This is genius: Huxley v Orwell

[Soph0571]

As Huxley said...

“A really efficient totalitarian state would be one in which the all-powerful executive of political bosses and their army of managers control a population of slaves who do not have to be coerced, because they love their servitude.”

Heh. Hhhhmmm.

[Atticus]

1. Yes, it is genius, but understand that some of us live in communities where less than 5%

of the people have ever heard of either Huxley or Orwell.

[unblock]

3. Oh plenty of people remember that Orwell started in an old Apple commercial

[robbob]

16. What difference does that make?

I mean, if I’m reading a book about the molecular structure and properties of the oxygen molecule if hardly matters if 95% of people don’t care or aren’t interested in that topic; we are all still breathing oxygen.

Neil Postman’s book is an observation of where we are at culturally. The fact that most people have never heard of Orwell or Huxley kind of just reinforces his point of how we are obsessed with the trivial.

[Atticus]

39. If you lived where I live, among people who ask questions like, "What do you mean,

'mendacity'?" you would understand what difference it makes.

[Bernardo de La Paz]

2. Thought-provoking. Thanks! . . . nt

[Docreed2003]

4. This is brilliant

Everyone fears "1984", but I have said repeatedly in this forum that Huxley seems to have been closer on the mark in some ways. We are largely too distracted to be concerned with our fascist takeover. Thank you for sharing this!!

[IthinkThereforeIAM]

30. I have often pointed that out over the past 20+ years...

... as long as society gets the faux/temporary warm and fuzzy feelings from time to time...

[DemoTex]

5. BTW: Aldous Huxley died on the same day as JFK. November 22, 1963.

Writer C.S. Lewis died on that day too.

[stopwastingmymoney]

19. Interesting, I didn't know that

A person could cook up a CT over that, or maybe a novel

[Joinfortmill]

6. Love it. Thank you

[PatSeg]

7. Fascinating

I think in many respects they both were right.

[lunatica]

43. Yup. Feed the people pablum until some begin to wake up then

stomp them out to keep the rabble quiescent.

[bronxiteforever]

8. K&R. This is wonderful. Thank you for posting!

[PA Democrat]

9. Sadly, I see elements of both in today's culture

For example today's version of Huxley's "soma" is mindless TV programming, social media obsession, video games, etc.

Today's version of Orwell's "two-minute hate" is the FOX "News", radio programming like Limbaugh, Trump's speeches inciting hatred of immigrants, Democrats, etc.

I count myself fortunate to have grown up in a time period in which most of those distractions were not available. We had one TV in our household, but hundreds of books. One of the biggest gifts my parents gave me as a child was a love of reading. I read both Brave New World and 1984 while in high school, and not because it was a class assignment.

[bucolic_frolic]

10. The public can't distinguish truth from lies

because they lie so much and have their own propaganda channel

[Soph0571]

32. As Huxley once said

“… [T]he passion for power is one of the most moving passions that exists in man. And, after all, all democracies are based on the proposition that power is very dangerous, and that it’s extremely important not to let any one man or any one small group to have too much power for too long a time. After all, what are the British and American constitutions, except devices for limiting power? And all of these new devices [television, radio, etc.] are extremely efficient instruments for the imposition of power by small groups over larger masses.” 1958

[Nitram]

11. Brilliant stuff! They were both right. A combination of the two is used like the carrot and the

stick.

[nuxvomica]

12. I love this sort of thought-provoking stuff

Ironic that it might be my undoing distraction. Huxley was also prescient that the gut biome, such a trendy subject nowadays, might be the key to health and possibly immortality in After Many a Summer Dies the Swan.

[kairos12]

13. Huxley predicted the world

of Alternative Facts. When facts become a headache to discern people turn on The Wheel of Fortune or The Bachelor.

Rise and Fall of the American Empire brought on by an illiterate culture who are glued to their remotes with Cheetos stained fingertips.

[eppur_se_muova]

14. As a couple of posters have noted, both were right, and both effects are flourishing.

The carrot of mindless entertainment and the stick of frenzied hate-mongering are both hard at work in the world today.

Now we add "social distancing" to the mix. Soon there may be little of our lives that does not arrive through one tightly controlled network or another.

