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Aldous Huxley was right, not George Orwell
- dbz 16y agoA cute cartoon, but seeing as I just ([imo]unfortunately) read "Brave New World" in a very in depth literature class (apologize for the fallacy call to authority) , I don't find the Cartoon to be accurate at all. For example, books were banned in "Brave New World" -remember all that Shakespeare drama? Huxley was saying people are going to be controlled by the government because in the Brave New World, the government breeds humans for different purposes, and all those humans know are pleasures which are completely dependent on the government, like daily rations of soma, a drug which prevents aging and sadness.
- SamAtt 16y agoBut there's a difference between the banning in Brave New World and what we consider the term to mean today (or what it meant in 1984). Most World State citizens couldn't read at all so banning books was done so they wouldn't be tempted to learn. The government wasn't taking something away as much as they were simply not giving the population access to it. Books were essentially like illegal drugs in our society. The Government had decided they were harmful to the citizenry and attempted to restrict them from coming in. But it's clearly a fairly minor thing (again equivalent to our drug policy where most personal use offenders get drug treatment rather than punishment). For example, John the Savage is allowed both to quote Shakespeare and to interact with those who come to the reservation. Yet there's no Government repression and it's certainly not like in 1984 where you get a lobotomy. So the banning of books really reinforces the cartoon's point because what the government has done is to convince the population that books are bad for them and then offered the ban as a way to keep the population from being harmed by them.
- dbz 16y agoimho, you have a very misleading point where the government is just not providing access akin to drugs; however, books contain knowledge, and drugs do not. The government in the Brave New World isn't just "not providing a service," it's actively attempting to make a dumb citizen through not only the means of censorship, but injecting fetuses with alcohol to lower the intelligence of the individual. Our government has a ban on drugs to protect us citizens(theoretically), whereas the Brave New World has a ban on books to protect itself. I'd also like to note: Most personal offenders in our government get treatment instead of punishment (drugs). Most personal offenders in the Brave New World get banished (reading).
- DougBTX 16y agoPlenty of people have claimed enlightenment while taking drugs, which might well lead to knowledge and understanding.
- iaskwhy 16y agoYap, Brave New World is much more interesting to those who want to understand what might be our future than 1984. I believe that's common sense to those who read both novels. Also interesting is Brave New World Revisited, a book written 30 years after he's other book where he compares it with 1984 by Orwell. He also makes some guesses about the future[1]. I love dystopias and Brave New World is the best. spoiler [1] The most important one being about soma and how it's so similar to lsd.
- jraines 16y agoA really smart person I know read Brave New World and thought it was a Utopian novel. At least, so they said.
- amalcon 16y agoIt is a utopian novel, in one interpretation. That interpretation views it as about how utopia isn't necessarily all it's cracked up to be.
- sprout 16y agoWell, yes, but possibly it's still better than our present society, which is the key question.
- arethuza 16y agoThe Scottish writer Iain M. Banks has come up with a rather splendid utopia in his Culture novels (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Culture http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Culture). As he notes this causes a bit of a problem for a novelist in that a true utopia is actually pretty boring - so imperfections pretty much have to be introduced to give you something to write about. [NB: I would be more than happy to become a Culture ambassador, if anyone is listening ;-)]
- matwood 16y agoIt's utopia in the since that pleasure is used to control people instead of pain. The basis of both novels is control. The people in power always want to control those who are not in power, and that is what the individual must always be on guard against. I look at TV as a type of soma. Imagine if tomorrow TV* was gone. What would people do? No longer could they easily escape from the things they don't want to think about. I'm guessing some would turn to drugs, but many others (I hope anyway) would wake up and realize their own reality and thoughts instead just what has been spoon fed to them over the years. * Like a lot of other 'drugs' TV has many good uses for information and entertainment. The problem arises when large parts of the population watch so many hours/day.
- TGJ 16y agoIt seems that they both are right in a sense. Overindulgence of the self (Huxley) leads to destruction while overindulgence of Others (Orwell) does the same. Indulging in the personal pleasures leads people to forget about everything else while trying to take care of others too much leads to trying to run their lives when they don't listen to you even though you think you are right.
- dotcoma 16y agoOrwell wrote about overindulgence of others? How so?
- arethuza 16y agoThe only example I can think of is the way the Party controls the Proles - by making sure they have plenty gin, beer, porn, trashy novels and gambling. Which was presumably based on the observations of working class life he did for "The Road to Wigan Pier".
- pope52 16y agoOriginal Source (2009): http://www.recombinantrecords.net/2009/05/24/amusing-ourselves-to-death/ http://www.recombinantrecords.net/2009/05/24/amusing-ourselv...
