Fallopian

[Dave Monroe]

"She found Mike Fallopian, a couple weeks into raising
a beard, wearing button-down olive shirt, creased
fatigue pants minus cuffs and belt loops, two-button
fatigue jacket, no hat.  He was surrounded by broads,
drinking champagne cocktails, and bellowing low
songs." (Lot 49, Ch. 6, p. 166)

   "'If you need any armbands or more weapons, do try
Winthrop Tremaine, over by the freeway.  Tremaine's
Swastika Shoppe.  Mention my name.'
   "'We're already in touch, thanks.'  She left him in
his modified Cuban ensemble, watching the floor,
waiting for his broads to come back." (p. 168)

http://www.pixunlimited.co.uk/sys-images/Guardian/Pix/gallery/2001/05/01/castro.jpg

Radical chic?  Wearing Sans-a-Belt (R)?  Whereas
earlier ...

   "'You one of these right-wing nut outfits?'
inquired the diplomatic Metzger." (Lot 49, Ch. 3, p.
48)

   "'Peter Pinguid was really our first casualty.  Not
the fanatice our more left-leaning friends over in the
Birch Society chose to martyrize.'" (p. 50)

   "'But that sounds,' objected Metzger, 'like he was
against industrial capitalism.  Wouldn't that
disqualify him as any kind of anti-Communist figure?'
  "'You think like a Bircher,' Fallopian said.  'Good
guys and bad guys.  You never get to any of the
underlying truth,  Sure he was against industrial
capitalism.  So are we.  Didn't it lead, inevitably,
to Marxism?  Underneath, both are part of the same
creeping horror.'" (pp. 50-1)

Do note that the NSDAP mounted a similar critique of 
industrialism, capitalism and Marxism.  But note also
the political multivalency ...

"Fallopian gave them a wry smile.  'It's not as
rebellious as it looks.  We use Yoyodyne's
inter-office delivery. On the sly...." (p. 52)

"'... each member has to send at least one letter a
week through the Yoyodyne system.'" (p. 53)

And note that, ca. this episode ...

"So began, for Oedipa, the languid, sinister blooming
of the Tristero." (p. 54)

But to continue ...

"Metzger, who'd come along to The Scope that evening,
wanted to argue.  'You're so right-wing you're
left-wing,' he protested.  'How can you be against a
corporation that wants a worker to waive his patnt
rights.  That sounds like the surplus value theory to
me, fella, and you sound like a Marxist.'" (Lot 49,
Ch.  4, p. 89)

Which side is Fallopian on?

http://www.kidsource.com/kidsource/content4/ovaries.gif

http://www.muenster.de/stadt/kongress1648/img/4_35.jpg

   "'They?' inquired Metzger, twinkling also.
   "'Us?' asked Oedipa." (p. 49)

Sides?

   "'Are we an underground?' he came back, mild
enough.  'Are we rejects?'
   "'I didn't mean--'
   "'Maybe we haven't found them yet,' said Fallopian.
 'Or mybe they haven't approached us.  Or maybe we are
using W.A.S.T.E., only it's a secret.'  Then, as
lectronic music began to percolate into the room, 'But
there's another angle too.'" (p. 167)

But why ...

"'I knew you'd be different,' she said, 'Mike, because
everybody's been changing on me.  But it hadn't gone
as far as hating me.'
   "'Hating you.'  He shook his head and laughed." (p.
168)

... oh, my aching hands.  Well, thanks, Sam, for
drawing attention to Fallopian here, who I might well
have breezed right over otherwise.  This seems a, er, 
critical juncture in the novel here indeed ...

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