Note: "Pangea" (i.e. "Demichronia") is not supposed to be a utopia nor a dystopia, just a thought experiment. I neither explicitly approve nor disapprove of this system, I'm just exploring the implications and potential consequences.
Pangea, in my lore, means "the land of everything", it's the land part of Pan (a Multiverse where everything you can think of happens somewhere in it), which contains Pangea (the land), Panthalassa (the ocean) and so on. However, in this page, "Pangea" will mean "Demichronia", which I will explain. Why do I call it "Pangea", considering it already means something else in my lore? Because I like the name "Pangea", hmpf! Anyway, here's a division based on how often you get everything you want:
Mostly undefined, but the climate-wise it must have very high diversity within a relatively small area.
Work in progress, the customer/worker distinction existed since antiquity but of course each historical period has their own technological limitations, resulting in drastic lifestyle differences. The worker/customer divide and the fact that customers must be pleased by workers as much as possible remains a constant throughout Pangean history. The flag of Pangea is the same as the polyamory flag.
Regarding "freedom": it is not the case that you're actually "free" in your free time: you can get whatever you want, but this freedom doesn't necessarily come without consequences! There are consequences for what you do in your free time, but those consequences are asynchronous, that is, they occur when you go back to work. This means that, unlike in Achronia, there is potential for, uh, 'interesting' social dynamics in Pangea! I call them "asynchronous social interactions" (contrasting with "real-time social interactions" that are common in Gaia), and I will explore them!
Something that may occur in Pangea is something that I call asynchronous punishment, that is, a customer "punishes" you (i.e. treats you as badly as legally allowed) for something you did in your free time. This may mean that, at least in theory, groups of bullies may disincentive you from doing what you want in your free time, but in Pangea, power dynamics are more even compared to those of Gaia (at least, if my reasoning is not wrong): the person who gets mistreated may carry out his/her revenge on the person/people who mistreated him/her. This may devolve into something I call "conflict loop", in which there's an endless cycle of revenge from both sides. It ends when both sides decide to end the conflict loop, otherwise it carries on. Perhaps (though I'm not sure), in order to avoid that I call "conflict loop", maybe there's an incentive to keep good relationships with others? In Gaia, it's often the case that someone has power over another person, but it's not turn-based, it's permanent, so the oppressed person cannot carry out any revenge or rebel. Since social interactions between worker and customer in Pangea are paid, that means the first person to end the conflict loop gets to keep the money that was initially used to pay for the mistreament, so I think this dynamic is very interesting from a game theory perspective! To highlight a difference between Gaia and Pangea: suppose for a moment that it's legal in Pangea to do physical violence towards a worker (it's not, this is just for the sake of the example): I vaguely remember that in the Aceh province in Indonesia (Gaia), someone was whipped for cuddling in public with someone. Apparently it went against "Islamic laws" or something (or at least, Aceh's interpretation of them). Suppose that physical violence was legal in Pangea: then if that guy was whipped, in Pangea he could legally carry out revenge and whip the person who whipped him (though physical violence towards workers is illegal in Pangea so whipping a worker, or a customer who didn't specifically ask for it, is a criminal offense). Of course in Gaia he cannot do any of that, he just has to be abused and that's it. So I think that Pangean social dynamics are more even than those of Gaia, even if still toxic. I'll explain some more social dynamics later in this page... some of them are really toxic, but very interesting from a worldbuilding perspective! Anyway, I suspect that because of the possibility of starting a "conflict loop", many people would be discouraged from seriously mistreating workers.
Just above, I have discussed customer-worker relationships. As for customer-customer relationships, they're generally based on consent: no consent, no interaction!
NOTE: these lists are NOT exhaustive! By far! I'll list lots of things (especially those that I find interesting) but it can't be everything, because the list would be pretty much endless!
Note: because of the system "everything you want happens during your free time (as long as you pay the appropriate amount of money)", the selection of things (e.g food, games, movies, activities etc.) is pretty much endless. Here I'll have to explain what "modularity" means: things are seen as components of interchangeable parts, which allows to maximize individual personalization of things. That means, the variety of things (food, games, movies, activities, everything really) feels endless, and the things listed in the lists below are simply random ideas that popped up in my mind, they don't represent even a tiny fraction of what's available in Pangea!
Food:
-Lemon juice
-Lytchee juice
-Sour candies (with varying degrees of sourness)
-Rice with curry
-Meat (or something indistinguishable from it in terms of taste and texture) that was created without killing animals
-All sorts of snacks (e.g. Tortillas, of various tastes e.g. chili, curry, vinegar chips etc. anything)
-Dog meat, cat meat, bugs, rats, snakes, scorpions etc.
-Street food exists.
