Crownguard
27-04-2004, 07:15
(This topic came from the one running on how the US will eventually dissolve, but I think it brought up a point. Feel free to offer comments/theories if you've read the book!!!
Vote democrat, get brave new world!
Vote republican, get 1984!
The worship of Ford and the obsession with mass production and consumption as forced down the throats of society by totalitarian government in Brave New World always struck me as being extremely Republican.
The difference between 1984 and Brave New World is not a matter of Republican and Democrat, the difference is a matter of accepting totalitarianism because to do otherwise is certain death vs. accepting totalitarianism because one genuinely doesn't care.
The latter is far more frightening in my opinion.
That's one of the best summations of those two works I've seen in a long time.
As for the why's and how's of America's failure, it would be difficult to postulate. Had someone asked this question in 1859 or 1930, they probably would have gotten some pretty definate answers. Those answers would also have been dead wrong.
In my mind the biggest threat to America is not gays or radical Christians. Rather, it's pessimism, the belief that nothing should be done about the nation's or the world's problems because nothing can be done, whether because there is some specified adversary that is confounding your groups efforts to save humanity, or that there is an impending demise, that people are too stupid or apathetic, etc. What we don't see by taking this stance is twofold.
First, we don't see that we do have it in our power to wreak immense amounts of effort for the good of humanity if we are so willing. 90 years ago, few people believed that the world would make it out of the 1920's. 70 years ago, few people believed that we'd make it out of the 1940's. 50 years ago, few people believed that the world would make it out of the 1970's. Each of these times America was confronted by profound evil, but also profound opportunity to make the world a better place. And you know what? The pessimists in all of those cases were wrong. If they had been right, we'd never have been able to stop the nationalist impulses of the 1910's, the systematized genocide of the 1940's, or the threat of nuclear annihilation of the 1950's. But in each of those cases, we pulled ourselves back from the brink. Not God, not luck, not chance. We pulled ourselves out of the very holes we dug, and we can do it again, provided we don't listen to those eternal pessimists. The problem is that we do.
This leads to the second problem: our pessimism saps our strength and resolve to do what needs to be done, and even our belief that we have the strength and resolve to do what needs to be done. We have within ourselves every bit as much strength as the so-called Greatest Generation, but because of naysayers, we have people who won't exercise it and politicians who won't ask for it. That's why instead of going to a wartime level of taxation, mandating higher fuel-economy standards, our expected committment after 9-11 was to buy a frappin' Chevy and "Keep America Rolling." That's why, instead of getting enough soldiers in Iraq and Afghanistan to secure both nations fully, we get enough to conquer only and leave both anarchist havens for Al Queda. It's because deep down, we feel we don't have the capacity for the job that must be done, even though history is replete with examples of people no greater, no smarter, no stronger than us doing precisely that: because what we lack is not the courage of the Greatest Generation, but its can-do and must-do sense of determination.
This is the true cancer our society faces, not Democrat or Republican, and it is the thing we must excise if we are to surmount the obstacles that we face. We can do it, but before that, we have to believe that we can do it.
*Looks at above post* Heh heh. Sorry if I went into rant mode.
First, yes I have read both books....at least 6-7 times each. The question that some people might have to ask is this: Was the world in Brave new World REALLY a dystopia?
Granted, the savages had a pretty shitty life, but other than that, technically everyone *was* happy. Doped up and working complacently, but they were happy. If they were happy, then is the goal of existence happiness or knowledge? Its a hard question, because Mustaphus Mond had good points. People were not "free" but there was no real crime, no real suffering, and everything was nice and decadent. Is that paradise or dystopia?
If you are religious, think of your idea of heaven, etc. Would it not also be the same way? Only in conformity is there really "peace" in a sense?
Also goes back to Voltaire, who asked whether happiness was the goal of existence, or was knowledge.
"Ignorance is bliss." If so, then is ignorance preferable for the world? Is it needed to create a utopia? If so, will there require an intellectual elite to keep it running, and a place to send the free thinkers?