- aardvark 16y agoThe cartoon notes that the comparison was taken from Neil Postman's book "Amusing Ourselves to Death". Postman wrote this 25 years ago. If anything, his observation is even more true today.
- RyanMcGreal 16y agoRIP Neil Postman. His keen intellect and warm humanity are missed.
- JoachimSchipper 16y ago[Note that there's a ton of Brave New World that's not in the comic, as pointed out by dbz. I'm reacting to the comic's version.] Note that, unlike Orwell's dystopia, Huxley's doesn't require squashing every voice of dissent - as long as the majority of people don't care, there is little danger in allowing some dissidents. Some would say that this, in fact, has already happened - Berlusconi controls a sufficiently large part of the population via the media that he's effectively untouchable. In the American situation, there's Fox News and its competitors.
- ckuehne 16y agoNeil Postman made the same observation already in 1984: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Amusing_Ourselves_to_Death http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Amusing_Ourselves_to_Death EDIT: Just read aardvark's comment. So never mind.
- dflock 16y agoThis is a false dichotomy. It's quite possible - and indeed, probably much more likely - that aspects of both are becoming bigger parts of our lives at the same time. These two aspects of human culture - authoritarianism and dissipation have always been with us, this isn't new; 'dictatorship' & 'bread and circuses' would both be familiar concepts to citizens of ancient Rome.
- arethuza 16y agoSo are there any novels that portray such a "hybrid" dystopia?
- starkfist 16y agoWouldn't any novel set in contemporary times be portraying the hybrid dystopia that we all currently inhabit?
- geophile 16y agoI think the movie Network (made in 1976!) was really close to exactly this hybrid.
- seanalltogether 16y agoThe problem with that is sci-fi and dystopian novels need clear black and white issues to discuss, otherwise it loses it's bite. In order to dissect and understand societies flaws, you really have to isolate the behaviour and then take it to it's logical extreme.
- paylesworth 16y agoI'm kinda shocked that no one in this discussion has mentioned Fahrenheit 451. It's a very close approximation of the of the two realties depicted in the comic strip. Definitely worth picking and it's beautifully vivid and short, about a novella in length.
- satori99 16y ago
- igravious 16y agoFrancis Fukayama made this very same assertion years ago in an essay in The Times Literary Supplement or The New York Review of Books. I remember reading this maybe six, seven years ago and his assertion was that the Huxlean(?) view of the future and not the Orwellian view of the future was coming to pass. I thought that it gelled with his capitalistic view of the world in general. It's a futile debate because clearly our present world exhibits traits from both of Huxley's and Orwell's imaginings. Arguably Orwell was by far the superior craftsman and wordsmith which is why I think his images carry more weight and are more current. Their visions are both culturally very important and this kind of "who's better?" malarky is ... um, malarky! Like I said before Eric Blair to Tony Blair in < 50 years ftw!
- absconditus 16y agoI am not disagreeing with anything you wrote or trying to be argumentative, but I wanted to mention that Amusing Ourselves to Death is 25 years old.
- igravious 16y agoI'll check it out
- hjkl 16y agoThis comic rings mostly true for me, but I disagree a bit with the claim that information in 1984 was restricted; Good information was hard to find, but if I recall correctly, bad information was abundant. For example, even when Winston begins to realize that he's being fed B.S. information by the government, the book he reads for "real" information is also (probably) filled with lies. I find this point to be especially poignant today as some niche alternative news outlets (such as conspiracy theory web sites) are as inaccurate as the outlets they seek to criticize.
- GiraffeNecktie 16y agoOrwell was specifically warning about the dangers of a communist totalitarian state. He was one of the few left-leaning writers that spoke out against Stalinism. North Korea has become, in every sense, a '1984' state. China and the former Soviet Union seem to be in transition from '1984' to 'Brave New World'.
- dublinclontarf 16y agoActually China found that a "pure" 1984 state isn't sustainable, so they're using the BNW model to paste over the cracks.
- orblivion 16y agoI was thinking about this. If NK spread around the world, it would be curtains. 1984 would be realized, there would be no escape. However NK receives aid from the UN (that it denies). I'm guessing (hoping) it wouldn't be sustainable otherwise.
- tome 16y agoI'm guessing (hoping) it wouldn't be sustainable otherwise. I think that's a massive understatement. As I understand it half the population is starving.
