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Similarities and differences between cultures
Similarities and differences between cultures
Analysis of the brave new world
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Our society is becoming a civilization where many are compelled towards entertainment to stay fulfilled. In Aldous Huxley’s, Brave New World, the society is under control of the government’s regulations. With this intention, the people of the government are controlled by having to deliver pleasure. The world within this novel is unlike our world in numerous ways, but is also similar in several ways. In the society of Brave New World, the citizens are content with their rules they must follow. They are unaware they have been conditioned to living a certain way that is different from other worlds which leads many to confusion and curiosity. Within our world we live in, we are not necessarily conditioned to live for one certain reason unlike Brave New World. Although, some …show more content…
In this novel, the children are taught to feel no emotion towards someone once they die. “Undoing all their wholesome death-conditioning with to disgusting outcry-as though death were something terrible” (Huxley Pg.187), John stammered as the kids surrounded his dying mother. In our world, we are not taught to block out our emotions towards death but children don’t feel as much emotion towards death as adults would. Needless to say, this is a similarity but also a small difference between our world and theirs. Although, the children in our world are not conditioned to not feel anything, they still do not feel as much but only because they have not grown to learn the meaning of life. Another similarity would be the entertainment within both worlds. For example, our main form of entertainment is our cell phones, where as in Brave New World their central form of entertainment is soma. To enumerate off this topic, people in our society rely on their cell phones for just about everything. Without these devices, all of us would be lost and would not know how to function. Where as in Brave New World, the citizens depend on soma to make them feel good and
According to events from the past, history today has repeated itself due to the sustained and increasingly high levels of drug and alcohol use as well as the popularity of casual sex displayed on media platforms. Huxley’s idea of the “utopian” society is manufactured, just as it is being artificially created today; in the modern world, euphemisms are frequently used to cover up the real truths. Similarly, the “brave new world” hid
Brave New World is an unsettling, loveless and even sinister place. This is because Huxley endows his "ideal" society with features calculated to alienate his audience. Typically, reading Brave New World elicits the very same disturbing feelings in the reader which the society it depicts has notionally vanquished - not a sense of joyful anticipation. Huxley's novel presents a startling view of the future which on the surface appears almost comical. His intent, however, is not humor. Huxley's message is dark and depressing. His idea that in centuries to come, a one-world government will rise to power, stripping people's freedom, is not a new idea. What makes Huxley's interpretation different is the fact that his fictional society not only lives in a totalitarian government, but takes an embracive approach like mindless robots. For example, Soma, not nuclear bombs, is the weapon of choice for the World Controllers in Brave New World. The world leaders have realized that fear and intimidation have only limited power; these tactics simply build up resentment in the minds of the oppressed. Subconscious persuasion and mind-altering drugs, on the other hand, appear to have no side effects.
As analyzed by social critic Neil Postman, Huxley's vision of the future, portrayed in the novel Brave New World, holds far more relevance to present day society than that of Orwell's classic 1984. Huxley's vision was simple: it was a vision of a trivial society, drowned in a sea of pleasure and ignorant of knowledge and pain, slightly resembling the world of today. In society today, knowledge is no longer appreciated as it has been in past cultures, in turn causing a deficiency in intelligence and will to learn. Also, as envisioned by Huxley, mind altering substances are becoming of greater availability and distribution as technology advances. These drugs allow society to escape from the problems of life instead of dealing with reality. With divorce rates higher than ever in the past few decades, it has become evident that lust has ruined the society's sexual covenants. People are indulging in their sexual motives; lust runs rampant, thus strong, long-lasting relationships are becoming a rarity.
Brave New World Essay Test Q: How does life in the Brave New World change John? A: Life in The Brave New World changes John in an unusual way. Being a child of the savage reservation, John was taught that morality, rather than conditioned by the Controller. John learned his rights and wrongs from his mother, and his own experiences. John knew a personal relationship was valued, and everyone loved one another.
According to Neil Postman’s Amusing Ourselves to Death, Orwell’s 1984 and Huxley’s Brave New World both predicted that society would eventually be governed by a global totalitarian system; however, the key difference between both their predictions is the method by which society’s cognizance would be undermined. Orwell claimed that contemporary society would be controlled by overt modes of policing and supervising the social hierarchy, whereas Huxley stated that society’s infatuation with entertainment and superficial pleasure alone would be enough for the government to have absolute control over the public. Unfortunately, today’s society is not an Animal Farm. All jokes aside, Postman’s assertion of Huxley’s theory, “what
In a society where the life is easy and no hardships exist it is inconceivable to the public to think that anyone would want anything else. No one is poor, no one is lonely. When times get rough, or doubt settles it, citizens just medicate with soma and feel no strong emotions. In their drug induced state they drift back into a sense that everything is perfect, without soma, citizens have no way to handle inconveniences of life. For instance, when Lenina visits the reservations with Bernard she desperately feels “in her pocket for her soma—only to discover that, by some unprecedented oversight, she had left the bottle down the rest house” (Huxley 111). She needs her soma, she cannot cope with regular events without it. The people in the society, whether Epsilon or Alpha, have every comfort they could dream of, never getting ill, never aging, never having to deal with any heartache. In order to not experience strong emotion people cannot get too attached to each other, tying into the idea that everyone belongs to everyone. When citizens have this mentality the concept of death is simply a passing event, it holds no true importance. When Lenina and Henry are flying above the crematorium, a puff of air, once a life, makes the helicopter shoot up for a moment. Instead of seeing this as a sentimental ending of a life, Lenina simply claps her hands and remarks on how enjoyable flying up was. Her ignorance displays how the way people live their lives in the World State affects how they perceive death. The World State is filled with essentially clones; no one is truly a free thinker, which is why Huxley writes in John. John is the purest form of individual that is present in Brave New World. John Savage is viewed by the society as this sort of animal, untamed and different.