Games:
-Various crazy fan-made ports (e.g. Tekken 6 for the PS2)
-Fan-games, modded games, ROM HACKS (of any console, from the NES... including PS5 games! No limits (though, due to technology, there is a distinction between pre-AI era and AI era). Copyright-wise: fan games are allowed, even to be sold, but part of the income must be redirected to the original IP holders.
Content:
-TV channels about pretty much anything you can think of. Not to mention the Internet!
-Blogs, videos etc. about anything!
Technology:
-Flip-phones of all kinds
-Javascript-free Internet (for those who prefer it, but there's also normal Internet with Javascript)
-Customizable themes (for websites and OS)
Stuff:
-Plushies of pretty much anything you can think of
--Fetish plushies of various things, including monster-girls etc. may also be a hybrid plushie/sex-toy.
-Any clothing you want e.g. you can dress as a penguin, you can wear whatever you want, and clothing shops have *lots* of stuff, anything you want!
-An automatic fruit juice extractor: you put the fruit (without the peel if it's not edible and/or if you don't want the peel juice, of course!) inside and it extracts as much juice as possible! E.g. you put an orange in there (without the peel, of course) and you get the juice, no manual work needed!
-A toy about a hand that does the middle finger and comes out of a toilet, and can reproduce "fuck you" in various languages by pressing a button on its remote (that contains various flags that represent languages).
Activities:
-Violent IRL shows, like a modern day Colosseum: customer pay to participate, and other customers pay to watch. All-consensual (I suppose there are people who want to participate and even pay for that! If not, then no violent IRL shows)
-Street fights: either, if the fighters are workers, the fights are fake or physical damage is pretty much non-existent... of if they fighters are customers... then the customers can decide up to what level of damage they want to risk being subjected to... and other customers who are interested in the fight may watch the fight.
-Fetish centers (e.g. where one can smell a girl's feet or farts if they want to, or have sex with people in furry costumes), sex work of all kinds.
-Street food where you can eat all sorts of stuff, including bugs, rats, snakes, scorpions etc.
-You can pay for friends (and partners). Yeah. And you can "customize" them (and they have to obey... it's a really difficult and mentally taxing job!). You can name your professional friend "Aquaboy" and make him wear a t-shirt with "Aquaboy" written on it (the client has to pay for the t-shirt, however!)
-Places where you can pay to set things on fire.
-Water parks
-Strip club where you can play billiard, watch semi-naked women (or even totally naked... or men even), and drink cocktails... even playing poker. The club is full of neon lights, both outside and inside. It creates a certain, specific aesthetics. Of course, there are places for every aesthetic thinkable!
-Kart racing.
-Places where you pay to destroy things (rage rooms?)
-You can pay someone to tell you a "bedtime story".
-Outdoor public discussion forums.
-You can find a "community" for anything!
-Maid cafe with barely dressed (or even nude) girls/guys serving you food. They can also be clothed if the customer wants to, and they have to wear whatever the customer wants them to wear (unless that clothing is painful or something).
-"Clubs" where one's own biases can be fed... an offline echo chamber, basically. The club managers may or may not actually believe in those biases, but they do that for money... it's their job to provide that service to the customers! E.g. "white supremacy clubs", from "white" immigrants who are basically grifters. Not just "white supremacy", of course, that's just one example... there are "clubs" for EVERY ideology, hobby and interest! And every aesthetic, as well! So, some may prefer hanging around people who have a certain aesthetics (e.g. 1980's rock aesthetics, or furry aesthetics), and there is a "club" for them. Of course, they must pay to join and stay. There may be other customers in those clubs, who are in no circumstance obligated to please other customers. In case no other customer wants to do activities with a certain customer, workers (e.g. the managers of that club) will do that, in order to assure every customer is always pleased and entertained, and never feel excluded.
-Copyright is more flexible, fan arts for money exist, but they have to pay a certain percentage to the original IP holders. The entertainment industry in Pangea is HUGE (to cater to the tastes of as many customers as possible, even the most obscure niches have tons of content in Pangea).
-You can buy and use drugs, any drug, even hard ones. If that's what you want to do in your free time...
-There is plenty of super blasphemous content, like, "Prophet Muhammad drowning in piss", either drawings, animated movies, or action figures of Prophet Muhammad (or Jesus... or anyone else, really) being put inside a glass of actual piss. But there's also lots of "halal" content in media, or halal food in supermarkets etc. the point is that every taste and preference is satisfied. If someone likes blasphemous content, there is plenty of that, if someone is a Christian or a Muslim, there's also plenty of stuff that respects your values and it's easy to follow your restrictions. There's also plenty of kosher food, vegetarian/vegan food etc.
-Themed parks (e.g. dinosaur themed)
-"Relax centers" where one can go after job, to relax from the stress of one's job (jobs in Pangea are likely pretty stressful... well... not that they're nice in the rest of the world either, lol).
