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Were the Luddites Right?

We’ve had a couple of Luddite conversations here on the blog. Who knew Ludd never existed?

Anyhow, I happened to catch an interesting (and very short) take on the Luddites on NPR yesterday. It gives a more balanced perspective than one generally hears, painting them as the original ‘Rage Against the Machine.’

Were they right? Economically speaking, perhaps they were. Perhaps they weren’t as much anti-machinery as they were pro-human-economic-flourishing. Give it a listen.

Listen to When ‘Luddites’ Attack: Destroying Machines To Save Their Jobs HERE.

52 Novels (18): Brave New World

My goal is to read a novel a week in 2015. I’ve made it to 18.

-Aldous Huxley, Brave New World

Why not two straight weeks of Huxley?

This is my second time reading the book. I decided to read it again because I want to read it and 1984 (which I’ve never read, though Animal Farm is one my favorites) in close proximity. My particular interest in this book, as well as 1984, stems from Neil Postman’s treatment of the two books in the foreword to Amusing Ourselves to Death:

We were keeping our eye on 1984. When the year came and the prophecy didn’t, thoughtful Americans sang softly in praise of themselves. The roots of liberal democracy had held. Wherever else the terror had happened, we, at least, had not been visited by Orwellian nightmares.

But we had forgotten that alongside Orwell’s dark vision, there was another – slightly older, slightly less well known, equally chilling: Aldous Huxley’s Brave New World. Contrary to common belief even among the educated, Huxley and Orwell did not prophesy the same thing. Orwell warns that we will be overcome by an externally imposed oppression. But in Huxley’s vision, no Big Brother is required to deprive people of their autonomy, maturity and history. As he saw it, people will come to love their oppression, to adore the technologies that undo their capacities to think.

What Orwell feared were those who would ban books. What Huxley feared was that there would be no reason to ban a book, for there would be no one who wanted to read one. Orwell feared those who would deprive us of information. Huxley feared those who would give us so much that we would be reduced to passivity and egoism. Orwell feared that the truth would be concealed from us. Huxley feared the truth would be drowned in a sea of irrelevance. Orwell feared we would become a captive culture. Huxley feared we would become a trivial culture, preoccupied with some equivalent of the feelies, the orgy porgy, and the centrifugal bumblepuppy. As Huxley remarked in Brave New World Revisited, the civil libertarians and rationalists who are ever on the alert to oppose tyranny “failed to take into account man’s almost infinite appetite for distractions.” In 1984, Huxley added, people are controlled by inflicting pain. In Brave New World, they are controlled by inflicting pleasure. In short, Orwell feared that what we hate will ruin us. Huxley feared that what we love will ruin us.

This book is about the possibility that Huxley, not Orwell, was right.

Anyone who’s been around my blog for a while knows that I love Neil Postman. I just ordered two more of his books to read. More on that soon; and I really need to blog through Amusing Ourselves to Death at some point. I’ve already written a lot about Technopoly (which is without a doubt one of my favorite semi-modern books). Which all reminds me that I’ve never blogged on Animal Farm. I need to at some point. Anyhow…

For this post, I simply want to record a few things about Brave New World that popped out at me this time around.

First, the ‘Ford’ worship struck this time in a way that it didn’t in the first reading. ‘Ford’ as in Henry Ford. In the future society of A Brave New World, all other forms of religion have been replaced by the veneration of Henry Ford. His brilliance for machinery and assembly lines are apparently the ideal in that future world. And so the word ‘God’ has been replaced by ‘Ford.’

So, then, the god of that future world is a secular god set up to symbolize the ideals of technology. Let’s hope we’re not venerating Steve Jobs to that level in the near future; though he already appears to have received his sainthood in modern America.

Second, the worship of Ford involves intense mysticism. That didn’t strike me as profound the first time around. But now, having seen the elements of mysticism implicit in our technological society, it takes on a bit more realism and possibility. It’s also worth noting that mysticism can go hand in hand with drug use; which leads me to my next point.