They are motion pictures, often erotic, that utilize all of an audience’s senses to provide them with pleasure (Frost 447). “Feelies” are the mass production of pleasure. Huxley felt that changes in the ways we achieve pleasure show the degeneration of our culture, “in place of old pleasures demanding intelligence and personal initiative, we have vast organizations that provide us with ready-made distractions — distractions which demand from pleasure seekers no personal participation and no intellectual effort of any sort” (qtd. in Frost 446). Industrialization and mass production, both of which are looked down upon by Huxley, are now applied to pleasure and leisure. Frost notes that Three Weeks in a Helicopter, the cookie-cutter “feelie” shown during Brave New World, involves many complex allusions and illustrates Huxley’s views (449). One of the allusions is the ironic setting. It is set in Alhambra, a location in Britain that evolved overtime to “accommodate the evolution of popular pleasure” (Frost 450) and embodies the cultural degeneration Huxley found in pop culture. Three Weeks in a Helicopter embodies the idiotic pop culture in a location where Huxley’s “real culture” would have once occurred (Frost 450). Despite Huxley’s disgust with cinema, Frost argues that Huxley’s use of cinema, in “feelies” and training films, “provide both a cautionary tale and a vision of cinema’s social
... In short, the novel Brave New World, shows that the World State eliminates individuality through social restrictions, government controlled groupings and the abuse of drugs to maintain control of the population. Social restriction through hypnopaedia and shock therapy robs individuals of their creative personalities by preventing freedom of thought, behavior, and expression. Government controlled groupings such as Solidarity Service Days and the feelies to eliminate individuality stemming from individual thought due to discontent; therefore maintaining control by eliminating the chance of people revolting and going astray from their conditioning. Works Cited Huxley, Aldous. A. & Co.
"'God isn't compatible with machinery and scientific medicine and universal happiness.'" So says Mustapha Mond, the World Controller for Western Europe in Aldous Huxley's novel Brave New World. In doing so, he highlights a major theme in this story of a Utopian society. Although the people in this modernized world enjoy no disease, effects of old age, war, poverty, social unrest, or any other infirmities or discomforts, Huxley asks 'is the price they pay really worth the benefits?' This novel shows that when you must give up religion, high art, true science, and other foundations of modern life in place of a sort of unending happiness, it is not worth the sacrifice.
In Brave New World by Aldous Huxley and “The Ones Who Walk Away From Omelas” by Ursula K. Le Guin, there are many ways that a reader can read these stories and see the differences between them. A further breakdown of both of these stories will show how they both contradict social classes and political ideologies of their time. Brave New World challenges societal structures by presenting the idea that a totalitarian style of government will create the feeling of peace and safety that people are looking for. At the same time “The ones who walk away from Omelas” is challenging political ideologies with what seems as a Utopian society that follows in the steps of a communist style government.
The books Brave New World by Aldus Huxley and Anthem by Ayn Rand are both valuable twentieth-century contributions to literature. Both books explore the presence of natural law in man and propose a warning for what could happen when man's sense of right and wrong is taken from him. In this essay, I hope to show how these seemingly unrelated novels both expound upon a single, very profound, idea.
Aldous Huxley’s Brave New World illustrates a colorful, fantastic universe of sex and emotion, programming and fascism that has a powerful draw in a happy handicap. This reality pause button is called “Soma”. “Take a holiday from reality whenever you like, and come back without so much as a headache or a mythology.” ( Huxley 54 ).
...easures and reckless behavior instead of close connections and marriage, John’s morals continue to cause a significant issue that demonstrates how he would be unable to survive in such a society. While his morals are constantly put to the test, through the different forms of entertainment, his own friend mocking his ways, and his relationship with the girl he loves, they are finally broken in a high-pressure situation at the end of the novel. As a result, John is so guilty and broken after the events that he brings upon his own death. Through this experience, Brave New World exhibits the struggle that someone who has not adapted to the modern world’s ways will face, yet also emphasizes that they should continue to maintain their own ways despite this for the alternative of conforming to society’s ways, which go against your morals, could be even more consequential.
One major issue that helps maintain social stability in Brave New World is sex. It is thought of as normal for people to be completely open with their sexual nature. It is typical for children to run around naked during recess playing games that are sexual and sometimes homosexual in nature. Every adult is encouraged to sleep with as many different partners as possible. This outlook on sexual nature is quite different from actual accepted views. Today, sex is most widely accepted as a private, romantic event that should take place between monogamous couples. Because sex is a natural need of the human body, people of Huxley’s society feel pleased by being open with their sexuality. Indulging in their sexual pleasures eases their minds and keeps them from questioning the level of freedom they have.
In most countries in our world, society has experienced technological advances to the point of being able to accomplish what Huxley envisioned. In contrast to Huxley’s vision, the moral standards of most nations allow all humans to enjoy basic human rights that embrace family, personal relationships, and individualism. Today’s society is able to comprehend how with the technological advances Huxley’s world could be a reality, but with the privilege of a democratic society, civilization would not allow the medical intervention for reproduction, the conditioning for happiness and consumerism. Work Cited "Brave New World by Aldous Huxley : Barron's Notes" Brave New World by Aldous Huxley: Barron's Notes. N.p., n.d. Web.