Sec­tion 9 cap­tures a vivid and ele­gant moment in Flatland’s cul­tur­al his­to­ry, when col­or had trans­formed even the sim­plest gath­er­ings into breath­tak­ing events. At a social func­tion, the crowd itself became a visu­al spec­ta­cle, each fig­ure daz­zling in a unique hue. In pub­lic set­tings such as church­es and the­aters, these visu­al expres­sions grew so rich that they began to over­whelm even the most dis­ci­plined minds. The mil­i­tary review was the most splen­did of all, where for­ma­tions of twen­ty thou­sand Isosce­les revealed vibrant flash­es of orange from their sharpest angles, while Equi­lat­er­al sol­diers dis­played patri­ot­ic shades of red, white, and blue. Squares, adorned in vivid tones, maneu­vered with their bright­ly col­ored artillery, and the grace­ful Pen­tagons and Hexa­gons swept across the field, embody­ing both duty and artistry. At that moment, beau­ty and order coex­ist­ed, and the pow­er of appear­ance rose to match that of log­ic. Lan­guage itself took on a poet­ic qual­i­ty, echo­ing this gold­en age in every rhythm and phrase.

Yet as the visu­al appeal of soci­ety grew, its intel­lec­tu­al core began to dete­ri­o­rate. The ancient Art of Sight Recognition—once essen­tial for under­stand­ing and safety—lost val­ue and van­ished from dai­ly prac­tice. With col­or serv­ing as the new iden­ti­fi­er, dis­ci­plines like Geom­e­try, Sta­t­ics, and Kinet­ics were grad­u­al­ly dropped from aca­d­e­m­ic pro­grams. Even tac­tile learn­ing, once nec­es­sary for the low­er class­es, was no longer empha­sized. This shift gave rise to a trou­bling imbal­ance: the work­ing class­es, freed from tra­di­tion­al edu­ca­tion­al bur­dens, began to grow in num­ber and ambi­tion. Their con­fi­dence, bol­stered by col­or-cod­ed equal­i­ty, led them to dis­miss the dis­tinc­tion between them­selves and the rul­ing shapes. Over time, this dis­re­gard expand­ed into resent­ment toward the intel­lec­tu­al arts, which were now framed as tools of oppres­sion rather than knowl­edge. The decline of struc­tured learn­ing marked the start of a dan­ger­ous peri­od in Flatland’s his­to­ry.

The sit­u­a­tion wors­ened as Isosce­les sol­diers and labor­ers demand­ed com­plete equal­i­ty with the rul­ing Poly­gons. They believed that, since col­or recog­ni­tion allowed every­one to be visu­al­ly sim­i­lar, no one had a right to claim supe­ri­or­i­ty. They argued that the arts asso­ci­at­ed with high intel­li­gence were designed only to main­tain pow­er. This sen­ti­ment fueled a move­ment to abol­ish all spe­cial­ized knowl­edge and prac­tices labeled as “aris­to­crat­ic monop­o­lies.” The pro­posed leg­is­la­tion was bold and dis­rup­tive. It would require every­one, includ­ing Priests and Women, to adopt stan­dard­ized col­ors to obscure dis­tinc­tions of class and form. Such a move was pre­sent­ed as pro­gres­sive, even noble—meant to cre­ate uni­ty and respect through uni­form appear­ance. But beneath the sur­face, it aimed to destroy the struc­tur­al integri­ty of Flat­land soci­ety.

The ori­gin of the Colour Bill traced back not to a sol­dier or work­er, but to an Irreg­u­lar Circle—a fig­ure who should have been removed in youth but instead sur­vived to sow dis­sent. With cun­ning and bit­ter­ness, he craft­ed a plan that would ren­der the rulers visu­al­ly indis­tin­guish­able from the com­mon class­es. The idea was to erode author­i­ty from with­in, using appear­ance to dis­man­tle respect. The bold­ness of the pro­pos­al ignit­ed fierce debates, par­tic­u­lar­ly because it promised gains for the most mar­gin­al­ized group: the Women. For the first time, they saw an oppor­tu­ni­ty to be viewed with the same dig­ni­ty as the high­est Priests, at least in out­ward form. Their sup­port added momen­tum to the move­ment, mak­ing resis­tance more com­plex.

The Colour Bill had a sec­ondary and equal­ly cal­cu­lat­ed purpose—it would break the intel­lec­tu­al dis­ci­pline of the Priests. Sight Recog­ni­tion was not just a tool; it was a form of men­tal refine­ment, sharp­en­ing per­cep­tion and judg­ment. By ren­der­ing it obso­lete, the bill aimed to dull the sharpest minds in Flat­land, weak­en­ing the very lead­ers who pre­served order. If suc­cess­ful, it would reduce gov­er­nance to guess­work and erode the foun­da­tion of Flatland’s theo­crat­ic rule. The Cir­cles, unable to rely on log­ic or train­ing, would become help­less fig­ure­heads in a soci­ety dom­i­nat­ed by visu­al tricks. What seemed like a bill of equal­i­ty was, in truth, an attempt to unmake the very struc­ture that defined the world. Behind a cam­paign of fair­ness hid a strat­e­gy for col­lapse.

This moment in Flat­land’s his­to­ry serves as a warn­ing about the cost of con­fus­ing equal­i­ty with same­ness. True progress involves ele­vat­ing all, not reduc­ing every­one to a sin­gle stan­dard. When iden­ti­ty is masked for the sake of super­fi­cial har­mo­ny, the result is not jus­tice but insta­bil­i­ty. Sys­tems built on deep knowl­edge can­not be replaced with dec­o­ra­tion. Visu­al appeal may inspire, but with­out wis­dom, it becomes a dis­trac­tion. The Colour Bill did not aim to teach—it aimed to erase. Its pass­ing would have changed Flat­land not into a utopia, but into a blur of indis­tinct forms with no foun­da­tion for lead­er­ship or growth. This chap­ter stands as both a cri­tique and a cau­tion, show­ing how even noble inten­tions can be used to serve destruc­tive ends.