Cyarah Stine
Mr. Brown
English 12 Per.3
Into the Brave New World
In the novel, Brave New World, Aldous Huxley wrote about his idea of a futuristic, manmade society. This future world is not one of a hopeful, or a perfect utopia; the opposite is true in this novel. It becomes clear early in this story that the created society is a disturbing dystopia where, technological advancement controls the citizens and strips them of their individuality. This future world focuses on the entire collective civilization whose importance is that of economy, industry and improving technology these are the things that society feels will make them happy. The individual has no place in the Brave New World, a world where science is used to enslave humans and
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Huxley begins the book by describing a cold and mechanical hatchery center where humans are made in test tubes in almost a robotic fashion in the civilized society of London. All of the humans in society are conditioned as children to act and behave uniformly, according to their social class; Alphas, Betas, Gammas, Deltas and Epsilons. The government controls the citizens by keeping them happy on the surface encouraging the use of drugs and distracts them by nurturing a consumer culture. "Call it the fault of civilization. God isn 't compatible with machinery and scientific medicine and universal happiness. You must make your choice. Our civilization has chosen machinery and medicine and happiness. That 's why I have to keep these books locked up in the safe." (p. 234). Humans are programmed to accept society’s rules without question or individual thought. In doing so they take away freedoms, such as the freedom to think for …show more content…
Soma is one of the tools the government uses to control its people, it is a technologically generated drug used to sedate and calm the citizens. Soma is a very significant symbol throughout the novel; it represents religion in today’s society. Soma is a way for the society to cope with their lives. Throughout the story people partake of soma to stay in a state of “euphoric, narcotic, pleasantly hallucinate” (Huxley 53). “There 's always soma to calm your anger, to reconcile you to your enemies, to make you patient and long-suffering. In the past you could only accomplish these things by making a great effort and after years of hard moral training. Now, you swallow two or three half-gramme tablets, and there you are. Anybody can be virtuous now. You can carry at least half your morality about in a bottle. Christianity without tears-that 's what soma is” (Huxley 238). Huxley also uses Henry Ford and the Model-T as significant symbols throughout the book. Ford represents a father figure of mass production to the World State since he was the inventor of the Model-T and created the idea of the assembly line-similar to the hatchery. Ford is so significant to society, they base their time period after the invention of the Model-T. Another important symbol is that of Shakespeare. Shakespeare represents all the noble aspects of being human, emotions, passion and
Since this book was published in 1932, Huxley based his ideas of the free sexualization of women and the heavy use of drugs from the conusmerism and rising economic growth in America during the 1920’s. When Huxley wrote about the negative treatment of women in the “brave new world”, he was most likely referring to flappers, who were often characterized by their slitted skirts, short bobs, and their “debutante slouch”, made their appearance (Sauro). The “modern” behavior of the flappers, like their tendencies to smoke and drink with the men and obvious makeup, were considered improper at the time (Benson). In Brave New World, Lenina “[thought] of herself as meat” (Huxley 53), and women were often referred to as “pneumatic” and were judged by their looks (Huxley 60). The rising economic growth was a huge deal in the 1920’s because it led to excessive spending; people illegally drank because it was exciting, and “bootleggers (makers and suppliers of alcohol) became modern-day heroes” (Benson). With the extra money to spend and time to spare, people partied more frequently; these parties at the illegal bars were laden with drinking (Benson). In Huxley’s novel, the soma represents the heavy use of alcohol and drugs. People wasted their feeling away with alcohol just like how the citizens in the novel took soma to numb their feelings and
What if there was a place where you did not have to, or rather, you could not think for yourself? A place where one's happiness was controlled and rationed? How would you adapt with no freedom of thought, speech, or happiness in general? In the novel Brave New World by Aldous Huxley, there are many different attitudes portrayed with the purpose to make the reader think of the possible changes in our society and how they could affect its people.
In his novel Brave New World, Aldous Huxley illustrates ways in which government and advanced science control society. Through actual visualization of this Utopian society, the reader is able to see how this state affects Huxley’s characters. Throughout the book, the author deals with many different aspects of control. Whether it is of his subjects’ feelings and emotions or of the society’s restraint of population growth, Huxley depicts government’s and science’s role in the brave new world of tomorrow.
Before examining how utopias rob individuals of their identities, it is important to note the large cultural differences between the present in Brave New World and the modern-day present to show how utopias cannot function even in a highly technologically advanced future. A common phrased used by most of the characters in the novel is, “Oh, Ford!” (Huxley 21) as opposed to “Oh, God!” in modern-day language. This shows how the Brave New World society views Henry Ford, one of the fathers of modern technology, as its deistic figure. The manner in which Henry Ford is viewed is similar to the way ‘God’ is viewed in the present day, as the omniscient, omnipotent figure. Likewise, the futuristic society is one driven largely by the consumption of drugs, spe...
Brave New World is a novel about a dystopian society named “The World State” set in A.F. 632 (632 years after Henry Ford’s Death). In this society, advanced technology is used to mass produce people and condition them into only wanting and doing certain things, creating a caste system. However, doing so takes away people’s freedom to think for one’s self. Certain people are able to step back from the monotony of this society and because of this they feel detached. This scenario adds an element of alienation, this scenario poses as a question, is it better to be happy or individualistic.
