Anti-utopia: why put the sword through someone else’s social dreaming?

Why would a writer or filmmaker go to the trouble of putting a sword through someone else’s social dreaming? This sure had me beat for the longest time. After all, those who imagined utopias were trying to imagine the world as a better place. I decided to do some digging around to find out some ways social dreaming has manifested itself in history since the late nineteenth century to the late twentieth century, in the decades before Huxley wrote Brave New World (1932) and Gattaca was released in 1997. I discovered that these social dreams could be considered to have sinister aspects and Huxley, along with filmmaker Andrew Niccol have serious reasons to be anti-utopian, or critical of some people’s social dreaming (Sargent).

Since the late nineteenth century, heredity, biological characteristics, and genetics have been inherent in social dreaming. I’ll begin the journey with phrenology. According to this theory, inherited external characteristics demonstrated that criminals were biologically inferior to law abiding people. It was thought that different faculties or departments of the brain each controlled a unique form of behaviour; enlarged or unusually undersized brain sections produced bumps or depressions in the skull. As a result, a physical examination by any 'doctor' could analyse someone's skull to find reasons for problematic behaviour (Greek). This theory ignores any social influence on a person’s behaviour and discriminates unfairly against those with lumpy heads!

Closely related to phrenology was the study of eugenics (Greek). Yale alum Irving Fisher, one of America’s greatest economists of the late nineteenth and early twentieth century, was an advocate of eugenics, or carefully controlled breeding with the aim of improving human populations. That actually meant “white Northern European population...discourag[ing] all others.” Eugenics was promoted in popular culture in terms of the positive benefits of careful breeding as society would become more productive save money. How? The poor, prostitutes, ne’er-do-wells, the homeless, and the criminal would be bred out of existence. Eugenics had all the prestige of Fisher and his associates on the Yale faculty behind it. Many aspects of its philosophy found its way into U.S. state law and influenced political movements internationally, such as Hitler and his National Socialism (Conniff).

http://www.yalealumnimagazine.com/articles/3456#comments

One such example of these state laws that recently came to light in Virginia is that of E. Lewis Reynolds. As a boy, Reynolds was hit in the head with a rock by a cousin. The incident nearly killed him and it triggered epileptic-like convulsions that lingered for some years. This did not prevent Reynolds from enlisting in the Marine Corp and serving his country during a 30-year military career that included tours in Korea and Vietnam. However, it was enough to classify the teenaged Reynolds as a “defective person” and he was compulsorily sterilized under a 1924 Virginia law that served as a model for other states and “even in Nazi Germany.” This gives us some indication of the way this philosophy came to be enforced on “mostly poor, uneducated men and women” (Kunkle).

This brings us to modern genetics. Incredibly, blood can be drawn from a pregnant woman to analyze the DNA of her unborn child (Kolata). The benefits of this, such as women being able to learn about their fetus and act on the information, of course, come with unintended consequences. These consequences include what Paul (in “Evolution”), writing in 1995, calls “subtle pressures to make the ‘right’ choice” when confronted with information about a genetically imperfect fetus. Paul (in “Evolution”)writes that “Some women may feel they have no realistic alternatives to the decision to be tested or to abort a genetically imperfect fetus.” This may be due to doctors’ fear of being sued if the child is born with a genetic disorder, “by anxiety of potential loss of health or life insurance, or by their inability to bear the enormous financial costs of caring for a severely disabled child.” This is what people generally have in mind when they characterize genetic medicine as a form of eugenics (Paul in “Evolution”).

This leads us to the human genome project. Completed in 2003, this map of the human genome has given scientists a greater understanding of cancer and rare genetic diseases (Kolata). This undeniably useful research is also tempered by the potential for this information to be abused. Employers and health insurance companies could use genetic information collected for a beneficial purpose to refuse employment or coverage of individuals. To prevent this, the Genetic Information Nondiscrimination Act, which took effect in 2009, was implemented (Nuzzo).

The events and research pertaining to eugenics in the late nineteenth and early twentieth century form the backdrop against which Huxley developed his ideas and wrote Brave New World. Subsequent research in genetics through to the end of the twentieth century influenced Niccol and the ideas in his film Gattaca. Developments in the early twenty first century seem to justify their concern and I think Huxley and Niccol were right to put the sword through this kind of social dreaming.  Their work serves as a warning to us, as members of society, about how things could be applied to advantage the elite and tread on the disadvantaged; put down individualism and remove opportunities for those who have few.

