/lit/ - Literature

This is a classic opinion - search for "brave new world" on r/books to see more of it. It is generally focused on the sexual freedom, as people make the natural connection "I like to ejaculate therefore a society which facilitates my ejaculation is good." What is it about the society in bnw that you think is good?

I bet you also enjoy Nietzsche's work, despite them being diametric

>>12136758
I agree, they have completely solved the problem of man's search for meaning. It's an artificial solution and it comes at the cost of free-will but it is a solution none the less. Everyone is satisfied with their life despite the ethics of it.

>>12136776
The sexual freedom to be exactly and use soma to forget all the problems.

>>12136776
I never got why people focused so much on the sexuality of this book. It seemed like at most a footnote and a distraction from more interesting aspects of the society

Read pic related, Huxley would have been munching Soma all day if he were able to.

>>12136758
Common misconception. It's actually a Utopia. Everybody's happy. The few that aren't are shipped off. I'd trade what we have for what they have in a heartbeat

>>12136865
Huxley did. He even died high on LSD

>>12136758
It's not a dystopia, rather, it's a utopia for bugmen

>>12137220
T. Bugman

>>12137485
A utopia for bugmen is a dystopia for real men, you know.

>>12137552
The majority opinion is that it’s a dystopian society. Only the real men can see that the sacrifice of personal freedoms is worth it in return for happiness on such a massive scale. Bug men aren’t willing to make that sacrifice because “muh individuality” and “DAE everyone’s speshul and (You)-kneeq?” True intellectuals can see beyond this.

>>12137642
But in this world there won't be any distinction of "true intellectuals."

>>12137675
And that’s the beauty of it, everyone will simply inhabit an acceptable state of being. There’ll be no use for shallow labels such as “intellectual”.

>>12136758
It's an intelligence test
You failed

>>12137700
Cringe: Brave New World is a utopia
Based: Brave New World is a dystopia
Based and Redpilled: Brave New World is a utopia

It's self-evident that a life where you trigger dopamine rushes and don't think is meaningless, so advocating it as a superior lifestyle doesn't hold much ground. It presupposes that there is nothing to work towards and that there is no mystery in this life - statements which no human being can truly have access to.

>>12137718
what makes you think our society is any different. You can't go two minutes without seeking more dopamine, whether it be from making a 4chan post, masturbating, eating something, watching television, etc. The BNW society has just perfected what we're doing every day.

>>12136758
>>12136788

Its a soulless solution. That is why it is so horrific. If you are such a materialist that you see nothing more to life than simply living and then dying with the only goal of trying to maximize pleasure and minimize pain (aka hedonism) then I can see why you would see it as a great society. But to anyone who isn't a nihilistic hedonist, it is quite a horrific portrayal of what human life can be reduced to.

>>12137689
>everyone will simply inhabit an acceptable state of being

The world may exist as a utopia for anyone who is fully enveloped in it and has no regard for his/her surroundings. It only takes a mistake in conditioning or a refusal to take soma to start to lose contact with this utopia. Even if someone glanced at a clock and saw that their life was ticking down, assuming they are capable of self-awareness.

The real question is why have this utopia at all if it has no desire to grow?

In a way, BNW is a utopia for anyone in their system. It may be devoid of higher pleasures that you or I might crave, but if you never get those to begin with then it really doesn't matter
They're basically stuck in the cave without light, except they sealed the entrance, so in the end I can't do anything but pity them for their soullessness and envy them for their lack of want.

>>12137642
>true intellectuals don't value the human soul
okay that's gonna be a mega-yikes from me mate

>>12137642
>true scotsmen are collectivists
Okay bucko

>>12137740
That's the point of dystopian fiction, it's social criticism taking a negative aspect of society to a conclusion

>>12137749
>But to anyone who isn't a nihilistic hedonist

aka delusional

>>12137915
The human wouldn’t just fade into oblivion it would grow and evolve, no longer shackled by the weight of human suffering and sorrow. It appears dystopian to us simply because we have Stockholm syndrome. With the deification of human suffering it is as if one can not be human without suffering or that to suffer is to be human. The book shows us that that is not necessarily true, that suffering can be extinguished and the soul can still prosper.

>>12137993
>it would grow and evolve
Because ever more elaborate games of centrifugal bumble-puppy is a worthwhile goal, am I right?
I'll let you in on a secret from Genesis 1: creation is division. Creation, or existence, lies in dividing the light from the dark, sea from land, good and evil, joy and suffering. There can be no creation nor existence otherwise. To eliminate suffering is to move to nonexistence. See the Christ figure, who as a superhuman differs from the merely human in his greater capacity to suffer. As Kierkegaard says, regarded dialectically, the capacity to suffer is an immense advantage, since naturally it is the same capacity for enjoyment.

>>12137988
If you're really a nihilist, there's no such thing as "delusional." All lives are pointless and equal in their pointlessness.

I think you're presuming that you've figured out the universe completely when you say hedonism is the only way, which is a pretty delusional thing to presume.

>>12136834
sex is control. The passions control the man, so you just need to control the passions.

I like your guy's discussion of the book more than the book itself.