Third, as someone who worked in the pharmacy business for several years, the fact that there is an actual drug named Soma still makes me giggle a bit. I’ve mentioned the fact that this was the name of the popular drug in Brave New World to virtually everyone I’ve ever worked with; no one else had ever read the book, and, therefore, didn’t notice. In the novel, Soma is the tranquilizer all people immediately turn to in order to numb emotions (“I take a gram and only am;” “a gram is better than a damn,” etc.). Yep, we’re about there on that one. However, in the real world Soma is a muscle relaxer (and yes it is used recreationally to numb the senses, they call it a ‘Soma coma’); it’s Xanax and Ativan and Tranxene and the like that we turn to to be numbed. Interestingly, another novel I recently read, Generation A by Douglas Coupland, features a sedating drug that has the world hooked. Both that novel and Brave New World are on the short-list of fiction that I recommend.

Fourthly, the strict imposition of worldly orthodoxy stood out. We’re seeing that a good bit these days. Blasphemy in our culture is no longer religious. Blasphemy now belongs to the secular realm.

Finally, there is lots of sex, but no reproduction. Well, I take that back. There is reproduction, but there is no procreation. People have multiple sexual partners; loose sex is encouraged. No worries; all the babies are born in a lab. Doesn’t really seem that far-fetched these days. Lots of sex, hatch the babies in a lab.

Huxley’s prophetic imagination is stunning; plus he was a great writer. It’s a wonderful book, and one that I will keep turning back to.

Beta

I came across something last week that piqued my interest and got me to thinking. If you ask me where I saw it, I’ll tell you. I don’t like linking to other blogs because it tends to bring extra traffic I don’t necessarily want at this blog. I’m still amazed I have any subscribers for that reason. Anyhow…

*Note* that, yes, I can use Google. And yes, this term has been used before (though not extensively to my knowledge). I’ve never had an original thought in my life that I am aware of.

I read an article that said something to the effect that Millennials don’t want to get married and have kids because they can’t have a Beta version first.

But, actually, marriage-Beta is a pretty big thing these days I would say.  Co-habitation, yes?

I read a while back about a celebrity who made his girlfriend sign a ‘co-habitation agreement’ before he allowed her to move into his house. It pretty much said that if either of them decided to terminate the relationship, she couldn’t take any of his stuff and she had to vacate the premises, and all rights to anything therein, within so many hours. So Beta. Pre-nup practice.

I thought it was a sign of the time; even more so in some ways than other controversial issues surrounding marriage in our culture. We don’t like the fact that some people (not going there in this post) are fighting to get married while we’re ignoring the fact that others are refusing to get married. By we I mean so-called culturally conservative Christians. Of course I’ve been accused of being somewhat liberal before. I listen to NPR! Hiss. But I digress. I got married at 21. Best decision of my life (because I have a good wife). But I digress again.

I’m still fresh off reading Douglas Coupland’s Generation A (I highly recommend it!). It was, I think, his attempt to give the Millennials a name that was more promising than his ‘Generation X’ for the previous generation and perhaps more symbolic than the bland term ‘Millennial’.

I wonder if Generation Beta wouldn’t be a better name in some ways (?). Perhaps the up-and-coming ‘Generation Like‘ will fit the bill of Generation Beta to a greater degree. I don’t know.

But the idea of Beta seems fitting for modern folks who are always testing, experimenting, and browsing without any type of finality or definitiveness. It goes along pretty well with Chesterton’s term I like so much: the Muddle Ages. It’s just a thought. Now I need one of my writing readers to come up with some appealing fiction.

I should also add that technically I am a Millennial (and Amillennial! – but that’s another post altogether), if that makes any difference.

Five More Questions to Ask of Technologies

I’ll warn you ahead of time that this post is pretty much for me. I’m such a selfish blogger.

A couple of weeks ago, I wrote about four questions we should ask of our technologies. Andy Crouch provides five more:

(1) What does this cultural artifact assume about the way the world is?
(2) What does this cultural artifact assume about the way the world should be?
(3) What does this cultural artifact make possible [that wasn’t before]?
(4) What does this cultural artifact make impossible (or at least very difficult)?
(5) What new forms of culture are created in response to this artifact?

