Aldous Huxley's Letter to George Orwell

[McCamy Taylor]

25. Dystopian sci-fi is a reaction to the author's own world.

Jack Booted thuggery existed in Orwell's Europe- including the UK.

Sophisticated methods of brainwashing existed for hundreds---no, make that thousands---of years before Huxley, as did rigid social stratefication. Churches are especially adept, though the military is a close second. The mother's voice, coaxing a child to be an Alpha and not a Beta---even though the child may be a Beta at heart---is the social equivalent of hyponosis, and it is very powerful hyponosis.

The individual's resistance to these two types of tyranny has also been lauded since humans first put pen to paper, stylus to clay tablet and now, finger to keyboard.

There is a precarious balance of individual needs versus social needs in every culture. The result is that in some cultures you can't be gay. In others, you can't be female. In others, you can't get high. In others, you can't cry. All these "can'ts" wear away at the individual's notion of self.

You can only "get the future right" if you predict the technology that will be available for society to enforce its norms upon the individual. And technology is, at least initially, driven by consumer demand and the desire to make profit.

I think "The President's Analyst" got it right, with their dystopian future in which every single one of us is joined at the hip to our phone. But then, it is easier to predict the technology of the near future than of the distant future.