-You can go play Dungeon and Dragons (you pay for it, of course!), the other people in your party playing with you are either other customers, or workers that get paid to play with customers... or a mix of both! The Dungeon Master is usually almost always a worker!
-Nudist beaches.
-Astronomic observatory where you can use an advanced telescope to see the Moon up close (and perhaps Saturn if the telescope is advanced enough?).
-Competition of racist jokes/sentences. You pay to join the competition, against lots of other participants, and whoever says the most offensive thing wins a prize.
-Games similar to Takeshi's Castle, which you can pay to participate in. Winners may get a prize. There are also TV shows about that.
-Practice Yoga.
-Water parks.
-You can pay to participate in an IRL game where you are a detective and have to find out a "criminal" (it's not real, just a game, an act... but it can be fun for some!).
-Videogame competitions/tournaments!
-A fun indoor park pretty much the same as the Gold Saucer in Final Fantasy VII.
-Disco with music in it, and there may be several activities.
-Cinema.
-Going to the beach. Likely free to just go to a beach, but the various activities available (and there are likely many!) are accessible through payment.
-Live concerts of every type of music you can think of!
-Karaoke.
-Various festivals.
-You can easily ride a bike if you want, there are bike lanes everywhere!
-Shopping!!! (supermarkets in Pangea have pretty much everything, lmao!)
-Cosplay festivals
-A place where you can interact with a (fictional) group of fairies in a forest! The forest is real, the "fairies" are just girls in fairy costumes role-playing as fairies for the customers' entertainment.
-Go see a physical original size recreation of Peach's castle of Super Mario 64 (probably somewhere in the highlands in southern Pangea, but may also be located elsewhere). It's likely a very attractive tourist attraction. What is the relationship with Nintendo, or whether Nintendo would allow it, is undefined. It's possible that the owners of the museum pay a royalty to Nintendo, or that Pangea has its own laws regarding copyright and they don't have to abide by international copyright laws necessarily (though that may lead to economic sanctions against Pangea). Idk, I may decide eventually, but one thing's sure: the castle DOES exist in Pangea!
-A penis museum. A museum that displays mummified penises of various animals, including a mummified penis of a human from ancient Pangea, and in the museum there are texts on the walls with explanations about penises in general, or some "fun facts" about penises.
-For those who like to vandalize buildings' walls with text or other stuff through spray paint: there are buildings made specifically for that. You pay, and for a set time you can have a certain portion of a wall that is "yours" to "decorate" with whatever text or symbol or drawing you want (even with all profanities and offensive stuff you want, if that's what you want). You pay for the service and, if you don't have a spray paint bottle with you, you are offered one (or more than one, with different colors), but that also costs additional money. As a result of the existence of this service, some buildings in Pangea, or rather, some parts of the city have "vandalized" walls, though this is intentional. There are also some parts of the city devoid of such "decorated" walls. You can generally find both "types" within a 30 minute walk.
-Churches, mosques, synagogues, Buddhist temples, Satanic temples, Neo-Pagan plages of worship (of all kinds) etc. as well as modular buildings for worship of minority religions or even religions made up and believed by a single individual. In the modular places of worship, the "priest" or otherwise the people working in it will adapt on a customer by customer case. If an individual has made up their own religion, they can send the description of the religion and description of the request (of what the worker(s) should do) to the worker(s) of that modular place of worship, and the worker(s) will do as told by the customer. In exchange of money, of course.. all places of worship, including mosques, Christian churches etc. cost money to enter and participate, though cheap enough a minimum wage worker can afford to go there every day.
-"Cuddle Therapy".
-Forcing someone who you know eats meat to watch a documentary about animals getting killed in farms (workers are pretty much forced to do whatever a customer requests... with certain limitations, of course)
Jobs (may be "normal" jobs as well as jobs that don't exist anywhere else): (P.S. possible outcome... very low unemployment rates? I'm not sure...)
-Plumber (you fix tubes in one's house etc. exactly like the rest of the world)
-Cashier in a restaurant
-Sex worker
-Countability section (for money, business etc.)
-Chef or waiter/waitress in a restaurant.
-"Professional friend/partner" (even sexual partner). That's a thing in Pangea.
-Those who clean up the mess in the "Pyromaniac fun center" (the centers where people can light things on fire in a safe, controlled environment). Or those who guarantee safety in those centers (they are experts in how fire works and propagates, and are able and paid to quickly extinguish a fire if things get out of control).
-Those who manage the outdoor forum discussions (they also must be well-knowledgeable about the topic of the discussions... PhD-level degree required?) -"Club" manager.
