/lit/ - Literature

1) Which one scares you more?

2) Which one do you think was best at predicting the future?

For me it's Brave New World for both. The West won't fall into dictatorships. It will just never happen (apart from Hitler and Mussolini I guess, but forget about them).

Huxley accurately saw just how insidious corporatism and materialism were, and how they would distract the masses from caring about the things that are important in life.

The worst thing is that 1984 gets all the praise and attention. So every normie out there is obsessed with the idea of "HURR I DON'T WANT BIG BROTHER WATCHING ME, SO NO I DON'T WANT SURVEILLANCE, DESPITE THE FACT THAT IT STOPS TERRORIST ATTACKS AND SAVES LIVES", while willing going on Facebook, Twitter, Snapchat, Instashit, et al., where their personal data is mined for profit. All so they can indulge in the "feelies" of posting inane pictures and waiting for the emotional reassurance of "likes" to come pouring in.

It really is no context for me. Orwell was a fool to think dictatorship would ever grip the entire West. He fundamentally misunderstood the individualistic liberalism that defined the Allied nations - Britain, the US, France. Huxley was much shrewder. He knew that the best way to control them isn't to try and keep them down, where they will ALWAYS fight back. The best way to control them is to distract them with hedonism so they don't even notice, or care, that they are kept down at all.