Page 84 - Just Deserts

Swami Adavasi

The young man shook his head, a stubborn set to his babyish
features. He had been through all this in the resistance class.
“No, sir, helping yourself is not like that at all. The relationship
between levels, once established, is permanent. It is registered at the
church headquarters and cannot be subverted or bypassed. Once
you’re in the hierarchy of giving and receiving, counting your
blessings results in ever higher numbers, never lower. And the swami,
who is at the top of the pyramid, has to give away the same
percentage as everyone else. It is a beautiful system. You can’t beat
it.”
Still in the same friendly voice, Deluce said, “But it’s totally
unrealistic, Otis. It’s a bubble that has to burst. Who is actually
creating the wealth? Only the people at the bottom of the ladder;
once they get up a rung or two, a have to do is sit back and live on
what they collect from those below. That’s the fallacy: it cannot go
on forever, because sooner or later the geometric expansion of the
base will gobble up every living human being on earth! Then what do
you do? That huge mass of people will have given away half of their
property to a group of fairly non-productive parasites, and those
donors will have no prospects for exploiting anyone else in the same
way. The result is catastrophe, violent revolution, economic
collapse.”
“Do you really think Help Yourself could get that big, Mr.
Deluce? What a wonderful idea: the whole world enjoying the
blessing of helping themselves!”
The deprogrammer suppressed a sigh and prepared to start over.
The longer the cult member was deprived of support from other
members, the easier it was to restore his or her prior beliefs and
attitudes. Suddenly running footsteps were heard approaching the
motel room, followed by a frantic knock at the door.
“Stay right there,” Deluce cautioned his involuntary client, “I’ll see
who it is.”
As he opened the door, the manager of the motel came tumbling
in. Mrs. Mahabalipuram was out of breath; strands of long gray hair
fell in front of her eyes as she waved her hands in excitement.
“Dr. Deluce! I have just been learning on the television about that
man who calls himself a swami!”
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