The Rule
Don't betray your underlying premise
If you set up your book by a certain premise, don't then betray the premise by having characters behave as if it didn't exist.
Counter-Example
"Why don't you use it yourself, then?" said Grandma Georgina. "You told Charlie you were getting too old to run the factory, so why don't you just take a couple of pills and get forty years younger? Tell me that?"
"Anyone can ask questions," said Mr. Wonka. "It's the answers that count."
ā Roald Dahl, "Charlie and the Great Glass Elevator"
Almost anything can be done for the sake of comedy, in whimsical material.
Commentary
The fundamental premise of Cline's novel is that virtual reality is a world where you can be anyone and do anything. It already stretches credulity that in this reality where you could do anything, you'd choose to play a coin-op console game from 1980, but to have your lead character and his romantic interest "meet-cute" in VR where she could be, by his own admission, a hairy-knuckled guy named "Chuck" (and it's clear he wouldn't be into this) betrays the entire premise of his book.
Like most of the book, the foundational premises (apocalypse, disease, poverty, war, even lag) are really not much more than "color".
Mike reading the meet-cute replacing the female nouns/pronouns with "Chuck" illustrates precisely how absurd this abuse is.