Page 83 - Just Deserts

Swami Adavasi

A few miles south of Camp Help It, in a squalid motel room in the
decrepit seaside town of El Pajaro, Alan Deluce was working hard
for his money. As an alternative to continuing as an unemployed
research psychologist, he had re-emerged in the job market as a
religious cult deprogrammer. It required neither new clothes nor the
removal of his beard: merely the patience of a saint and the poker
face of a man holding nothing but a busted flush.
“Mr. Deluce, can’t I go now? I can’t help anybody stuck here in
this lousy place.”
“You just sit tight there, Otis, and think about your dear old
parents. They want to help you; that’s why we’re here. And you can
help them by listening to me. All right?”
Otis, a software engineer in his late twenties, was a recent graduate
of Camp Help It’s intensive training course. Half his property was
gone, and he was impatient to be out recruiting his old
acquaintances—particularly the well-heeled among them.
“No, sir,” he said emphatically. “I can best help you and my
parents and anybody else by explaining to all of you the blessings to
be gained by giving me exactly fifty percent of your accumulated
wealth.”
Deluce smiled gently, but kept his position between Otis and the
door. “Come, now, Otis: you’re an intelligent fellow. Do you know
what a chain letter is? Of course you do. If you received one, would
you send money to the names on the list? How would you know if
the chain it represents had been honestly presented? What’s to stop
anyone from putting his or her own name at the top instead of the
bottom when he or she sends it on to the next level of recipients?
Nothing: it is totally open to fraud. And even if the succession were
scrupulously honored by everyone in, say, ten levels—a possibility
you must admit is remote—even then, the chain will be broken here
and there, effectively terminating the benefit for several people at
intermediate levels. The only ones who really profit are the ones who
start the thing; by the time it peters out, they will have taken in a lot
of money and given virtually nothing. Well, you must be aware that
Help Yourself is just another pyramid scheme, like a chain letter.”

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