Imagine living in a society where there is no sense of independence, individual thought or freedom. A society where the government uses disturbing methods that dehumanize people in order to force conformity upon them. Taking away any sense of emotion, It would be very undesirable to live in a society with such oppression. Such society is portrayed in Aldous Huxley's novel Brave New World. The World State uses social restrictions to create permanent artificial personalities for people within the society. The World State also uses controlled groupings of people to brainwash them further to be thoughtless people with no sense of individualism. Lastly, the World State uses drugs to create artificial happiness for people, leaving no room for intense emotion which causes people to revolt against the World State. Within the novel Brave New World, it is seen that the World State eliminates individuality through social restrictions, government controlled groupings and the abuse of drugs to maintain control of the population.
"'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.
Technology in a Totalitarian Society. In Brave New World written by Aldous Huxley and 1984 written by George Orwell the dystopian societies depend on technology to create a totalitarian society. Brave New World is a sequel to 1984, because Brave New World is an established dystopian society which uses technology in a much more pleasureable way, whereas in 1984 the technology is used in a much more aggressive manner. The technology used in both novels aids both governments in creating a totalitarian society, technology helps the government take control over all citizens, influence all of the peoples actions, and determine the people’s emotions.
Huxley’s portrayed society does in fact work to an extent. People know what they need to do, people are happy, people have soma, and people can have pleasure whenever they like. Things get done, but those same things could get done in a different way. The introduction of the Savage starts to show a different side of the story. The Savage, not conditioned and born to an actual mother, has different ideas about society- especially soma. “Listen, I beg of you. Lend me your ears… Don’t take that horrible stuff. It’s poison, it’s poison.”
... through life without ever truly having to face reality or make logical decisions. Soma symbolizes and shapes many parts of society and is arguably the main symbol in Huxley's satirical masterpiece. The truth is that this utopian society is synthetic and massed produced like soma, and society is cowardly while soma is a crutch to humanity.
In the dystopian novel, Brave New World, Huxley uses symbols to create meaning and to get his agenda across. The use of sex and reproduction, and Shakespearian writing and religious texts, as symbols in the novel help to push Huxley’s agenda that total government control is devastating, and the inner human drive to be an individual can never be suppressed. Also, the fact that the novel was written in 1931 shows that Huxley was attacking the newly forming Socialist nations.
For years, authors and philosophers have satirized the “perfect” society to incite change. In Brave New World, Aldous Huxley describes a so-called utopian society in which everyone is happy. This society is a “controlled environment where technology has essentially [expunged] suffering” (“Brave New World”). A member of this society never needs to be inconvenienced by emotion, “And if anything should go wrong, there's soma” (Huxley 220). Citizens spend their lives sleeping with as many people as they please, taking soma to dull any unpleasant thoughts that arise, and happily working in the jobs they were conditioned to want. They are genetically altered and conditioned to be averse to socially destructive things, like nature and families. They are trained to enjoy things that are socially beneficial: “'That is the secret of happiness and virtue – liking what you've got to do. All conditioning aims at that: making people like their inescapable social destiny'” (Huxley 16). Citizens operate more like machinery, and less like humans. Humanity is defined as “the quality of being human” (“Humanity”). To some, humanity refers to the aspects that define a human: love, compassion and emotions. Huxley satirizes humanity by dehumanizing the citizens in the Brave New World society.
This book can be a warning to humanity, telling society that brainwashing can become common and destroy the modern day world. This book makes the people of the modern day world think about what could happen in the near future if society decides to go farther and more into scientific research. Misuses in science could contribute to the making of man into an animal, not a smart, adapted, emotional connected human being. In “Brave New World,” Huxley creates a world that is complete and utterly disturbing to what humanity could become. The people in the World State are controlled through psychological conditioning on a ground breaking scale.
Technology, which has brought mankind from the Stone Age to the 21st century, can also ruin the life of peoples. In the novel Brave New World, the author Aldous Huxley shows us what technology can do if we exercise it too much. From the novel we can see that humans can lose humanity if we rely on technology too much. In the novel, the author sets the world in the future where everything is being controlled by technology. This world seems to be a very perfectly working utopian society that does not have any disease, war, problems, crisis but it is also a sad society with no feelings, emotions or human characteristics. This is a very scary society because everything is being controlled even before someone is born, in test tube, where they determine of which class they are going to fall under, how they are going to look like and beyond. Therefore, the society of Brave New World is being controlled by society form the very start by using technology which affects how the people behave in this inhumane, unrealistic, society.
Brave New World, by Aldous Huxley, portrays a future society where people are no longer individuals but are controlled by the World State. The World State dominates the people by creating citizens that are content with who they are. Brave New World describes how the science of biology and psychology are manipulated so that the government can develop technologies to change the way humans think and act. The World State designs humans from conception for this society. Once the humans are within the society the state ensures all people remain happy. They program these humans to have needs and desires that will sustain a lucrative economy while not thinking of themselves as an individual. Huxley describes the Worlds State’s intent to control their society through medical intervention, happiness, and consumerism which has similarities to modern society.