To conclude:

http://newyork.craigslist.org/mnh/etc/3739965753.html

Works cited:

Conniff, Richard. "God and white men at Yale." Yale Alumni Magazine. Yale Alumni Mag. May/June 2012. Web. 20 Apr. 2013.

"Evolution: Humans: Babies by Design." PBS. WGBH Educational Foundation and Clear Blue Sky Productions, Inc. 2001. Web. 20 Apr. 2013.

Gattaca. Dir. Andrew Niccol. Perf. Ethan Hawke, Uma Thurman, Gore Vidal. Columbia Pictures Corporation, 1997. Film

Greek, Cecil E. Criminological Theory. The Florida State University, 2005. Web. April 19 2013.

Huxley, Aldous. Brave New World. New York: HarperCollins, 2004. Print.

Kolata, Gina. "Human Genome, Then and Now." New York Times 15 Apr. 2013. Web. 20 Apr. 2013.

Kunkle, Frederick. "Va. eugenics victims would receive compensation for sterilization under bill." The Washington Post Jan 30 2013. Web. 20 Apr. 2013.

Nuzzo, Regina. "Genetic Profiling." CR. CR Mag. 3.5 (Fall 2008). Web. 20 Apr. 2013.

Sargent, Lyman Tower. "The Three Faces of Utopianism Revisited." Utopian Studies 5.1 (1994): 1-37. Web.

Two Thousand Thirteen

We live in a very different society to the one portrayed by Orwell through the character of Winston in Nineteen Eighty-Four as the United States prides itself as a country on promoting the idea of freedom. To me, this means the freedom to express our humanity through how we choose to live out our lives. However, these freedoms should never be taken for granted and need to be carefully guarded. We need to be aware of groups that demand conformity, be aware of attempts by groups to control language, and be aware of grabs for power as these are the key weapons in the arsenal of the Party.

The character of Winston loses his humanity to the Party in the novel. Throughout the first two sections of the novel, he tries to hide his humanity by attempting to conceal his personal relationship with Julia and writing his private thoughts in a diary. He even tries to join a secret Brotherhood that works against the party in a clandestine manner. However, in the end, the inexorable, all-powerful Party owns him and he is no longer free to even think about defining himself through relationships, preferences, and passions (Orwell). This matters in our society because many believe we should be free to define ourselves through our relationships, preferences, and passions, as long as we are not hurting anyone else.

Although our society is not at all similar to the one portrayed by Orwell, we are not always free to define ourselves through our relationships. A group that has made this difficult is, in this case, the federal government. The Defense of Marriage Act of 1996 defines marriage as a union between a man and a woman for the purposes of federal benefits (Liptak). This act rewards heterosexual marriage but disadvantages those who do not share that orientation, devalues their relationships, and provides an example of one group attempting to have another group conform to an arbitrary norm.

In our society, we also need to be aware of how groups attempt to control language. A current example is the debate on gun rights. The language used by the NRA includes words and phrases such as “Ring of Freedom,” “freedom fight,” “right,” “firearm,” and “King Pinocchio” (referring to the President) (NRA). The NRA appears to avoid words used on the other side of the debate by the White House, such as “gun violence,” “wrong hands,” “background check,” and “mental health” (The White House). As Orwell makes clear in his ideas on newspeak in Nineteen Eighty-Four, if a group can control the language used, it can control the message and ideas about an issue, as each of these groups are trying to.

We also need to be aware of grabs for power. In recent history, one of the most incredible grabs for power in the United States must be the Uniting and Strengthening America by Providing Appropriate Tools Required to Intercept and Obstruct Terrorism Act of 2001 (USA PATRIOT Act), of which an extension was signed in 2004. This post 9/11 legislation broadened the discretion of law enforcement in detaining and deporting immigrants suspected of terrorism-related acts indefinitely, significantly reduces restriction in law enforcement agencies gathering of data, regulation of financial transactions, particularly those involving foreign individuals, and expanded the definition of terrorism to include domestic terrorism. The extension in 2004 includes roving wiretaps, searches of business records (including library records), and conducting surveillance of “lone wolves” (107th Congress; “Patriot Act”). The USA PATRIOT Act gives the federal law enforcement powers to observe citizens and immigrants alike without permission from the courts in many instances.

Orwell’s novel contains these warnings for humanity but I go to bed every night safe in the knowledge that members of U.S. society would never put up with any serious imposition on their freedoms. They would never let apathy and taking freedoms for granted to allow any one group to hoodwink them into the kind of slavish devotion to it that Winston experienced. Right?