Answers would be nice people.
Vote democrat, get brave new world!
Vote republican, get 1984!
The worship of Ford and the obsession with mass production and consumption as forced down the throats of society by totalitarian government in Brave New World always struck me as being extremely Republican.
The difference between 1984 and Brave New World is not a matter of Republican and Democrat, the difference is a matter of accepting totalitarianism because to do otherwise is certain death vs. accepting totalitarianism because one genuinely doesn't care.
The latter is far more frightening in my opinion.
That's one of the best summations of those two works I've seen in a long time.
As for the why's and how's of America's failure, it would be difficult to postulate. Had someone asked this question in 1859 or 1930, they probably would have gotten some pretty definate answers. Those answers would also have been dead wrong.
In my mind the biggest threat to America is not gays or radical Christians. Rather, it's pessimism, the belief that nothing should be done about the nation's or the world's problems because nothing can be done, whether because there is some specified adversary that is confounding your groups efforts to save humanity, or that there is an impending demise, that people are too stupid or apathetic, etc. What we don't see by taking this stance is twofold.
First, we don't see that we do have it in our power to wreak immense amounts of effort for the good of humanity if we are so willing. 90 years ago, few people believed that the world would make it out of the 1920's. 70 years ago, few people believed that we'd make it out of the 1940's. 50 years ago, few people believed that the world would make it out of the 1970's. Each of these times America was confronted by profound evil, but also profound opportunity to make the world a better place. And you know what? The pessimists in all of those cases were wrong. If they had been right, we'd never have been able to stop the nationalist impulses of the 1910's, the systematized genocide of the 1940's, or the threat of nuclear annihilation of the 1950's. But in each of those cases, we pulled ourselves back from the brink. Not God, not luck, not chance. We pulled ourselves out of the very holes we dug, and we can do it again, provided we don't listen to those eternal pessimists. The problem is that we do.
This leads to the second problem: our pessimism saps our strength and resolve to do what needs to be done, and even our belief that we have the strength and resolve to do what needs to be done. We have within ourselves every bit as much strength as the so-called Greatest Generation, but because of naysayers, we have people who won't exercise it and politicians who won't ask for it. That's why instead of going to a wartime level of taxation, mandating higher fuel-economy standards, our expected committment after 9-11 was to buy a frappin' Chevy and "Keep America Rolling." That's why, instead of getting enough soldiers in Iraq and Afghanistan to secure both nations fully, we get enough to conquer only and leave both anarchist havens for Al Queda. It's because deep down, we feel we don't have the capacity for the job that must be done, even though history is replete with examples of people no greater, no smarter, no stronger than us doing precisely that: because what we lack is not the courage of the Greatest Generation, but its can-do and must-do sense of determination.
This is the true cancer our society faces, not Democrat or Republican, and it is the thing we must excise if we are to surmount the obstacles that we face. We can do it, but before that, we have to believe that we can do it.
*Looks at above post* Heh heh. Sorry if I went into rant mode.
First, yes I have read both books....at least 6-7 times each. The question that some people might have to ask is this: Was the world in Brave new World REALLY a dystopia?
Granted, the savages had a pretty shitty life, but other than that, technically everyone *was* happy. Doped up and working complacently, but they were happy. If they were happy, then is the goal of existence happiness or knowledge? Its a hard question, because Mustaphus Mond had good points. People were not "free" but there was no real crime, no real suffering, and everything was nice and decadent. Is that paradise or dystopia?
If you are religious, think of your idea of heaven, etc. Would it not also be the same way? Only in conformity is there really "peace" in a sense?
Also goes back to Voltaire, who asked whether happiness was the goal of existence, or was knowledge.
"Ignorance is bliss." If so, then is ignorance preferable for the world? Is it needed to create a utopia? If so, will there require an intellectual elite to keep it running, and a place to send the free thinkers?
Answers would be nice people.