-You can be paid to tell people bedtime stories in Pangea (ASMR-like experience?). Of course, you must be skilled at that. Good voice intonation etc. but there are schools courses made specifically for that (to train you to act friendly or in various manners, or to have various voice intonations... essential to interact with customers in Pangea... yeah, Pangean culture is often fake and artificial, it's often like an act... the professional partners usually don't *really* love you, but are trained to be *very* convincing!).
-Voice actor/actress. Programmer/designer. Cartoonist etc. all the jobs required to create anime/cartoons and videogames.
-You can sell drugs. Even hard drugs. Cashier at that "drug store" or someone who produces/cultivates drugs. Since all drugs are legal and regulated in Pangea, the quality of the drugs is higher. I mean, drugs are still dangerous because, well... they're drugs, duh! But at least a heroin addict won't accidentally get addicted to Fentanyl, unlike in countries where drugs are illegal (and therefore zero regulation). Drug-related crimes are also very low in Pangea since it's all legal and regulated (no rival drug gangs conflicts, for example).
Pangean culture, in a nutshell: the customer is always right!
Regarding Pangean culture... I have left it mostly undefined, but technically speaking it can have *any* culture, I guess? Like, there may be versions of Pangea that are like, 95% Muslims or something? But of course, it should go without saying that this very system (that I call "Demichronic") will necessarily have drastic effects on the culture, and it won't be comparable to anything on Gaia! For instance, a Satanist (let's call him John) may force a Muslim (let's call him Josh) to blaspheme against Allah during the John's free time. Then, to relatiate, Josh may force John to pray in a Mosque and declare that Allah is the greatest. And this petty conflict may go back and forth, in something I call "conflict loop". Of course, neither of them will mean what they say, they're just being forced to say and do those things. This can easily happen in a version of Pangea that is 95% Muslim or 95% Satanist, for example, or literally any other percentage of religions, which means that minorities have a lot more power than they have in Gaia. So, regardless of the percentage of the various groups, Pangean culture is wildly different from that of Gaia, even with the same percentages of people having a certain religion, ideology or opinions! This can make social interactions in Pangea... quite interesting, from a worldbuilding and game theory perspective! A mix of toxicity, coercion, authoritarianism... but also more even-ness (in terms of power dynamics) compared to Gaia! It's quite an interesting mix, which I will explore in depth with time!
Example of modularity (though there is *A LOT* more to say about that): foods in restaurants are made of a collection of interchangeable ingredients, rather than complete, indivisible meals. Reason why modularity is very important in customer-oriented liberalism: by making it easy to combine ingredients, it increases the likelihood that a customer has what they want. *Modularity* is a very important concept to keep in mind throughout this ideology (not just about foods, of course, this was merely an example to illustrate the concept).
Sex work is legal and regulated (not just sex but also all kinds of fetishes are available to be experienced). All drugs (even hard ones) are legal and regulated. Hypothesis for drug legalization outcome: less drug-related crime (e.g. no violence related to rival drug gangs having conflicts with each other), drugs are controlled (e.g. a heroin addict won't accidentally get addicted to Fentanyl), though the substance itself remains dangerous, for obvious reasons, but the dangers that are unrelated to the characteristics and effects of the substance itself and arise from the fact that drugs are illegal are reduced or perhaps even eliminated. Since drugs are taxed (like everything else, thought the amount and extent of taxes is unspecified for now, in this first draft), it provides revenue for the government, and since they're legal, police has less work to do (compared to, if everything else is equal, drugs were illegal).
Copyright: copyright exists in this system but fan-art is allowed, provided royalties are paid to the original IP holders. Products (e.g. videogames) are, as said before, modular. E.g. videogames are not considered (by law) as a whole, undivisible product, but rather as a collection of parts (e.g. assets, levels, soundtracks, dialogues, voice acting etc.). The more of those parts a fan-art uses, the more the percentage of money will go to the original IP holders. That is, the less derivative the fan-art is, the higher the percentage of money will go to the original IP holders. It is possible to copy the game 100% and sell it, BUT in that case it must be sold at the price of the game that is copied and 100% of the money will go to the original IP holders. The more different the fan-art is from the original product, the less money will go to the original IP holders. This modular approach may (maybe?) permit a balance between copyright and fan-art. The absence of copyright would discourage large companies from creating entertainment, leaving only hobby projects that are unlikely to be of high quality, whereas prohibiting fan-art would go against "customer service" e.g. if one wants some fan-game mash-up of two of their favourite games, or any fan-art really, prohibiting fan-art would lead to more unfulfilled wishes. This approach may maximize "customer gratification" (compared to other approaches), if my understanding is correct.