Works cited:

107th Congress Public Law 56. Uniting and Strengthening America by Providing Appropriate Tools                Required to Intercept and Obstruct Terrorism (USA PATRIOT Act) Act of 2001. Washington: GPO,      2001. Web. 12 April, 2013.

Liptak, Adam. “A Look at Issues in the Defense of Marriage Act Case.” New York Times, 27 March 2013.Web. 12 April, 2013.

NRA Digital Network. National Rifle Association of America, 2013. Web. 12 April, 2013.

Orwell, George. Nineteen Eighty-Four: A Novel. Orlando: Harcourt Brace, 1949. Print.

“Patriot Act.” Wikipedia. Wikimedia Foundation, Inc., 8 April 2013. Web. 12 April, 2013.

The White House. The White House, n.d. Web. 12 April, 2013. 

Picture credits:

qeisecurity.com

fixthispcnow.webs.com

Brave [Dated] World

Huxley's Brave New World is dated and condescending, but, I admit with reluctance, still relevant.

Huxley's vision of manufacturing (from people to helicopters) is from the past. The modern process of manufacturing is nothing like Huxley's vision, which is reminiscent of nineteenth century England. All operations were carried out by people "decanted" expressly for the purpose of the job they carried out. "Thrity-three Delta females, long-headed, sandy, with narrow pelvises, all within 20 millimeters of 1 metre 69 centimetres tall, were cutting screws" is just one example out of the groups working at the factory visited by John Savage (147).   In a modern plant, robots dominate manufacturing rather than people. For the remaining people that work in a manufacturing plant, unions and state and federal governments regulate the process and add checks on employers.

Some of Huxley's attitudes are also dated. The consequence of separating sex from procreation has not resulted in the inability of people to connect in an emotionally fulfilling manner and has not resulted in emotional infantilism. Rampant promiscuity (at least perhaps what Huxley would consider rampant promiscuity) has not shaken the foundations of society to a point where it can no longer function.

In addition to these dated visions and attitudes, Huxley is condescending to his audience (Hitchens points this out in his forward of the 2010 edition). There is evidence of this attitude in Huxley's descriptions of activities and culture his denizens of London can access, such as Obstacle Golf,  sexophones, synthetic music, and feelies, all of which are contrived to disgust and disconcert the reader ever so slightly.

Despite these limitations, Huxley's Brave New World still has a vestige of relevance to society. Mustapha Mond points out that people can be conditions to accept anything (211). People will accept anything they consider "normal," whether it is healthy or not; whether "normal" provides potential for all members of society to self-actualise, or not; whether it provides individuals with the freedom to choose their own path in life, or not. That is why it is important to listen to those moments when "normal" makes us uncomfortable and to question everything.

Huxley: Looks as Grumpy as he Writes (guardian.co.uk)

Herland: Experiements in Cultivation

So much of what we accept as natural is cultivated. It is cultivated over such a long period of time that we no longer think about it and cannot imagine it any other way. I think Gilman's point in Herland is that we need to examine and interrogate what we think is natural, to discover if it is actually cultivated. If it is cultivated, then we  can cultivate it in a different way, just like Gilman's women of Herland did.

In U.S. society, the types of things that have been cultivated in the past are gender roles. Kerri gives a neat summary as to how this can play out in her March 22 post on this blog. In addition, there are the obvious statistics, such as, the United States has only ever had male presidents; corporate boards continue to be dominated by males (2020 Women); males also continue to dominate the U.S. Congress (Manning and Shogan). It is easy to continue to ignore these statistics because, as Van suggests in Gilman's novel (68), "Some...things we have grown to accept as perfectly natural, or as belonging to our human limitations...."

Gilman presents an alternative to the cultivated order of U.S. society as it stood at the beginning of the twentieth century, and in some respects, continues to persist to this day. The education of women  was carefully developed and implemented (55), along population control through "negative eugenics" (59), health and hygiene practices virtually eradicated sickness (61), and the sense of community, which was described by Van (67) as "a unit, a conscious group...." was highly developed. Van adds (61) that "...they did not seem "cultivated" at all - it had become a natural condition." All of this was achieved by the women of Herland over a 1500 year time frame.

http://agriorissa.blogspot.com/2012/01/carrot-cultivation.html

As a society, we need to continue to do as Gilman suggests, through Van (68), and shine a light on those "things we have grown to accept as perfectly natural." We need to challenge these ideas that seem perfectly natural and come up with our own way to address a cultivated situation that has grown out of control. As a result, hopefully we can cultivate our own, healthier, society.




