calls it faith, while in the Eyes of God it has no faith at all.

Any state, any entity, any ideology which fails to recognize the worth, the dignity, the rights of Man...that state is obsolete.