The Reality of Our Dystopian Fantasy
Recently I have been reading dystopian fiction as I think through the nature of totalitarianism in real life. I’m struck by both the similarities and differences between the various books I have read. Although the authors have drastically different worldviews, much of what they held to be a means of control is similar and many of those means of control are already in place.
More significantly, many of the means of control that are in place in our society are voluntarily implemented. We choose to be absorbed and distracted by our televisions and smart phones; we (societally) elect to be distracted by sex in various forms. In light of these somewhat dated dystopian visions, reality is even more frightening.
Entertainment
In George Orwell’s 1984, for example, entertainment is used both as a means of control and of monitoring. The telescreen is always on, pornography is produced for the proles to consume to keep them happy, and other cheap entertainments are made available that are poor quality and degrading. Striking in Orwell’s fantasy is the nature of the violence in the movies, which was used to help the audience dehumanize other people.
In contrast, Aldous Huxley’s Brave New World doesn’t have the intrusive telescreen (likely because that technology was in its infancy and had little commercial availability), but the feelies are a common source of entertainment, where the motion pictures are trite in their plot, pornographic in nature, and have technological innovations that allow the audience to get some of the physical sensations of the actors on the screen.
In both cases, the purpose of the entertainment is largely to pacify the masses. In both cases the entertainment is also a major means of shaping culture. This is reflected in the warlike nature of Orwell’s Oceania and the sensualism of Huxley’s world.
Set in an obviously fictional dystopia, the symbolism of both authors is heavy handed, but it is not too far from the techniques used in totalitarian regimes. In We Have Been Harmonised, which reads like a real-life 1984, Kai Strittmatter describes the cheesy entertainment produced for the masses to support the Communist Party. This includes forming music groups to produce party-supporting rap music: “The reform group is two years old now / and it has already done quite a lot / Reform! Reform! Reform! Reform! Reform!”
There is also overlap with the way the Nazi’s rose to power. In Milton Mayer’s book, They Thought They Were Free, German citizens describe how they were perpetually entertained through meetings, organizations, etc., so they were always imbibing the National Socialist message and not thinking about big things.
Consider, then, the message of The Shallows and Amusing Ourselves to Death that what we consume for entertainment and how we consume it deeply shapes our experience in life, particularly how we think. The difference is that we are clamoring for more of the entertainment that is destroying us. With regard to entertainment, we are living in a voluntary dystopia.
Sex as Control
Dystopian fiction also tends to see sex as a means of control.
This is nowhere more obvious than in Brave New World, where casual sex is not only allowed, but socially expected. However, prevention of the natural result of sex is an absolute social necessity as the girls are taught from childhood to execute the Malthusian Drill to prevent pregnancy. Control is exerted by sex and lots of it to keep people quiet.
In contrast, the suppression of sex is significant in Orwell’s 1984. Party members are not supposed to enjoy it, so much of Winston and Julia’s rebelling consists of sneaking off to knock knees. Orwell is less dire in his depiction of anti-natalism, but the joyless sex that Winston suffers through from his willing, but resistant wife is appalling. Children are presented as a duty and not a delight.
In C. S. Lewis’s dystopian fairy tale, That Hideous Strength, when Filostrato describes “reproducing ourselves without copulation.” Eliminating sex is a part of control for the N.I.C.E. because, “There will never be peace and order and discipline so long as there is sex. When man has thrown it away, then he will become finally governable.”
According to these various authors, either the total elimination of sex or its abundance is a means to control. These amount to the same thing, because in each of these situations, sex has become essentially meaningless.
Sex in Brave New World has no social purpose other than to pacify and to conceive through it is failure. Sex in Oceania is supposed to be pleasure free, solely for begetting future members of the Party. There is no social purpose of it. For the N.I.C.E., sex must be eliminated, because it will have no purpose. Whether there is a great deal of sex or very little sex, the physical act is always divorced from its natural purpose.
And this is exactly where we find ourselves. Contemporary “hook-up” culture is essentially similar to Huxley’s vision, though freely chosen. We need look no further than the rabid concern among left-leaning politicians that sex be divorced from its gendered directionality, and that if a couple who can procreate do copulate, that the government provide the means to prevent conception or destroy its result. The self-chosen sterility of many young professionals for the sakes of their careers, etc., is a sign of this acceptance. As a society, we certainly live much more on the Huxlean side of the spectrum than the Orwellian side, but I think we may not be too far from seeing Lewis’s dystopian vision come to fruition.
Self-Chosen Dystopia
The amazing think about each of these dystopias is how accurate they are with respect to the worst aspects of our culture. The tragedy is we often realize the unhappiness that results but fail to connect it to the cause. We are, in general, less happy than earlier societies even though we are much wealthier. Part of the reason for this is that the very things that were supposed to make life better have helped to sap its meaning.
At this point in my life, I’m not prepared to give up my smart phone. There are simply too many advantages to having the sum of human knowledge in my pocket wherever I go. What needs to change, however, is how often I pull that silicon and plastic rectangle out of my pocket to look at useless things. There is little doubt that some of my dissatisfaction with my life as it is because I’m constantly borrowing other people’s strife and longing for other people’s good.
At the same time, there are likely means of control that I can rightly eliminate from my life with no real loss and a great deal of gain. The challenge is to find the room above the antique dealer––hopefully one that isn’t bugged by Big Brother––and figure out what adds value, what distracts, and what can be eliminated. I think we’d all be happier if we spent some time doing that, though our technological controllers were much prefer we did not.
The way we talk about humans also has moral implications, which are more significant than how we treat our pets. In his 2011 book, Less than Human: Why We Demean, Enslave, and Exterminate Others, David Livingstone Smith explores how language changes culture and leads to the justification of extreme violence against others, especially when they become perceived as less than human.