Player Piano VI

"Paul had a vision of civilization as a vast and faulty dike, with thousands of men like Doctor Pond in a rank stretching to the horizon, each man grimly stopping a leak with his finger." (152)

Comments:

This quote comes from a section in the book when Paul is trying to purchase an old run-down farm without any modern amenities or conveniences. "Doctor Pond" is the realtor, who is trying to talk him out of this and explaining to him that it is "below his station". Doctor Pond's job is to help people find real estate that matches their station in this highly structured and hierarchical society, so that those folks at the top of the hierarchy have nicer homes than those "below" them.

Paul can sense that his highly structured society has undercurrents of instability, and that the whole thing, while appearing solid, is really build on very shaky ground. His analogy of the people trying to put a finger in the "dyke of society", to keep the facade in tact is an apt one. By the end of the book, Paul's observations will ring true, as the dyke breaks and the flood-gates open (metaphorically).

It makes me wonder: what structures in our own societies seem solid but are really just a facade? What structures might be on the verge of extinction/collapse, but we haven't quite recognized it yet?