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| by comrade commissar | May-Lynn | @ Sunday, August 08, 2004, 12:59:00 AM | permalink |
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Wouldn't you need to demonstrate pain in order for people to understand pleasure? Or capitalism in order for them to grasp communism? At least some part of every concept can be said to be defined by its opposite. So utopia could never be truly utopia unless everyone participating had a clear idea of what, exactly, they were against, as well as what they were pro (pro-kindness, pro-sharing, pro-liberated sexual orgies, whatever).
Demonizing the opposite (or the Other, again) is also pretty useful in persuading people to adhere to your belief and value system. I'm sure everyone who read 1984 knows this - the nations were always at war with each other and each nation told its citizens that it was winning, obviously because their way of life was the "right" one. In advertising, we learnt that this was a highly effective method of getting people to buy your product, especially if it was a safety or medicinal product like Dettol (eg. clean is good, all germs are bad, we are constantly under siege from germs, therefore buy Dettol so you can act out your firm belief in the holiness of cleanliness). So technically, you could build a utopia that people would not instinctively choose to rebel against, but only if you define beforehand what they are supposed to rebel against (dirt, evil, capitalism, being selfish) and persuade them through fear (germs will kill you, evil will take your family away, capitalism will cause your loved ones to starve, etc) to participate fully in your utopian society. In participating, they are effectively acting out their rebellion against the opposite/other. It wouldn't matter if they were adults or infants, in this case, but you can't build a society where the citizens are raised blindly knowing only one direction (eg. communism) without knowing why they should adhere to it. The fact that we tend to question everything in life without anyone telling us to is already proof that this will not work. Kids ask "Why?" all the time. Also, only fear would work as a means of persuasion, since pleasure is largely individual and not conducive to the formation of a peaceful utopia if it has nothing to measure up against. (It's not a question of what I like to do, as it is a question of what I prefer doing to something else.) Fear or dread, on the other hand, appeals to the documented human and animal instinct for self-preservation. I'd rather be watching TV than be suffering heatstroke in the sun, but just giving me TV wouldn't be effective if you didn't show me other, more unpleasant ways I could be spending my time. The happy citizens in Brave New World demonstrated this: they feared/disliked having nothing to do, so dancing was preferable. They were disgusted by dirt, so they enjoyed buying clean, new things. In summary: achievement of utopia possible only with imagined/real existence of feared dystopia outside, regardless of upbringing. Self-preservation is the only programming we need, and it's already inbuilt - it's just waiting to be played on. In other news: Melee (I'm not gonna bother putting in the special characters) is a good band. |
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<--latest post-- Got utopia?--Touché!--Rare Argument--Mr. Anderson does not want to leave his cocoon--Pestil's having a tea break @ my house before retu...--Go Donate Blood - Pass Screenings, Do Not Collect ...--Very Obvious--Because I Got High! (Legally)--Dude, what did I say on Monday?!?--A wise decision?-- --last post--> |
