Expectations?

I admit some moments of frustration with this class from time to time. When I signed up for it, I made the mistake of assuming that the material would be confined to Utopian literature. The study of history and philosophy that came before really surprised me. I guess it shouldn't have, it is the logical place to begin- one should explore what Utopia is and how it began before actually diving in to More's Utopia with a head full of misconceptions.

I will say that I think Plato was a good place to begin. I do believe that a lot of the qualities that make a good city also make a good man, and it make sense to consider what is necessary in a society and then build into what a city wants to have in order to be happy.

The other readings and I aren't getting along very well. I really admit that I am not seeing the connections so well. I'd be more ready to describe Barney the annoying purple dinosaur as an attempt at Utopia than Augustine's City of God or the Rule of St. Benedict.


*sigh* wow. So my iPad just deleted the majority of my post for no reason and I can't get it back. Well, I'll try again.

For me, Utopias..... Utopiai?  need a few things. Maybe perfection isn't possible. We will try to let that one pass. However, I think they need a real society of people that interact, that the creation of this society benefits the majority of the people by creating a better life for them, and that it can be implemented on a large scale. Neither of these doctrines can possibly fill these requirements.

Augustine describes his city as a divine bond between people in myriad societies all around the world. He doesn't even call upon them to act in the same ways. He tells them to live well in their own society according to their rules,  traditions and mores so long as it does not interfere with their Christianity. That is not a society. That's a religion.

If you remove this concept from the religious dogma, you have only a subset of people who have general moral values in common. They don't even know of each other's existence. How can you be a Utopian society if you are not a society?

The Rule of Saint Benedict is a little closer, it is a society of people who live and work together. They have similar ideas, a clear structure and my god do they ever have rules. A lot of them are very nice rules. Love each other. Don't be mad at each other, and if you do have any arguments make sure they are settled by dinner time. Make sure everyone has their own voice and opinion, no matter how lowly. Be productive, only speak when you have something to say. Nice, right?

Even setting aside the more extreme rules, beating and so forth, this is not a utopia. The reality was rarely as good as the Rule, but even if we set aside accounts of monks who used their position to get money out of townsfolk and had illegitimate children all over the place, the Rule is still not a utopia.

The monastic life style is about removing oneself from the community- not helping it. In some ways it is exactly the opposite of a utopia because it does not affect the majority in a positive way, but is only meant to create yet another subset. They have general pretensions about helping the outside world when it happens to crawl though the door and beg for help. But the point of all of this is to build great big stone walls and hide on the inside. They want to escape the vice and unhappiness of the world outside, but that vice and misery is still out there, but it will find a way in.

If you took the Rule out of the monastery and applied it across the world to give everyone that structure and life style, it just wouldn't work. Setting aside the fact that the majority would not wish to obey, if it were universally accepted and adhered to, the human race would vanish in a single generation because the Rule is unreasonable. It outlaws sexuality and family. Their would be no more children, and very soon no more people.

I very strongly believe that utopia cannot be successful unless it is global. If cruelty and strife exists outside the society, it will find a way to corrupt it. It has to be something everyone buys into.