Works cited:

2020 Women on Boards. 2020 Women on Boards, 2011. Web. 22 Mar. 2013.

Gilman, Charlotte Perkins. Herland. Mineola, New York: Dover Publications, 1998. Print.

Manning, Jennifer E. and Shogan, Colleen, J. Women in the United States congress: 1917-2012. Congressional Research Service. RL30261. 26 Nov. 2012. Web. 22 Mar. 2013.

Dear Emily, How can I Break Free?

This week, Emily addresses the concerns of a struggling member of the proletariat.

501 words.

A Map to Utopian Philosophic and Religious Beliefs

This week's presentation presents a rough sketch of how the philosophic and religious beliefs of the Utopians may have connected with each other and with classical efforts.

(This post contains approximately 533 words.)

Dear Emily, Is St. Augustine's City of God Really Utopian? Tommy More

In this week's video, Emily counsels a man who's confused by St. Augustine's City of God.

Is Plato's Republic really an early Western example of what Sargent calls a utopia?

Plato's Republic works on multiple levels and may be considered as a set of ideas for living a moderate life, as well as a metaphor for the soul and the role of justice within it. However, I had my doubts as to whether or not Plato's Republic fit the bill of a utopia. As I read the required sections, it seemed too different from my preconceived ideas of what I thought a work about a utopia should be like and at first glance, seems too distant from Sargent's definitions of what makes a work utopian. In my mind, a work about a utopia should already exist in time and space and be described by the narrator, rather than be constructed and tweaked by philosophers on the fly. Furthermore, The Republic seem to be more about the nature of justice rather than a better society, as Sargent partially defines utopia. Some more thinking about this, in the context of Plato being held up as an example of a classical effort in the direction of a utopia, is clearly in order.

I begin with Sargent's (9) definition of a utopia:

• social dreaming

• a non-existent society; 

• described in considerable detail;

• normally located in time and space; and

• something that the author intended a contemporaneous reader to view as considerably better than the society in which that reader lived. 

With this definition in mind, I drew up this T-chart to try and decide whether or not Plato's Republic was an example of a utopia:

I'm not looking perfection; I'm looking for an internally consistent fantasy

Max Beerbohm (by way of Sargent) says:

                              So this is Utopia,

                                             Is it? Well –

                              I beg your pardon;

                                             I thought it was Hell.

Beerbohm does not appear to have been a fan of utopianism. I admit that I am with Beerbohm on this one and tend to view other people’s utopian ideas with a little suspicion. For example, in today’s Washington Post (Knuckle) there was an article outlining the consequences to Virginia’s plan to sterilize “defective” people under a 1924 law “whose aim was to build a more perfect society.” The plan was based on concepts about eugenics and was the same set of ideas that led to the horrors of Nazi Germany.  One person’s utopia was, in this case, another’s hell. With this in mind, I am conscious that whatever I write in this blog about making the world a better place may well turn out to be someone else’s nightmare. There is no possibility of creating a perfect utopia that will accommodate everyone.

However, Sargent (1994) insists that utopia should not be equated with perfection. To qualify as a utopia, according the Sargent (1994), the author has to intend, and perhaps contemporary readers agree, that creating the utopia proposed would be better than the society they lived in at the time.  I would like to think of utopia as a thought experiment rather than an actual desire to change society into what I would consider to be better.

With this in mind: in my utopia, everyone who worked would be paid exactly $75,000 per year. I’ve heard this is the optimum amount a person needs to be happy with his or her life (Luscombe). I perceive there to be several benefits that would outweigh the negatives to this scheme:

1.      People may enter professions, begin careers or jobs they may not have considered because of the pay available;

2.      The gender pay gap would be eliminated, as would the idea of ‘female professions’ and ‘male dominated industry’; and

3.      The class divide may flatten out and the gap between rich and poor narrow (though it would not be eliminated).

Everyone would not live happily ever after. Perfection was not the goal. But my intent for this radical idea is that it would make a society better than the one we have today.

Works cited:

Knuckle, Frederick. “Va. eugenics victims would receive compensation for sterilization under bill.” Washington Post 30 Jan 2013. Web.

Luscomb, Belinda. “Do We Need $75,000 a Year to Be Happy?” Time Magazine 6 Sep 2010. Web.

Sargent, Lyman Tower. “The Three Faces of Utopianism Revisited.” Utopian Studies 5.1 (1994): 1-37. Web.