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A Brave New World
Nov. 19th, 2001 02:38 pmI have been reading a lot lately, trying to knock off a lot of classics that are oft mentioned in conversation, so i can be informed about them rather than just nodding and smiling. I just finished "A Brave New World" the other day, and almost immediately went into "Virus of the Mind," an expose on the "meme," which is essentially a way to unite many fields relating to psychology. The gist, we are influenced by "memes," which are like a cross between a cliche and an idea, these evolve as they are passed from user to user, and our minds twist them press certain psychological buttons. The meme is then passed from one user to another, becoming the root of actions, the root of religions, the root of those cheesy email chain letters.
After reading this, i was struck by this passage from the intro to "A Brave New World," it's on how total control over the human population can be obtained, via the establishment of a love of servitude.
It seems to me that in our modern world, the mechanisms of this theory are in place already. There are some differences, true, but it seems that our capitalist world is slowly evolving the mechanisms required for totalitarian control. Interesting, eh? Let's break it down; we have the media evolving these "memes" to become honed suggestive techniques (act now! limited time offer!) I doubt psychology has advanced to the point where we are all fitting into ourespective "holes," but we do have a complex series of tests and qualifications barring entry into certain tasks and jobs. Cultural biases in these exams are slowly ensuring that certain groups have no access to certain jobs. The mapping of the human genome has made the creation of "designer people" and genetic manipulation a near reality. In fact, Hawking tells us that essentially it is inevitable. He says that the passage of restrictive laws will only lead to the creation of a literal division of humanity along financial status. (As the rich could afford to have thier children "improved" outside of the country, while the poor would be bound by the law.) Finally, Huxley mentions the use of a drug (and i paraphrase here, he actually calls for the need for a "distractor..." a "Holiday" from this utopia.) For this, with his narrow (yet accurate) foresight he envisioned a drug. But we really have something much, much, more powerful, a self perpetuating rewards system where we need to work in order to obtain the next newest status symbol. We may have a computer, but we will need a processor upgrade in a few years. We may have the Gamecube, but do we have the X-Box? (A good example, a talk show this afternoon, abandoned the war in afghanistan for an argument about the virtues of the gamecube or the x-box. Who would have thought, on 9.11 that by 11.19 we would be discussing such trivialities.) We can pair this with the "designer idea," the engineered meme, and it's incredible transmitter, television, and we need no drug. We will be caught in our servitude, slaving away for the newest console game, and when we come home, we can see fifty ads an evening for the new Lexus. Imagine what you could accomplish if you were free of this? Imagine the freedom! You ccould have a job with the minimum amount of responsibility. Just enough pay to put the basics on the table, and then the rest of the time, is yours! Yours to make art, to write your novel, to start your own business. Instead, we are enslaved. Virus of the Mind defines a "cult" as any system where the individual works towards a goal that is not thier own. and where there are great penalties for leaving the system. Sounds like our whole society.
After reading this, i was struck by this passage from the intro to "A Brave New World," it's on how total control over the human population can be obtained, via the establishment of a love of servitude.
The love of servitude can not be established except as the result of a deep, personal revolution in human minds and bodies. To bring about the revolution we require, among others, the following discoveries and inventions. First, a greatly improved techniques of suggestion-- through infant conditioning and, later, with the aid of drugs, such as scopolamine. Second, a fully developed science of human differences, enabling government managers to assign any given individual (Round pegs in square holes tend to have dangerous thoughts about the social system and to infect others with thier discontents.) Third (since reality, however utopian, is something from which people feel the need of taking pretty frequent holidays), a substitiute for alcohol and the other narcotics, something at once less harmful and more pleasure-giving than gin or heroin. And fourth (but this would be a long-term project, which it would take generations of totalitarian control to bring to successful conclusion) a foolproof system of eugenics, designed to standardize the product amd so to facilitate the task of the managers. - Aldous Huxley, from the 1958 paperback introduction to A Brave New World)
It seems to me that in our modern world, the mechanisms of this theory are in place already. There are some differences, true, but it seems that our capitalist world is slowly evolving the mechanisms required for totalitarian control. Interesting, eh? Let's break it down; we have the media evolving these "memes" to become honed suggestive techniques (act now! limited time offer!) I doubt psychology has advanced to the point where we are all fitting into ourespective "holes," but we do have a complex series of tests and qualifications barring entry into certain tasks and jobs. Cultural biases in these exams are slowly ensuring that certain groups have no access to certain jobs. The mapping of the human genome has made the creation of "designer people" and genetic manipulation a near reality. In fact, Hawking tells us that essentially it is inevitable. He says that the passage of restrictive laws will only lead to the creation of a literal division of humanity along financial status. (As the rich could afford to have thier children "improved" outside of the country, while the poor would be bound by the law.) Finally, Huxley mentions the use of a drug (and i paraphrase here, he actually calls for the need for a "distractor..." a "Holiday" from this utopia.) For this, with his narrow (yet accurate) foresight he envisioned a drug. But we really have something much, much, more powerful, a self perpetuating rewards system where we need to work in order to obtain the next newest status symbol. We may have a computer, but we will need a processor upgrade in a few years. We may have the Gamecube, but do we have the X-Box? (A good example, a talk show this afternoon, abandoned the war in afghanistan for an argument about the virtues of the gamecube or the x-box. Who would have thought, on 9.11 that by 11.19 we would be discussing such trivialities.) We can pair this with the "designer idea," the engineered meme, and it's incredible transmitter, television, and we need no drug. We will be caught in our servitude, slaving away for the newest console game, and when we come home, we can see fifty ads an evening for the new Lexus. Imagine what you could accomplish if you were free of this? Imagine the freedom! You ccould have a job with the minimum amount of responsibility. Just enough pay to put the basics on the table, and then the rest of the time, is yours! Yours to make art, to write your novel, to start your own business. Instead, we are enslaved. Virus of the Mind defines a "cult" as any system where the individual works towards a goal that is not thier own. and where there are great penalties for leaving the system. Sounds like our whole society.
