Tenth of December

In several stories, elements of corporate-controlled speech enter the narrative, such as the trademarked terms for drugs in “Escape from Spiderhead” or the name Semplica Girls (which, in the world of the story, is already and commonly shortened to SGs, such that the reader doesn’t encounter the full term until its meaning is being explored for a child). The products are often heightened parodies of contemporary products; VerbaluceTM and DarkenfloxxTM echo prescription drug naming conventions, and MiiVOXMax is a tech-inspired mashup of big-brand naming conventions. These function as markers of the way that corporate power has shaped reality in modern life for these characters, using branding to increase its stranglehold on society. For Saunders, putting a proper name on the dehumanizing forces that shape his characters is an act of criticism toward tech and pharmaceutical practice and a deliberately blunt satire of American corporate lingo. The Semplica Girls make an even more pointed statement about the conflation between status symbols and the trauma that they inflict on women from impoverished countries, literalizing the harm of capitalist consumption.

On the flipside of the overt visibility that corporations build through advertising and branding are the subtle implications within corporate power structures best exemplified in “Exhortation.” Todd’s memo is full of veiled threats built around the actuality of employment: His employees have families and home lives that are supported by doing their work, and Todd has power over their continued employment, life, and happiness. Instead of saying so, he appeals to a sense of morale and community. This mirrors contemporary conceptions of the struggle between labor and management and the common practice within large corporations of blurring the lines between employee and family member (while having broad power to terminate employment at will). Dr. Abnesti in “Escape from Spiderhead” uses a similar strategy. He appeals to his own goodness and points to the company hierarchy to absolve himself of his complicity in the deaths of his subjects; succeeding at his job requires him to willfully ignore the ethical dilemma in front of him. In every case throughout Tenth of December, any invocation of corporate power is meant to criticize the way it habitually dehumanizes people.