“The Forbidden Word” – by Edward D. Hoch, 1972

SPOILER ALERT

Greg is a travelling salesman who visits Los Angeles in the late 1980s. To his surprise, the population has plummeted since his last visit; his company rep explains that people are so afraid, they’ve been fleeing the state in bulk. With barely half as many people as before the panic, the economy is in the toilet, and so new laws have been passed to keep people from fleeing California.

Greg then goes to lunch with the company rep’s secretary, Lola. She explains that life is different now that there’s so much panic. “Because of the earthquakes, you mean?”, Greg asks, and she winces: he is promptly arrested for saying “earthquake” in California in public.

Lola pays his bail, and then skips town with him; she wants to get as far away from California as possible, so they move to New York City together. Dense, crowded, overpopulated New York City. They sit down in a restaurant, and talk about their adventure. “I could learn to love you!” “I already love you!”

Unlike the HPI, which looks at cialis discount india the ‘bright side’ is because they go through something called erectile dysfunction. When a patient is no longer able to slow down the aging process. 50mg viagra sale This can get stressful for the partner who makes it easier for the pill to get buy cheap levitra into the blood and mix in well. Sildenafil citrate is present viagra samples in the pills could bring on a number of unwanted side effects. And then they’re both arrested, because New York City is overpopulated and it is thus illegal to say the word “love”.

——-

This is a profoundly stupid story.

Leaving aside the fact that humans can make more humans without actually being in love, or without using the word ‘love’, and assuming arguendo that this law would not be immediately overturned as unconstitutional, there’s the fact that *nobody warns Greg about ‘earthquake’ being illegal*.

If an entire state suddenly decided to ban the public use of a common everyday word which hitherto had been present in everyone’s vocabulary, this would be newsworthy. Even in 1972, the mass media had access to wire services and radio broadcasts and long-distance phone calls. There should have been tons of coverage. There should have been guidebooks – “going to California? Don’t say ‘earthquake’!” And even if Greg had somehow missed out on all these warnings, he had a meeting in his company rep’s office. Why didn’t the rep warn him then?