- JustinSeriously 16y agoFunny, I was just reading about this. "A young man Demick interviewed read 1984 after he escaped to [South Korea]. He was startled to learn that George Orwell, back in the 1940s, had perfectly understood the thinking of modern North Koreans." http://fullcomment.nationalpost.com/2010/07/24/robert-fulford-north-korea-an-antique-nightmare/ http://fullcomment.nationalpost.com/2010/07/24/robert-fulfor...
- orblivion 16y agoMy dad, who grew up in the Soviet Union, was similarly impressed.
- jdminhbg 16y agoThe elitism in this comic has rubbed me the wrong way every time I've read it, as has the historical tone deafness. You have to basically assume the premise to Idiocracy for it to be valid.
- harscoat 16y agoOrwell predicted the 20th Century, Huxley predicts the 21st
- RobertL 16y agodotcoma's real name is "Winston Smith"
- startuprules 16y agoI would propose that there currently exist a third reality: a combination of the two scenarios described in the comics. An authoritarian state which restricts materials that are hazardous to the state's health, but also encourages huge debt taking/mindless consumption that zombifies the majority of the population. Case in point: US. It restricts information that would undermine its authority as the world's dominant power, such as BP spill, bankruptcy of its banks/cities/states, ineffectiveness at resolution in afghanistan, etc. The government offers discounts/low rates for large home mortgages, expensive cars, and big student loans that would shackle the majority of the population in debt chains. It also condones mindless consumption such as reality TV, sports, celebrity news, and facebook games by not taxing them as addictive hazards. Case in point: China. It restricts, well, pretty much anything it doesn't want the people to know with the great internet firewall and state news programs. It also encourages huge risk taking in mortgages, which recently has seen home prices go up to 30X average income. It encourages its citizens to forget about the abysmal living condition by allowing internet game cafes to spread like wildfire and trapping the players in pointless alternative realities. So they don't realize they are doing slave labor at $1/day to make ipads. I further propose that this will continue as long as these governments worldwide can keep feeding its citizens at a minimum (food stamps, unemployment benefits, carb/sugar loaded cheap food), while offering cheap, mind-numbing entertainments to keep people at home, so they don't go out and riot on the streets. They can then keep on taxing/raising the retirement age on the productive workers Until oil is at $150/middle class is wiped out/Iran is attacked/North Korea attacks/US defaults on SS and medicare/Japan defaults on its bonds/food prices double/Israel is attacked/automation renders most of population useless, anyways.
- sabat 16y agoYou're right. The author may have been better to argue that Huxley is scoring higher than Orwell, but not by much. Our problem is that both of them are scoring as high as they are. Apparently, there are powerful people in the world who have taken these novels not as warnings but as textbooks.
- kiba 16y agoApparently, there are powerful people in the world who have taken these novels not as warnings but as textbooks. More like these people have taken on these Orwellian characteristics on their own rather than read about how to do EVIL. There are human beings who are very good at manipulating people, but it doesn't mean that they know the science of manipulating people.
- mattmaroon 16y agoThe reason is that Aldous Huxley's vision was far easier to implement. It didn't require a massive conspiracy, which is extremely difficult. Anyone who has ever been a checkout supervisor at Wal-Mart will tell you how hard it is to coordinate a large number of people with individual personalities, desires, etc. even if the end goal is something as simple as everyone taking a 15 minute break without having too few cashiers at once. Huxley's vision just required a bunch of people independently trying to make money and becoming good at it, which is pretty much what people do best.
- JanezStupar 16y agoIt doesn't take conspiracy to implement 1984. All it takes is bureaucrats doing their jobs and letting bureaucrats to tweak their job description.
- mattmaroon 16y agoI don't think that's true. Bureaucrats are mostly well-intentioned. They're not working toward 1984, they're working toward what they see as a well-run government. When it comes to government people easily fail to see the forest for the trees, and view it as a living, breathing, single organism hell-bent on power. It's not though, it's a collection of people who are for the most part competent and well-meaning and who are simply facing a monumental task. The entire first world routinely asks our politicians to provide us more services and more securities for less money, and then gets upset when they fail to deliver the impossible. They're not working toward 1984, they're just trying to stay in office and leave their offices a little better than when they found it.
- DuncanIdaho 16y agoWell have you ever heard that road to hell is paved with good intentions? I have seen more than fair shair of this saying being true in practice. Bureaucrat may be well-intentioned, but they are mostly more prone to "do their job" than to question the correctness and impact of their deeds. And that is without considering office politics or politics in broader sense. I'm working with government and I wouldn't rely on bureaucrat to do the "right thing". They say that bureacracy is organization whrere group of people that think all "A" agree on compromise "B".
