chasing the Dime



I picked up this book again.

 

Partially because I'd not seen it on the shelf for such a long time, partially because there is always something intriguing about the Internet world of vice and porn, and partially because it really isn't always about the Internet world of vice and porn, but is really about people whom you know- or people whom you think you know.

 

If Henry Pierce knew- really, really knew- about Cody Zeller and what truly went on behind his hacking abilities... then there'd be no story in the first place. There'd be no story development at all. He's a chemist (of sorts), this Henry Pierce, and his world is about nanotechnology and proteus and building the biological electrical charges for molecular technology to work. His world is about patents and burning carbon and lab work. His world is about draft patents and investors and shares.

 

But his world grows beyond the familiar when a telephone number assigned to his new apartment turns out to be the same on a advertisement for sexual services belonging to one Lilly Quinlan, who has since gone missing. And so, from the website where an alluring, come-hither photograph and description lead to the offices cum studios where the girls can advertise, to the post office, to her f*** pad (her place of work), to her own home that she rents, to her mother's place in Florida, to another f*** place where there are smoothies to be sold across the road to Domino's Pizza because the girl she works with- Lucy LaPorte aka Robin- likes pizza but hates smoothies...

 

In LA this may happen to be, but perhaps, this IS everywhere.

 

And that makes this one story so compelling.

 

Because in every society there are layers which we don't see. Where on the external there are societal benchmarks and morally right behaviors, beneath the layers in the cities, suburbs, and communities, there can be opposing needles on the moral compass.  Where there can be brains, there is also brawn. Where there can be patents and research in cold, clinical labs on one end, there can be implants and leather masks with zippers at the mouth in dingy, dirty basements. Yet, they co-exist.

 

It's not as if the worlds don't merge. They do, which is why it is remarkably surprising when you find out that the upright character in your community turns out to have a hidden fetish for unbridled lust and power.

 

It's an unending debate- this problem of vice and pornography and plenty of thoughts abound regarding this. But the point it, it doesn't matter what you feel towards it. Whether you judge it, venture into in, like it, hate it, condemn it, accept it, support it or are already part of it, this place is there- and it isn't going away anytime soon. Whether or not you sympathise with the girls because they're just wanting to earn money and get out and go to school, or whether you think they entered with their eyes wide open and therefore knew what they were in for and they get what they deserve, these two worlds are just going to stay. 

 

What then do we do since we don't know whether it can be correctly identified as a problem and we don't know the appropriate solution? What then do we do since we can try as hard as we might, but still face the tsunami of overloading issues?

And what then do we do since no one's talking, and no one's saying anything and we don't know what is, or what is not, and how they are, and how they are?

Do we just leave things be?

Do we just let it happen on its own?

Do we intervene, or interfere?

Is this something that should be entirely eradicated? If yes, what happens thereafter? If no, how then should it exist?

 

These are hard questions, to which few, if not no one, can balance the answers. These are questions that rely on a set of beliefs, a directive for living, and given the complexity of the human character and personality, there is no way we can go please everyone.

 

In the meantime, there are human beings inside there. People who have stories they may want to tell. People who have stories that they don't want to tell. We won't know which is which, but given that not all of us have the opportunity to venture into the deepest unknowns, there are also some of us who do.

And I'm glad that for those who do, their avenues of expression and (fictional) information) offer us a little glimpse into their worlds.