Internet: Internet websites must have two versions. "Original vision" website and "customer-oriented" website. "Original vision" website may be whatever the creator(s) of the website want it to be, they can censor stuff, put whatever they want. "Customer-oriented" website means that the customer decides what the website is like, as such, it must be hyper-personalizable (with CSS themes or other ways of theming the website however the customer wants, or for example, it MUST work without Javascript, in case the customer wants to disable Javascript), and there should be freedom of speech. Pangea is very pro-free speech, but in a weird way that would confuse Gaians: more details about this will be written below because there are some things to specify about "free speech" in Pangea. Also, websites necessarily must have various "light" versions, for various hardware: the lightest versions of all should be able to run on text-based browsers with very limited RAM and very low specs. If they're video-only websites, then a text-based version of it should exist, to see at least the titles and descriptions of those videos, and other text content! Every app also has "light" versions with different system requirements! Games have fan-based ports for lighter hardware (a percentage of the money goes to the original creators of that game).
Free speech (in Pangea it's "PAID SPEECH" though LMAOOO): what many online people (who are usually either anti-free speech or pro-free speech) don't understand is that speech is a two-way thing: there is a speaker and there is a listener. The customer vs worker distinction here remains very important. A customer should be able to access all the "speech" (i.e. content) they want (though it costs money, e.g. a book costs money, of course, and in order to access contine online you must pay for a monthly online connection, it's not free, of course). E.g. if you want to buy Mein Kampf, sure, pay the money and you can have that book. If you want to hear racist things, sure. The important thing to remember is that this "access to content" is a result of the desire of the customer, and that the customer pays for that desire to be fulfilled. One has pretty much complete freedom of speech and what I call "freedom to seek" (e.g. as I said before, the freedom to access any content one wishes, rather than producing it). However, when one works, the worker does not have freedom of speech. E.g. regarding "misgendering", it is totally legal for a customer to misgender a worker and not respect their pronouns, but there may be consequences: the transgender people who got disrespected may (or may not, that's their decision) direspect that person when that person works, and potentially start a "conflict loop"... it's perfectly legal to be disrespectful towards a worker or even insult them, though, but again, it may start a conflict loop, which one may want to avoid. On the other hand, a worker must respect the customer's pronouns, otherwise that worker may potentially be fired, or have some other consequences for "discrimination" or "hate speech". A question may be: how can a mistreated person carry out revenge, if the person who mistreated them works in a non-social field (e.g. building lightbulbs or something)? Well, every worker has a small time window (about one hour, I think?) every day where they must interact with customers in the way customer wants. That time window allows "asynchronous revenge" or something. The worker must meet the customer in a certain place, and service the customer. Pangea makes sure one can always now the name and surname of a customer, that way one can interact again with that person (and not necessarily in a good way, as we see here, but not necessarily in a bad way either... it may vary). Note that physical violence is illegal (unless requested by the customer, specifically), so neither the mistreament nor the revenge can include it.
Crime: some things are crimes, of course. E.g. theft, non-consensual physical violence, sexual assault, murder, drunk driving etc.
Pangea is very pro-gun, like the USA (it logically results from the idea behind this ideology... if a customer wants a gun... they must be able to get it). Even weapons like molotovs etc. are legal and sold in stores. Euthanasia is legal. There is social welfare: everyone is entitled to a minimum wage, though they are forced to work, and it's often the case they don't choose their jobs, like in Communist countries. However, the economy in Pangea is not Communist, but more similar to State Capitalism, but not exactly... it's complex, and I haven't fully decided every detail. It doesn't have to be "good" (note: Pangea is not meant to be a utopia or a dystopia, just a thought experiment), it just has to be the one that is most likely to maintain the "Demichronic" situation. It's not Communism, as there is currency (money) and income inequalitie.
Anyway, there are income inequalities (the surveillance and control needed to maintain economic equality, e.g. like in Communism, would decrease the "customer service" and therefore would go against this system). Minimum income in this system is enough not only to survive but to have some basic daily entertainment as well! Though you are literally forced to work, and it's often the case the government chooses your job (like it happens in Communist countries). Businesses are usually either owned or strongly regulated by the state and centralized, to ensure the maximization of "customer service/gratification" (I use these terms mostly interchangeably, lol), which would not be maximized if business owners decided the rules for the services/products provided by that business, because it's often the case that the profit motive keeps companies from making products the way people desire (think about the "enshittification" and "planned obsolescence"). I'm not an expert on economy but... somehow the Pangean state tries to maximize the variety of products, so that every taste can be satisfied. I suspect it's technically possible IRL but I suppose it'd require some really convoluted economic decisions contrived specifically for that purpose! Business workers and owners can keep the money, provided all the workers are paid at least the minimum wage. If a business closes, then the services and products provided by that business MUST be provided by at least one business in an area that is accessible to the customer (e.g. in the same city, preferably within 15 minutes of walking).
