Wednesday, November 4, 2009

Moral Order & Dystopia

Moral Order & Dystopia
Pierre Boulle’s Planet of the Apes suggests an apocalyptic premodern moral order sans humans. There is a hierarchy in the primates’ government – Orangutans are the class from which leaders are culled; Chimpanzees are the thinkers in this society; and Gorillas are enforcers of order through force. This hierarchy is based on the first type of premodern moral order mentioned in the book Modern Social Imaginaries by Charles Taylor. It is founded on the law “which has governed this people since time out of mind and which, in a sense, defines it as a people.” In this society, disorder to the status quo is an affrontery to nature. Human beings in the scheme of things are slaves to the primates. This “Law of Nature,” despite their capacity for thought, governs the primates. The primates defined themselves by this Law. Human beings did not fit within this Law and were regarded as oddities, suited only for slaves and experimentation. Human beings lose their survival edge – reason and compassion (survival-based attributes) – to become bestial, intolerant, and are thereby eclipsed by the lower primates, whom are cooperating to assure mutual survival and prosperity among the lower primates. As we, humans, grow further apart and separate ourselves from our true nature and ourselves, so do the primates grow stronger as they become closer to Nature.
Why do we become more detached from ourselves and other people daily? Technology is a driving force, real and concrete; urbanization is cramped and less natural space – people are more detached among each other. What drives technology? The Industrial Military Complex pumps dollars into research and development for efficient subjugating and killing. Marketing dollars are the ammunition for technology by dictating what to think, how to feel, and where a person should be in his or her life; so, an individual’s self-worth is determined in this fashion. These controlling forces do not have the individual’s best interest at heart, but are only interested in the bottom line – profits. The internet seems to “connect” people from different stations of life: chatting, blogging and other forms of communication. However, people tend to be more transparent; one does not know whom he or she is communicating with, one is only identified based on the other person’s “description” of who he or she is; one does not really connect with the other because he or she does not see the other in person; non-verbal cues are absent. Ultimately, the person is always sitting in front of his or her computer for hours and real human connection or interaction is substituted with the “projected” identity. This is indicative of where Planet of the Apes is leading to; detachment and divorcement from human contact.
In The Iron Heel by Jack London, we are informed by the writings of Avis Everhart – an eyewitness to the “fall” of the United States – the west – and which are “corrected” by the point-of-view of a scholar Anthony Meredith, whom is a future historian (inserting and adding his myopic view of the future to the completed text). I would argue that The Iron Heel is an example of using platonic models-in-hierarchy or (a premodern moral order of the second example in Taylor’s book) to form its society, and that the forms are functional and normative. Creativity and spontaneity by the populace and authorities are regarded with suspicion and implication of crime (and perhaps envy). These unfortunate individuals – the unsanctioned artists – also play a role: the insane. Everyone has a place and function in that society from the misfits to the proletarians to the leaders – all are crucial to that society, even the myopic scholar and the long dead Avis Everhart. People ought to behave and to discharge their societal duty and obligations. That is their purpose and function without which they have no identity separate from should’s and ought’s and individual-driven desires. They are their societal purpose; to think otherwise is contrary to the natural order and considered as out-and-out heresy. To think outside the box can get you economically ruined, if not literally killed.
It is difficult, if not possible, to know what the typical citizen thinks and feels about himself or herself, the world, and freedom from an oppressive country like North Korea. The country is hermetically separate from the real world, contained in their small bubble. The power yielded by the leaders is absolute, a certainty, and final. In their fiefdom, they have the power of prosperity or ruin, life or death. All arguments break down to the essential elements for a tyrant. Logic is reduced to concrete and real power: who has the power to deal out death, i.e. who has the gun, and who will use it. People who live in this type of society are subject to the whims and voracious control from their leader(s). Tyranny and Totalitarianism control every aspect of their human existence. No one is truly free. There are no checks and balances of power. There is no freedom of thought, freedom of speech, freedom of the press, freedom to protest, freedom to “life, liberties and pursuit of happiness.” Constitutional Rights do not exist. One only has the right to follow the dictates of the tyrant or simply die. There is no public sphere – a place for dialogue and exchange of ideas. One is not allowed to express his or her ideas. Ideas are contained, constrained and suppressed by fear and force.
Fahrenheit 451 by Ray Bradbury and 1984 by George Orwell are a modern moral order. Although not free in these novels, the public is expected “to be rational and sociable.” The people will turn into “subversives” in their society whom are outside the norm. O’ Brian catches Winston and Julia and informs the authorities about them in 1984. In Fahrenheit 451, his wife, Mildred, betrays Montag. Charles Taylor states: “The organization of society is not judged on its inherent form, but instrumentally.” How effective this society administers security and fosters prosperity determines how true the system is to the people. Who benefits and who prospers, as well as who is secure, is the key question. Is it from the top to the bottom that punishments and rewards are meted out even-handedly? According to Taylor, security and prosperity are the principal goals of organized society. In these previously mentioned novels, however, order is an end-in-itself, and civil liberties of the public, curtailed for their own “good,” are visibly absent. Prosperity is lacking in these systems. There is only the owner of production and the worker. Innovation is sacrificed for conformity. Innovation, in this type of society, is considered a product of the people serving their supposed roles and their adherence to these forced roles. Yet, any dissension thereby created is addressed through forceful retaliation as a response to defiance.
In Bradbury’s novel, the book burning, oppressive society, irredeemable, is decimated by nuclear weapons by their enemies as a cleansing act and the literate people who survived is set free among the devastation and ash of the former society. They are the new wardens of knowledge. This shows how durable and lasting book knowledge is imperious to book burning and fanaticism. Books will always be with us, regardless what technology is in vogue or the latest theories debunking the literary classics. They are classics for a reason; the books challenge the current way of looking at the world; they are lasting examples of exemplary critiques of ideas and philosophies of modern thought, e.g. a seminal essay The Culture Industry: Enlightenment as Mass Deception by Theodor Adorno and Max Horkheimer and their discussion of the culture industry. Fascist societies, left and right do not want the public reading such material, which makes the public think for themselves. Such a mind is less susceptible to out-and-out influences and is less easy to be manipulated and controlled. Such a mind is the ghost-in-the-machine. It follows its own agenda, according to its own thought. Statistics and probability break down when the human mind is involved. Many in authority underestimate it in making decisions.
The Republican Party emphasizes absolute order, rugged individualism, and laissez-faire capitalism. The Democrats offer normative, inclusive, and people-oriented policies. We are a republic, constantly reinventing ourselves and theoretically learning from our mistakes and positively evolving, but we always –ideally – strive for truly diverse attitudes and views. We separate Church and State; power divorced from the religious impulses. Democracy is equated with society-wide, liberal freethinking, e.g. Democrat. (Note: we are a representational and indirect democracy or a republic, e.g. Republican). Fanaticism, in any form, usually deserves suspicion in a democracy, and is always the enemy of critical thinking. It delimits and befuddles clear thinking. It involves should’s and ought’s in a restrictive and rigid style. Fluidity and spontaneity, as well as innovation and creativity, are needed in life and to stay in power in a real democracy. Moderation and balance are the keywords in the context of power (and life, in general). Such somewhat diametrically opposing and arbitrary ideas, such as Republicans and Democrats, or Church and State, could not safely manifest (even inchoate), unless there is true freedom, a safe context to contain the opposing ideas. Thus, people of vastly different and opposite ideologies can assemble and peaceably exchange ideas – the public space.

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