–BEGIN TRANSCRIPT–
DEFENDANT: I swear to tell the truth the whole truth and nothing but the truth.
PROSECUTOR: Mr. REDACTED, can you talk a bit about your past business ventures?
DEFENDANT: Um, let’s see. We tried a company that you pay to change the arrangement of someone’s furniture as a birthday surprise. We tried an app that notifies you when you’ve put on weight. We tried one that was sort of like AirBnB.. erm, I know how that sounds… but you rent out your kids. We tried a dog owner-friendly private clinic that can make you so that you can lick your own testicles. We tried productivity tracking with fly swatters…
PROSECUTOR: And you arrived at… [looks at papers] I’m quoting from the business plan here… “A supermarket that’s completely silent and all the employees are staring at you?”
DEFENDANT: Correct. It’s a guilt-based revenue model for the 21st Century. Stepping up from practices like ethical branding in fast fashion or local sourcing in food that we would see as outdated conscience-based revenue models.
PROSECUTOR: Further down it says you were to sell, quote: “packaged meat with a face,” end quote?
DEFENDANT: Correct.
PROSECUTOR: You promised your investors to quote: “disrupt the supermarket industry with a personalized experience so intense customers will have to book in advance to buy back their own souls?” in brackets, pause for applause, end quote?
DEFENDANT: Correct. I believe we delivered.
PROSECUTOR: Mr. REDACTED, were you aware of the mental health of your employees at the time of the hostage crisis?
DEFENDANT: I think this question is loaded, there was no hostage crisis, there was an immersion scenario where our on-site curators had, as always, maximum creative agency.
PROSECUTOR: I’m quoting one of your employees from CCTV transcripts here, to illustrate: “Oh you wanna know on which aisle your bath products are. Are you at all aware what carbon footprint your shower has, well go ahead, you bougie REDACTED, I’ll just sit here and contemplate my remaining sick days, oh wait, I don’t get any, don’t apologize, go buy your herbal shampoo and your sandalwood soap, that’s right, put it in the basket, and grab some red meat too while you’re at it, grease your arteries, yeah, we’ve put a face on it, what, the cow had no family, oh you’re crying now, well grab some wine too, you already look like an alcoholic, come on, I’ll throw in the ice cream tub–”
DEFENDANT: They were to be their worst selves to the customers’ optimal satisfaction.
PROSECUTOR: Mr. REDACTED, help me understand, says here this aisle-worker had made his face up with corpse paint and demanded to be called ‘Necromundo the Adjudicator’?
DEFENDANT: Incorrect.
PROSECUTOR: Would you care to correct me, Mr. REDACTED?
DEFENDANT: It wasn’t corpse paint, it was Haitian death loa worship ceremonial garb.
PROSECUTOR: [pause] Mr. REDACTED, says here one of your assistants texted you, quote: “holy shit the guy who wants a green card came in with a gun today,” end quote?
DEFENDANT: Correct.
PROSECUTOR: And you replied, quote, “cool I’m rolling in cash and I’m lit ay eff,” end quote?
DEFENDANT: I believe if we look more closely at CCTV footage–
PROSECUTION: Objection, your honor, changing the subject–
JUDGE: Overruled. I’ll hear the little cracker.
DEFENDANT: If we look more closely at CCTV footage we see customer delight, we see engagement–
–END TRANSCRIPT–
the Budafoki amended 