Urban planning: 15 minutes cities. Ideally, at the very least for necessities, products and services should be available within a 15 minute walk from every customer. If something is not a necessity, then it may be expanded to 30 minutes, but it should be accessible. There are bike lanes everywhere, making it easy to cycle. Reasoning: if a customer wants to ride a bike around, or walk, they ought to be allowed to. Cars are also allowed, of course, but they should not be a requirement for living a normal life. Neighborhoods are mixed residential and business. No "suburbia", unlike the USA cities built and developed post-WWII. Various parts of the city may have different aesthetics, so one can live or stay in places with their preferred aesthetics: e.g. cottagecore parts of the city, cyberpunk aesthetics part of the city, medieval aesthetics etc. but those are optional and it's easy to avoid them if you don't want to see them. The rule is that "themed" parts of the city must NOT have any product or service that is only available to that part of the city!!!
Protests are allowed with permits and only in certain areas, and only if you pay! Reasoning: if a customer wants to protest, they should be allowed, but as with everything else in Pangea, you have to pay in order to get a "protest permit". If a customer wants to *see* a protest, they are allowed, but they should also pay (not the protester, of course, since those are also customers... unless that's a staged fake protest purely for entertainment!). If a customer *does NOT* want to see a protest, they are allowed to not see it, so protests are only allowed in protest-designated areas. It's an in-between, between so-called "free countries", that allow more disruptive protests, and authoritarian countries which do not allow protests at all. It seems like Pangea is often a mix of extremes, as I'm seeing so far! Interesting!
There will be interesting activities, such as "rage rooms" or "pyromaniac fun centers" where people can burn things, in a safe, controlled environments. This is a logical result of the idea behind this ideology. As mentioned before, you can pay not just for sex but also for friends. Like, a "friendship session" for one or more hours cost a certain amount of money. In a "normal" system there are, I'm aware, some people who use therapists as the closest approximation for "friends", leading to an unsatisfactory experience, because of course, therapists are not meant to be friends, but something different. Not just sex or friends, but you can also pay for "romantic experiences" (which may or may not include sex).
There are also "Clubs" where one's own biases can be fed... an offline echo chamber, basically. The club managers may or may not actually believe in those biases, but they do that for money... it's their job to provide that service to the customers! E.g. "white supremacy clubs", from "white" immigrants, who are basically either grifters or they actually believe in that, but that does not matter at all. Not just "white supremacy", of course, that's just one example... there are "clubs" for EVERY ideology, hobby and interest! And every aesthetic, as well! So, some may prefer hanging around people who have a certain aesthetics (e.g. 1980's rock aesthetics, or furry aesthetics), and there is a "club" for them. Of course, they must pay to join and stay. There may be other customers in those clubs, who are in no circumstance obligated to please other customers (that's a "customer to customer" interaction, and there is no obligation). In case no other customer wants to do activities with a certain customer, workers (e.g. the managers of that club) will do that, in order to assure every customer is always pleased and entertained, and never feel excluded. It's basically paying to have your biases fed, paying for validation and "community" (even though that "community" is just staged interactions for money).
There is plenty of super blasphemous content, like, "Prophet Muhammad drowning in piss", either drawings, animated movies, or action figures of Prophet Muhammad (or Jesus, or Buddha... or anyone else, really) being put inside a glass of actual piss, for example. But there's also lots of "halal" content in media, or halal food in supermarkets etc. the point is that every taste and preference must be satisfied, and as such, the highest variety of content possible must exist, and able to be accessed if one wants to see it (but also able to easily be ignored... the social infrastructure may be optimized for that). If someone likes blasphemous content, there is plenty of that, if someone is a Christian or a Muslim, there's also plenty of stuff that respects your values and it's easy to follow your restrictions in your life. There's also plenty of halal food, kosher food, vegetarian/vegan food etc. in restaurants and supermarkets. It's not *necessarily* the case that ALL businesses must have those products, BUT they should be available within 15 minutes of walking from every customer. If they are not available elsewhere, at least one supermarket within a 15 minute walking area will be COMPELLED by the government to have such products.
You can go play Dungeon and Dragons (you pay for it, of course!), the other people in your party playing with you are either other customers, or workers that get paid to play with customers... or a mix of both! The Dungeon Master is usually almost always a worker! There are plenty nudist beaches.