-Culture Making, pp. 29-30ff

You could remember these with MAR:

  • Make possible/impossible
  • Assume is/should be
  • Result

Now let’s be reminded of the four basic questions of Marshall McLuhan (as summarized by Mark Federman):

We used RODE to remember those questions:

Revive, Opposite, Displace, Extend:

  • What does the technology revive?
  • What is is the opposite that it may revert to? (I’m particularly fond of this one)
  • What does it displace?
  • What does it extend?

I like asking questions; and these are all good ones to ask.

Worldly Asceticism: Ruthlessly Repressive and Nihilistic

Broadly considered, the fact that bulks biggest in the modern industrial world is this: that its moral movements are much more utterly and ruthlessly repressive than the past forms of mysticism or fanaticism that commonly affected only the few. Medieval men endured frightful fasts; but none of them would have dreamed of seriously proposing that nobody anywhere should ever have wine any more. And Prohibition, which was accepted by a huge modern industrial civilisation, did seriously propose that nobody should ever have wine any more. Cranks who dislike tobacco would utterly destroy all tobacco; I doubt whether they would even allow it medically as a sedative. Some Pagan sages and some Christian saints have been vegetarians, but nobody in the ancient world would ever have prophesied that flocks and herds would utterly vanish from the earth. But in the Utopia of the true vegetarian, I suppose they would utterly vanish from the earth. The more pedantic Pacifist has the same view of fighting, even for justice, and disarmament is as universal as conscription. For both conscription and disarmament are very modern notions. And modern notions of the sort are not only negative but nihilist; they always demand the absolute annihilation or “total prohibition” of something.

G.K. Chesterton, The Well and the Shallows

I get funny looks from time to time when I talk about what I call ‘worldly asceticism.’ Chesterton nails it down (in some of its forms) pretty well here.

The idea of the ‘ascetic’ is one who is rigorously disciplined. At some point this idea became tied together with monks and hermits – someone who cuts himself off from the world for a life of solitude and spiritual discipline. Chesterton’s point is that the modern non-religious (worldly) ascetic wouldn’t just cut himself off from the world, but would cut the world off from itself. Physical things become bad. Of course, this would never apply to sex. It would apply to things like meat or gluten or fat or carbs, tobacco or alcohol or soda. I’ve read someone mention that our culture’s oddness is typified supremely in the fact that we are okay with abortion but want to lock up a pregnant woman who smokes.

The cloister of worldly asceticism these days is the modern living room, in which we can live with other people and remained isolated through technology, following our own devotional routines. The monastery of worldly asceticism is the teenager in front of his screen cut off from all physical contact. Red Bull is the blood of this covenant.

It takes a thousand forms and they’re not necessarily all bad. But it’s a term that gets people’s attention and is worth using (for that reason alone).

This is not to say that everyone has to eat meat or gluten. It’s not to say that everyone has to smoke or drink alcohol. It’s not to say that no one should play video games. I hope that’s obvious. It’s to say that we should at least consider whether we are asking others to cut themselves off from the world in unhealthy ways.

Ignoring What You Notice, Noticing What You Ignore

The challenge is a tricky one: We must create an anti-environment so that we can ignore what we notice and notice what we ignore.

-Mark Federman, The Cultural Paradox of the Global Village

So, yesterday I mentioned the idea of purposeful ignore-ance: cultivating a life that intentionally ignores some things so that it can focus its attention on others. This is where the idea leads. We do not want to ignore things to the point that we become completely oblivious to them. Rather, we want to notice what we ignore while being able to ignore what we notice.

Federman makes the point that this demands the creation of an ‘anti-environment.’ If you are submerged in an environment, you will either not ignore what you notice or not notice what you are ignoring. That entails complete assimilation on the one hand or blind acceptance on the other. The one means that you buy in completely to the environment. The other means that the environment smuggles in its trappings right under your nose.