[Das Outsider]

I liked “Brave New World”. But we do just the opposite. His little axioms about throwing things out and buying new haven’t come true. We obsessively recycle, repair and repurpose EVERYTHING.

You're being tongue-in-cheek, aren't you? ;)

However, he got the chemicalized pacifization of society EXACTLY right.

Ritalin, Prozac, and so on. This was because he was able to see how a truly materialistic philosophy of man would ultimately enable the lesser angels of our nature and those in power. He could never get past his own roadblocks, but unconsciously provided a back-alley way around them.

Seems to me if we were really awake our chemically suppressed depression might motivate us to fight off the raging hordes we’ve elected to lead us down the rat hole.

Drug addiction is one thing--but what about media? It is just as much a potent drug as any psychoactive compound I know of.

Going back to the overall theme of "Brave New World": Unlike Orwell, Huxley saw a society in robot-like conformity, inflicted with pleasure instead of pain, contra the traditional totalitarian model--a society very much like our own.

[Jo Nuvark]

I liked “Brave New World” because I was 18 and
for a girl who liked historical romance novels,
at least this one kept my attention.

I was an intellectual pretender at that age. I
pretended that I understood “2001 A Space Odyssey”.
I pretended that it was deep. But now I know that
it was making fun of me in the Emperor has no clothes
kind of way.

Best book I ever read, other than the Bible, was
Ayn Rand’s “The Fountainhead”. Changed my life and
gave me the courage to dissent and be the individual
that God made me.

—Jo—

[Jo Nuvark]

[... Huxley saw a society in robot-like conformity,
inflicted with pleasure instead of pain ...]

Pleasure IS killing us.