Do people still read Brave New World? |
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Do people still read Brave New World?
By Jon Rappoport
Rule by technocracy---that is the subject of this article. In
such a future, there would be no politicians. They would have been made
extinct...
Huxley's 1932 novel about a World State and its version of
Utopia is still one of the most important and relevant novels of our
time.
It is the companion piece to Orwell's 1984. The overt brutal
force has been removed from the equation in Brave New World. Instead:
all births are synthetic, hatched in artificial womb factories, with
accompanying genetic manipulation; no more nuclear families; no more
monogamy; education is achieved through hypnotic sleep-learning; a caste
system is engineered so the lower, less intelligent classes are happy
with their lot, and the upper-level "alphas" occupy the top positions;
the castes have little interest in associating with each other.
The theme of life, the basic theme, is Pleasure. Pleasures of
the senses. Not of the mind, not of constructive action, certainly not
of imagination. Pleasure keeps the citizens of the World State
occupied...and if that fails, the ultimate backup is a drug called Soma,
which relieves anxiety and depression and stimulates "happiness."
There are many people living among us today who would opt for
that life in a heartbeat. They would see no downside. "Well, of course.
Sign me up. I've been trying to find that pleasure all along. I'll take
it."
The 1932 technocrats of Brave New World found a key. Why
should they waste time trying to inflict pain on the population as a
control mechanism? Why should they risk rebellion and revolution? Go
"positive." Give people pleasure. Absolutely.
All older forms of government fade away. They were just crude
experiments in the foothills of the one and only revolution: technology
deployed to pacify the world.
By the way, in Brave New World, no one reads books. They're
unnecessary. They make no sense. The "better life" is already a living
fact. What possible benefit could a book deliver?
Every time I read Brave New World I see complacent animals
grazing in pastures. That's the picture. Human animals at peace in the
fields. Nothing to care about. Nothing to think about. Just bend and
chew. Don't worry, be happy.
As Patrick Wood mentions in his fine and highly recommended
book, Technocracy Rising, Huxley began writing Brave New World as a
parody of other utopian novels of his time, but he became fascinated
with his own ideas along the way, and set his mind to the task of
fleshing out a technological end-game civilization.
Brave New World reveals a landscape in which people would be
unable to turn around and throw off what has been done to them. They
would not consider it. They would have no basis for comparison. They
would have no cultural memory. They are living in a universal
super-welfare state. Their needs are satisfied---especially the central
need: pleasure. It isn't gained or worked for. It's given. It's a fact
as basic as rain and sun. It's there. It's the shortest distance between
the present moment and the next moment.
Isn't this the fairy tale told about rich and famous
celebrities? They can wake up in the morning thinking about what
pleasure is immediately there for the taking. They have the means. They
have the time. They have the opportunity. In Brave New World, everyone
is that kind of creature. By necessity. There is no real choice. Their
most base desires are their only desires. Their horizon is shortened.
Here are several choice quotes from Huxley's masterwork:
"Hot tunnels alternated with cool tunnels. Coolness was
wedded to discomfort in the form of hard X-rays. By the time they were
decanted the embryos had a horror of cold. They were predestined to
emigrate to the tropics, to be miner and acetate silk spinners and steel
workers. Later on their minds would be made to endorse the judgment of
their bodies. 'We condition them to thrive on heat,' concluded Mr.
Foster. 'Our colleagues upstairs will teach them to love it'."
"Feeling lurks in that interval of time between desire and
its consummation. Shorten that interval, break down all those old
unnecessary barriers."
"No pains have been spared to make your lives emotionally
easy - to preserve you, so far as that is possible, from having emotions
at all."
"A gramme [of the pleasure drug Soma] is better than a damn."
The foundation of Brave New World conditioning: with enough
basic pleasure, there is no need to think, to contemplate, to assess, to
investigate; there is no need to imagine new realities because the
current one is more than sufficient; there is no need to rebel because
when a person is attuned to pleasure as the highest value---and he has
pleasure---what is there to object to?
Lee Silver, an enthusiastic molecular biologist at Princeton,
has written a book, Remaking Eden (1998), about the future of gene
science in society. This is how he sees things playing out:
"The GenRich-who account for ten percent of the American
population-all carry synthetic genes. All aspects of the economy, the
media, the entertainment industry, and the knowledge industry are
controlled by members of the GenRich class....
"Naturals work as low-paid service providers or as laborers.
[Eventually] the GenRich class and the Natural class will become
entirely separate species with no ability to crossbreed, and with as
much romantic interest in each other as a current human would have for a
chimpanzee.
"Many think that it is inherently unfair for some people to
have access to technologies that can provide advantages while others,
less well-off, are forced to depend on chance alone, [but] American
society adheres to the principle that personal liberty and personal
fortune are the primary determinants of what individuals are allowed and
able to do.
"Indeed, in a society that values individual freedom above
all else, it is hard to find any legitimate basis for restricting the
use of repro-genetics. I will argue [that] the use of reprogenetic
technologies is inevitable. [W]hether we like it or not, the global
marketplace will reign supreme."
Of course, in the future Huxley describes in Brave New World,
there is no marketplace. The powers-that-be have built a World State.
It is run by a scientific elite. They have left behind all traditional
forms of governing. Programs are followed.
That is all. That is enough.
This vision of technocracy clarifies the agenda. The New
World Order eventually travels light years beyond political tyranny.
What need is there for laws or courts or traditional office holders or
even the inside game of bribery and special favors?
They were old; this is new.
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Jon Rappoport
The
author of three explosive collections, THE MATRIX REVEALED, EXIT FROM
THE MATRIX, and POWER OUTSIDE THE MATRIX, Jon was a candidate for a US
Congressional seat in the 29th District of California. He maintains a
consulting practice for private clients, the purpose of which is the
expansion of personal creative power. Nominated for a Pulitzer Prize, he
has worked as an investigative reporter for 30 years, writing articles
on politics, medicine, and health for CBS Healthwatch, LA Weekly, Spin
Magazine, Stern, and other newspapers and magazines in the US and
Europe. Jon has delivered lectures and seminars on global politics,
health, logic, and creative power to audiences around the world.
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