The Girl Who Was Plugged In

We see GTX establish how best to use Delphi. The decision to pair her with an elderly Spanish aristocrat is part of the initial plan and shows how constrained the roles of these so-called gods are. In terms of age, he’s a totally inappropriate partner, and there’s no sign of any connection between them. He sees Delphi purely as an acquisition. His designs on her are predatory and sexual, something Tiptree emphasizes with allusions to his falconry pursuits and repeated bird imagery. After Delphi faints, he “pockets the veined claw to which he had promised certain indulgences and departs to design his new aviary” (57). The scene all the more disturbing as it refers to Delphi as a “child” and “doll.” She’s simultaneously infantilized and sexualized.

Delphi’s pairing with an 81-year-old aristocrat might seem unusual, but it makes sense when viewed from the perspective of her role as an influencer among a super-rich audience. It sends a message to the wealthy that beautiful young women like her can be bought for the right price, and it normalizes sexual relations based on purchasing power.

Delphi is, however, allowed a form of intimacy with her fellow celeb, Davy. He, like her, has little capacity for sexual experience: “not impotent exactly, but very very low drive” (59). There’s something child-like in their portrayal, “two little kittens in a basket” (15).

As Delphi’s popularity and marketing potential grows, so too does the potential for disruptions. Her role as a star of a popular show gives her more sense of her own importance, and she begins to speak honestly about some products. Ironically, the problem comes from her own naivety about the role she plays. She took Mr. Cantle’s speech too literally. This is P. Burke’s first expression of freedom, an individuality and unpredictability that GTX won’t tolerate for long. It’s becomes a central point of tension as the narrative evolves. Add to this the disturbing flicker of independent life that Delphi shows while P. Burke is out of the capsule. This too lays the seed for future conflict in the narrative and draws our interest as readers.

The narrator takes time to depict the futuristic entertainment industry. In many ways, it’s a continuation (and critique) of contemporary Hollywood trends. It’s a culture driven by technology and money, and controlled by powerful vested interests, who use entertainment as a means of social control: “the unceasing hose that’s pumping the sight and sound and flesh and blood and sobs and laughs and dreams of reality into the world’s happy head.” (61)

Far from a place for individual expression or “creative flamboyance” it’s an entirely ordered, technocratic, and data-driven world, where “nothing is left to chance” (61). Something illustrated in the neat rows of domes Delphi sees, “like a giant mushroom farm” (60), and the machine that instantly gathers feedback for producers. An algorithm replaces creation. Everything is empty, superficial, irrelevant, and no one cares, so long as it’s hitting the pleasure sensors that the feedback machine monitors.

This entertainment industry provides wish-fulfilment and escapism in a way that’s designed to encourage conformity, and in this respect, it’s an important aspect of the totally ordered, prescriptive and controlled world that the GTX is seeking to maintain.

Delphi seems to be both the perfect expression of this culture and somehow to poses a problem for it. She’s an instant hit and yet part of the reason people identify with her goes beyond the physical beauty of Delphi to the naïve joy and enthusiasm of P. Burke. P. Burke “just sees rainbows” (60), and it’s her passionate belief in the illusion that leads, ironically, to her subverting it with her honest complaints about products.