1984 vs. Brave New World

Although both Orwell and Huxley have presented us with visions of the future that seemed completely far-fetched and fictional during the time they were written, the two visions placed society at opposite ends of the spectrum as far as the "downfall" of humankind. Orwell envisioned us in a world where we are miserable, oppressed, and controlled by an external force, but contrarily, Huxley envisioned us in a world where there is no such thing as misery because there is no such thing as an ability to form complex emotions or thoughts. As for today's world which has come to be heavily controlled by the media and technology, one would likely assume that this degree of control is an Orwellian perspective; however, Postman is accurate in claiming that Huxley's view of the future has proven to be more accurate in our society.

Postman makes a point that is relevant to our society when he claims that "What Huxley feared was that there would be no reason to ban a book, for there would be no one who wanted to read one." When one considers the influence of the internet on our society today, and how that influence is steadily becoming heavier, the idea of no one ever wanting (or needing) to read a book seems plausible. When we need information for a paper on, for example, elephants, does the first step consist of going to the library and looking through the "E" volume of an encyclopedia, or does it consist of going to Wikipedia.org and typing in "elephants" in the search box? We have come to a point where, if we can't find the answer to something by typing it into Google, then we won't be able to find it anywhere, ever. This point is reinforced when Postman states that "Huxley feared those who would give us so much information that we would be reduced to passivity and egoism." This is exactly what has been created with the widely available internet with an infinite amount of available information. We can use the internet as a tool to do anything we could possibly want to do. We can cheat on our school assignments by typing homework questions into Yahoo! Answers, create a new identity for ourselves by hiding behind a blog screenname, steal someone else's identity by discovering a simple six character password, and express things about ourselves on Myspace and Facebook that we wouldn't dare express in person. These are freedoms that humans couldn't have dreamed of having before the internet became available to the public as a universal communication tool. On the other hand, in Orwell's world view, we would be so oppressed that such mass communication and widely available information would never be allowed for the general population, but only to the ubiquitous Big Brother.

It has been argued for decades that the culture of America (and perhaps even the world as a whole) is dissolving as time progresses. Our "culture" in America currently consists of reality shows starring celebrities whose millions of dollars from decades past went to waste on drugs and prostitutes, Weight Watchers and McDonald's alike for the overweight population that is simply too busy to cook a healthy meal or take a walk around the block for some exercise, and sex coming from absolutely everywhere. According to Postman, "Huxley feared we would become a trivial culture, preoccupied with some equivalent of the feelies, the orgy porgy..." It has become literally impossible to go one day in America without seeing or hearing of sex on TV, on the internet, in the hallways of middle (and perhaps now even elementary?) schools, in songs on the radio, or even in the books we are required to read for English class. I can recall VERY few books that I've read in high school that never once mentioned sex, if any at all. It is literally impossible to watch even the news on TV without hearing something about sex or seeing a suggestive commercial. If our world was really becoming the Oceania that Orwell predicted, we would be completely opposite of what we are today as far as the presence of sex in society, as we would not be permitted to have even the slightest exposure to sexual subject matter. We must now be concerned about whether or not our twelve and thirteen year old children are being provided with proper sex education. Teen pregnancy and STD infection rates are exponentially higher now than they were sixty years ago when premarital sex and promiscuity were virtually unacceptable. Surely many people who read Brave New World were shocked like I was when reading the part about the "erotic play" on the playground among six year old children, but with thirteen and fourteen year old parents becoming less and less unheard of in today's society, it appears that we are definitely approaching something along the lines of Huxley's vision for the future.