>>12138076
>I like your guy's discussion of the book more than the book itself.
You sound like a fucking retard.

>>12138082
No, you. The book sucked btw,

>>12136758
>>12136788
>>12137642
They live meaningless lives. The literal definition of NPCs. No family, no love, no purpose. They eat, shit, sleep, get high and die all for the "safety" and "security" of the state. Pathetic. You should be ashamed of yourselves.

>>12138018
Kierkegaard was a depressed wreck. Of course he couldn’t imagine a life without suffering. And of course Christian theology would place an extreme value on suffering, there is no other way to justify it. Suffering must be justified and even argued as crucial to the existence of the human soul because we have never been without it and we could never be without it. But what if we could part ways with suffering? Would it really be so bad? Society functions better than ever, everyone is happy and fulfilled. Would living as a destitute bum in our world really be better simply because of the opportunity to suffer? If granted the choice no one would willingly endure it.

>>12138103
Is that so different from your life now? That is literally how 99.99% of people live out their lives only they have to struggle to maintain even that. They go to work for at least 8 hours, come back home exhausted, eat, shit, consume entertainment and then go to bed so they can do it all over again. If they are lucky enough to have a family they don’t get much time to spend with them. The modern world has a way of seducing people into believing it is better than it is, the false illusion of opportunity can be very alluring.

>>12138103

>They live meaningless lives

From their perspective, this is not the case. Therefore their lives have immanent meaning. The horror in the book is the fact that if a person was engineered to enjoy his lot in life and find it meaningful, even if his lot happens to be something we would consider to be very constrained or empty of meaning--- this remains our own disgust in line with our own desires, whereas the engineered man remains unaffected by such considerations. You're just offended due to your desire of novelty which captures suffering as necessity for overcoming, which is just crypto-novelty generation in terms of aesthetic fantasy.

>>12136788

>comes at the cost of free-will

Avoiding the whole debate concerning free will. In operation, what is represented is the absolute systematization and assembly line capture of the human being. This is not a pure fiction of course. But the way in which it occurred in the book was limited by the zeitgeist of the time. The actual paradigm we live in does not rely on satisfaction itself, but on constant dissatisfaction and desire production. In the book, the process is streamlined from birth. The members of the society described in the book are arguably better off than any of us, because of their lack of ''free will''.

>Everyone is satisfied with their life despite the ethics of it.

If everyone is satisfied, what or who is there to arbitrate otherwise?

I am trying to understand why this is classified as a dystopian novel and not tagged under the utopian fiction genre. Bernard is an arrogant faggot with an inferiority complex, and Helmholtz, while I can't blame him for finding his work boring, is nagging about something as minor as being over-skilled for his job. John is the only character that raises decent criticisms, but they feel too idealistic; when you get down to it, practically the only ailment he is suffering from is culture shock. Realistically, it seems to me that the system of the World State is wildly successful, stable, and all individuals under it are guaranteed self-actualization.

Could asking whether the society in BNW is utopian or dystopian be used as a kind of Turing test to see if someone has a soul?

>>12138238
Yes, those who answer dystopian will be declared phony bugmen and instantly wiped out. The brave few who answer utopian will be allowed to live.

>>12138240
What bravery does it take to choose being zonked out on drugs all day and never experiencing anything beyond immediate satisfaction of your desires over experiencing the world as it actually is?

>>12138260
The sacrifice of personal freedoms for societal happiness.

>>12138424
>the sacrifice of the greatest fulfillment for a lesser pleasure
Your happiness argument doesn't even work here

>>12138260

>experiencing the world as it actually is?

What do you mean? In the book, the people who run the society have the meta-view, they understand how this mass hallucination is enforced, and how necessary it is for it to be that way, hell, they even keep places on the world for people seeking suffering. The savage that whips himself in public is an example of this desire. How is this mode of desiring any *realer* than the drugged out conditioned classes of the world state? They are over-determined, yes, but the ''savages'' are determined as well, even though their determinacy is relatively volatile and not conditioned towards any particular goal outside of their small culture or personal mimetic or otherwise desires. What people, in truth seem to find disgusting and dystopian about it, is the quality of it being an ''end of history''. In an interesting parallel, Fukuyama wrote in the work of the same name, about how people will want dramatic suffering and volatile aesthetics, in a scenario of an ideologically and socially stagnant milieu. That, when there is no necessity for suffering, many will try to create it. Now, does this seem traditionally ''authentic'' to you? Suffering has become another commodity, not even capitalized upon, but exposing the driver behind it, i.e. the subjective conditions upon which such mechanisms prey. To be honest, I enjoy peoples reaction to the book more than the book itself. The book doesn't matter, its outdated in many ways, and we will never see anything like it in actuality. But the reaction of people to it, really reifies the whole point of the book and serves as an odd ideological mirror to the person, and its all a hallucination, as is ''the world as it actually is'', by this process. The world that *is*, is just some privileged idea immanent to your umwelt, pretending to be the welt. And I do not mean this in an ontological sense, but in the themes of desiring and modes of determinacy presented in the book.

>>12136758
yes it is youre a pleb

>>12137711
Beyond All Bases and Pills: the Brave New World is for babies too weak to be exiled from the world