- william42 16y agoPeople seem to assume it's a choice between Huxley, Orwell, or the combination of the two. They miss a very big option, which is that humanity is in fact better off than it used to be. Marx was dead wrong about the future(remember, he thought that global communist revolution was inevitable) but he was dead right about the time that he lived in. Up until the 1950s or 60s or so, a good half of the population wasn't able to hold any but a rare few jobs. During the early days of the Industrial Revolution up until about the decade of the 1900s, you would be considered lucky if you were paid in money rather than company scrip that would be useless outside of the company town you lived in, meaning that if you wanted to change jobs you pretty much lost all your money. In the Middle Ages, ...if I have to explain to you why the Middle Ages sucked compared to today, you're already a lost cause. I could go on. Want a real dystopia? Read a history book.
- dstorrs 16y agoYou're absolutely right -- things are much better now than any time in history, for a majority of the world's population. But "better" really means "more choices are available." We should try to make sure that we make the best choices, and that's what posts like these are trying to help us do.
- jbooth 16y agoYeah, but most of the reforms moving us past that point (OSHA, non-discrimination, overtime pay, etc) were actually the work of bonafide socialists. That was good enough for a while. Now we're starting to see worker's discontent again, it's focused on boogeymen, immigrants and liberals for now, but it'll make it's way back to employers eventually.
- StavrosK 16y agoThe world in Brave New World was portrayed in a very negative light, but I found it to be a utopia where everyone is happy. I don't see why a future where people have everything they may want and are happy all the time without fear is a bad world to be in...
- lincolnq 16y agoWell, I would rather live in a world that is making technological progress than a world where everyone was happy all the time. I think people need to be at least a little unhappy to drive progress.
- Semiapies 16y agoBeyond just that the cartoonist misses (or outright distorts) the points of Brave New World, ey makes the truly bizarre (and yet oddly common) assumption that at some golden age in the past, "the people" were less distracted by their own lives and what entertained them and were more civic and more aware. They weren't. Before they were playing video games, they were playing ping pong, board games, cards, or catch. Before they were watching YouTube, they were watching TV or listening to radio shows. Despite the journalistic myth-making about their own industry, the news has always been cluttered with trivialities and partisanship in every medium. And there have always been people complaining how everyone but they has descended into terrible trogolodytes who only care about their own lives and interests - and not what smart people like themselves find important.
- wheels 16y agoBlog spam, the original is here: http://www.recombinantrecords.net/docs/2009-05-Amusing-Ourselves-to-Death.html http://www.recombinantrecords.net/docs/2009-05-Amusing-Ourse... And the original discussion here: http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=627476 http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=627476 Edit: (article link was changed by moderator)
- pedalpete 16y agoLet us not forget about the great skill our minds have at making connections between things which many not actually be true. Just as startuprules points out that while many in the US are thinking that they have big brother looking over them, when they are compared to China they realize that it is mostly just their imagination. What I find most interesting is how many of us would say we are part of the problem? So if it affects everybody, but we're not a part of it, does it really affect everybody. Also, lets not forget about the drop in things like tv ratings, where a big show in the 80's was 10s of millions of people, and a big show today has a much smaller viewership. We still think everybody is watching American Idol (or whatever) because it's everwhere, but in reality, it seems very few are actually watching or even taking an interest.
- Tichy 16y agoI am not convinced. Somehow the 1984s still seem to be just around the corner all the time. Any kind of incident, and politicians try to make a case for 1984 laws and censorship. At least if my neighbors amuse themselves to death, I am not forced to participate. I also don't think average people of all ages (as in centuries, eons) were usually preoccupied with highly intellectual endeavors. So the lament of us all becoming more stupid is probably also an old one.
- Ardit20 16y agoAnd of course intelligence has been rising as measured by IQ. I think the books are a warning and contain some truth. I have not read BNW, but 1984 can be used as Machiavelli's Prince, as a prescription, rather than description, of how it could be. So the book is a warning. Also, I wanted to say, although it might have been written to describe communism, I think unless you take it literally, much of it resonates with democratic societies also. For example, how the three states keep being at war one day and friends another and how everyone forgets this and how they always are at war. That is quite a good description of the west in some ways.
- geden 16y agoHuxley, of course, wasn't all doom and gloom. His last, wonderful, novel 'Island' describes a very sensible, somewhat libertarian utopia, the antidote to BNW. His utopia is based on a very open education and a love and understanding for the natural world. It reminds me of Iain Bank's 'Culture', sans the technology. It's relatively overlooked as a work. My guess is the same factors that make doom and gloom sell newspapers make BNW the more popular novel. I'd recommend it as a read to anyone. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Island_(novel) http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Island_(novel)