Notes:
-It's illegal for businesses to discriminate customers (though you can behave in discriminatory/bigoted ways while you're not working, of course, especially against workers, unclear about customer to customer relationships but likely not, unless they consent, though you can definitely produce that kind of content and post it online, it will be shown to people who want to see it and hidden from people who don't want to see it). Workers must always (except very specific very serious circumstances) provide service. As for social media, both the "original vision" website and "customer-oriented website" must be available. "Original vision" website is whatever the creator of the website want to do. If the creator of the website don't want to platform certain speech, that speech will not be featured in the "original vision" website. Laws allow "original vision" websites to exists for "the artistic expression of the creators of the website". However, a separate "customer-oriented" version of the website must also exist, and it must allow all lawful speech in this system (and this system is very pro-free speech), and must be extremely customizable in terms of aesthetics and functionality, as well as content shown/hidden (there must be filters that maximize the "customer gratification" in terms of content shown). As for "misgendering laws", for example... a customer can misgender a worker all they want, though they may have repercussions from that person when they're back at work... and then that person who originally mistreated that person may potentially mistreat them again, and so on... what I call a "conflict loop", which may discourage people from being disrespectul towards workers in the first place (though some workers may get offended easily? I'll explore that...). There may be various ways of "conflict loop resolution", which I'll explore eventually. On the other hand, a worker must ALWAYS respect the customers' pronoun choices, otherwise the worker may face consequences for discrimination (or even "hate speech") and have various consequences.
-It may be common for people in this system to have two different "identities", one for work (where one's birth name is usually used), and for one's free time, (where one decides their own name, though they can also keep their birth name if they want). E.g. if one is called John Doe in his work time, in his free time he may be called "Aqua Boy" if he wishes so, and workers MUST call him by his "free name". So, distinction between "work name" and "free name". Of course, the free name can be the same as the work name if one wishes so.
-It's illegal for an employer to contact someone for work-related reasons after they have finished their work hours, as that's considered "outreach", and a violation of the "sacredness" of free time. All work-related communication must be done within the work hours.
-Regarding talking with strangers: it's common and normal to talk with workers, especially if you're their customer e.g. it's perfectly normal to chat with a cashier in a supermarket or grocery store or a waiter in a bar or restaurant as if you two were close friends, chatting about anything you want, even if you never met each other before. That can also happen with a doctor, you can talk with a doctor or nurse as if you were best friends forever (though the relationship can also be more 'professional', that entirely depends on the preferences of the patient, and the doctor/nurse MUST adapt). As a general rule, a customer can chat with a worker (even a doctor, or a plumber that comes to your house to fix your sink) as if they were best friends, if the customer wants. However, in other contexts, talking with strangers is not something you should do in Pangea, e.g. with strangers who sit close to you in a bus, or with random people in the streets. That is generally not recommended, and frowned upon. "Customer to customer" relationships tend to be less common in Pangea. Note: regarding talking with a worker, be it a cashier, plumber, doctor, pretty much anyone: the interaction is not free, it costs money, though it's generally quite cheap. Letting a worker do their job (e.g. healing you if they're a doctor, fixing the pipes of your house if they're a plumber) without any interaction is slightly cheaper as you only pay for the service. The interaction has an additional cost, though usually quite cheap and very accessible.
-Certain aspects of Pangean society are "liberal" while others are "authoritarian". Pangea is an interesting mix of both extremes. For instance, you can be forced (by law) to donate your blood, if the government deems you to be healthy and fit for that (and healthy people are usually forced to donate their blood periodically), but that obligation happens during your work hours, and you get paid for it. You may have to skip one hour of your work to donate your blood (though you get paid for that). Outside of your work hours (i.e. during your free time), nobody can force you to do anything.
-Regarding "paid friends", the price varies depending on the type of interaction: just chatting and keeping you simple company in a natural manner has a certain price, but things get more expensive if you request for activities that may be tiring or difficult, or if you request for a particular personality or (fictional) identity. Hostile, humiliating or unpleasant interactions are the most expensive when it comes to "friendship sessions". However, paid friends can also be used for work, rather than friendship. You can pay, for example, paid friends to clean your house, but that type of service is more expensive compared to just hanging around and chatting. For pretty much any service (and that includes paid friendships) there is a "menu" of possible services, and the prices may differ!
-Regarding "customer-oriented websites", they are more expensive compared to "original vision" websites, which may be free. For example, you can pay to remove ads and tracking, or to customize the website exactly the way you want it, with themes and features fully customizable (e.g. you can put a retro or kawaii theme on the website, or for example on social media you can pay to hide "distracting" stats such as number of followers, likes or views). The law requires websites to have such "customer-oriented" versions, even though you have to pay a subscription for it.
