Oscar found the scandal a very cheering development. It meant that the conflict between the Collaboratory’s two populations had broken through to a symbolic, psychosexual, politically meaningless level. The public fight was now about deep resentments and psychic starvations that would never, ever be cured, and were therefore basically irrelevant. But the noise was very useful, because it meant that enormous quiet progress could now be made on every other front. The public psychodrama consumed vast amounts of attention, while the Collaboratory’s truly serious problems had become background noise. The real problems were left in the hands of people who cared enough about them to do constructive things.