[NNadir]

15. Brilliant. Thanks Sharing it with my sons with the source...

http://www.stuartmcmillen.com/blog/amusing-ourselves-to-death/

[klook]

21. Thanks for the link. Great young writer/artist. (nt)

[zentrum]

17. Brilliant. Depressing.

[Beakybird]

18. Both books had big impact on me.

I think that Huxley's fears of the future were more prescient, but there's a lot of Orwell in countries like China, with cameras everywhere and social media monitoring.

[gab13by13]

20. I said several times that we are headed,

into a "Brave New World," where everyone is the same and those who rebel or are different are exiled or worse.

[ancianita]

22. Thank you. Timely. Hopefully it sharpens our judgment about hype.

[ElementaryPenguin]

23. Genius indeed!!

[spike jones]

24. Amused To death- Roger Waters you should listen to the whole album

No tears to cry no feelings left This species has amused itself to death

[denem]

25. Completely misses the point of 1984

For a start its wrong -in 1984, 80% of the population were proles - fed with trash culture, lotteries, porn etc - not too dissimilar to Huxley.

[B Stieg]

26. The visual re-presentation of Big Brother...

is not from the novel nor the film 1984 (1984).
It's the face from the famous 1984, first-ever, Macintosh Superbowl Commercial.
(played by actor Bob Flag)
Just sayin...

[librechik]

27. Excellent! I often wonder whether we'll end up like 1984 or Brave New World

at this point I'm thinking Brave first then Big Brother forever.

[AleksS]

28. And it turns out the little girl in the meme was right

Why not both?

[Uncle Joe]

29. Kicked and recommended.

Thanks for the thread Soph.

[empedocles]

31. Surprised no one in the thread mentioned . . . 'IDIOCRACY' . . . still

getting replays everywhere.

[I see a little test case playing out at flakewell's Liberty University. The information is out there on the virus, the LibU environiment idiotically denies it. Time will tell. One indicator will be summer and fall enrollments at LU].

[Soph0571]

33. Indeed

[Newest Reality]

35. Yes!

I consider Idiocracy to be one of the best documentaries ever

[empedocles]

36. All of the LU students are having a very exceptional educational opportunity to deeply experience

the fact v. fiction problem at LU.

[Haggis for Breakfast]

47. They'll ALL be in therapy is 15 years, I bet.

[empedocles]

50. Widespread reports that the young are markedly, less likely to follow into evangelicalism

[Newest Reality]

34. That was good!

Thanks!

I have long thought that we are living in a hybrid of Orwell and Huxley and those who have read both might notice that there is a spectrum now that might just indicate the relationship of a dual approach, in essence.

If you then read Debord's, The Society of the Spectacle; Chomsky's Manufacturing Consent; Baudrillard's America and Simulation and Simulacra; you then have a good overview of how this modern system tends to function, (media being the message) by using influence over bullets, (unless absolutely necessary) because the spoils are kept intact and increased functionality can be beneficial to profit margins.

Also, a good primer is The Century of the Self, an excellent BBC documentary.

[grantcart]

37. Yes indeed

Turns out that the opiate of the masses is not religion but play stations and other electronic games.

[softydog88]

38. I first saw this on highexistence.com

and have been sharing it with friends for a couple of years. I also bought the book, but I haven't read it yet. This underscores the fact that I need to. Here is a video lecture called "The Surrender of Culture to Technology," by the author, Neil Postman, if anyone is interested. There are also a number of videos of people discussing "Amusing Ourselves to Death."

[3Hotdogs]

40. Postman's "Teaching As A Subversive Activity" was excellent.

[yonder]

41. Excellent. Thanks for posting.

[muriel_volestrangler]

42. I think people should remember BNW was mainly about controlling children by abolishing the family

and bringing them up with brainwashing (reinforced with pain if needed), "hypno-teaching" (can't remember if he had a particular phrase for it), and designing each person for a particular job and station in life (if necessary including poisoning fetuses). Plus cloning to get an identical workforce when wanted. It's not that much about the media (which, to be fair, Orwell did include too - what to have to keep the 'proles' content, propaganda to make the party workers think the war is going well, they're being treated with ration increases, and so on).

[BunnyMcGee]

44. "...they love their servitude."

Yes, I see this in folks around me. Glued to Facebook or TV.

[Karadeniz]

45. WOW! Great post! America chose Huxley.

[BlancheSplanchnik]

46. I read Postman's "Amusing Ourselves to Death" a long time ago

It made my jaw drop, it was so prescient. Even still, it’s a must read.

[Cetacea]

48. Excellent!

Thank you!

[burrowowl]

49. Kick