About schools in Pangea (to be expanded eventually)
Schools in Pangea often have the same subjects as schools elsewhere, but they are particularly focused on preparing students for work, so what schools focus on may be different from schools elsewhere. One has to study psychology, physics, mathematics, history, programming classes etc. just like everywhere else, but there's a focus on making the subjects relatable to prepare the students for work, e.g. psychology can be associated with having to please customers, physics can be associated with building things, or working with substances, or other things, programming classes may prepare a student to work on software development etc. basically subjects are, whenever possible, associated with possible work uses. This makes schools in Pangea quite pragmatic and efficient! Also, students get paid if they pass a test! The higher the grade, the higher that student gets paid! School hours are roughly from about 8:30 A.M. to 3:30 P.M. five days a week but there is a hour-long pause for lunch around 11:30 to 12:30 where they can pay for school lunch food and also there are various games (both physical and video games) and leisure activities (which I may list eventually) a student can pay to access during the 'school free-time'. School tests don't have a 'maximum level of difficulty', regardless of the class you are in, the better you are at a subject, the more difficult the tests you'll have to do will be, and the more you'll get paid. Some students are really good at certain subjects! Students are given learning material (e.g. books, lessons) for free, but they have to pay for lunch and optional leisure activities (I mean, lunch is also technically optional, but it's not the best idea to skip meals... but on the other hand, you can bring your lunch from home!), and they get paid if they pass tests! Students don't have to wear a uniform, because in Pangea, any coercion is seen as "work", so the student would have to get paid to wear the uniform, and that wouldn't make much sense economically! They are just coerced to go to school (to be physically present there, but they don't get paid for that), study and do the tests. If they pass the tests, they get money. The higher the grade, the more money they'll get. After a certain age (which I'll think about), students will have to work on one of their formerly free days, though not full time, just half of the time of a regular adult work hours, so they have only one free day a week. Five school days, one "part-time" job day, and one free day. Leisure activities available at Pangean schools during the lunch break (the list is NOT exhaustive by any means, as there's LOTS of stuff there!) (P.S. you have to pay for EVERY activity you participate in during the school break!):
-Video games (though you have to pay to play them, just like every other activity during lunch break, including the lunch food itself)
-Physical games (e.g. sports, card games that can be played in less than one hour, and other stuff, I guess)
-A place where you can either (list in increasing order of cost): read a book during the break, or rent the book for some time (so you can read it at home), or even buy the book permanently! Not just books, but also movies, videogames (as I said before), music (with headphones or headphones, otherwise the logistics of pleasing everyone would become rather difficult), and other forms of media!
-A sort of "club" where people (workers) say stuff like "tired of school rules? come here, then!". In that place you can do a lot of stuff: swear, say offensive things, there's even a "rage room" where you can destroy stuff, insult any teacher that you don't like: you can evend demand them to be present and insult them to their face, though that costs considerably more than just insulting them behind their backs, as per the general logic of Pangea, as well as to avoid that the students may punish the teachers asynchronously (the vast majority of that extra money goes to the teacher that got insulted!). Of course, teachers cannot mistreat students either, or rather, they can, but then the teacher that mistreated the student must pay the student as if the student got a really high grade on a test (that minimizes the effect of any asynchronous punishment the teacher may had wanted to give to the student). The school logic mimicks that of the broader Pangean society: students are like workers, they go to school under coercion (like everywhere else, of course. not just in Pangea), and therefore that cannot be considered "free time", but "work time", and students get paid for their "work" (i.e. passing tests). During lunch break, students are like customers, and they can spend the money that they either received from the tests or got from their parents for the lunch food and leisure activities. They can also save it and use that money outside of school (e.g. to buy a videogame, or a phone, or some cool stuff, or go to a restaurant, whatever they want), of course! Oh, also, in this "rebel club", the more "rebellious" you behave, the more compliments you will get from... well, the people who get paid to run the club, of course! The compliments are something along the lines that you're "cool" or something like that, to play on the rebel aesthetics. This may please teenagers and, perhaps more importantly for the Pangean government, it brings money
-Other stuff (I'll have to think about it!)
Reasoning regarding Pangean schools: ok, so... students are "workers" and get paid if they pass tests... teachers are also workers and get paid for their jobs... so, who is the customer? The Pangean government, obviously! That's who pays both the students and teachers! The logic makes perfect sense!
=== Examples of some people's lives in Pangea ===
Note: I may write some fart fetish stories set in Pangea in the future. They'll be Neocities exclusives. I won't post them on DeviantArt, because the amount of context required to understand the settings of these stories is not something for normies, just for worldbuiling nerds, lmao. Here's the link. I'll post stories set in Pangea in the future.
Update: judging by the plot of a story (not a fart fetish story) I may write in the future, the part of the life where you're a worker and the part of life where you're a customer may not be as disconnected as I initially thought! I'll update this page once I figure out what life in Pangea (i.e. Demichronia) would really be like! However, I strongly suspect that due to the fact that Pangea is a society where one group of people has a high amount of control over another, even if the groups are temporary and the roles are regularly reversed, will likely make Pangea a relatively toxic society. However, power dynamics are likely overall more balanced compared to Gaia. I'll try to find out as many details as possible!