Can a Utopia Exist?
So, both of the books we’ve read so far have clearly been
about utopias gone wrong. These societies were created based on the vision of a
few people of how they could make the world perfect. It just happened that said
people were either extremely delusional, or just complete jerks, and their
envisioned society turned out to be pretty terrible. But that got me thinking:
is there a way that a utopia could be done right?
Well,
my short answer is no. And here’s why I think that.
Every
society is made up of a whole bunch of individuals. We all have slightly
different needs to make us happy, and we all have our moments of greed,
selfishness, anger, and stupidity. And that’s fine. We’re all human, and I
genuinely believe that 99% of people really are good people. But on the other
hand, we are all human, and no one’s perfect. And there is that one percent of
people that, for one reason or another, just can’t wait to make life miserable
for everyone else. And this is the problem with the idea of a utopia, the idea
of perfection in society. Sure, if you over-generalize society, it seems
plausible. But there are plenty of outliers. In fact, society is pretty much
made of outliers. The only way to control these outliers is to control
everything, even how people think. And in doing so, you are sacrificing a vital
component: freedom.
Maybe
some of you are rolling your eyes reading this, and that’s probably fair. In
the US, I think freedom might be used in a pretty empty manner, and it seems to
have become somewhat of a buzzword. “Freedom” might conjure up an image in your
mind of a middle-aged man in a lawn chair shouting about it on the 4th
of July. But just because it’s empty use had made it seem meaningless and
unimportant, don’t discount it. Freedom really is extremely important. Without
freedom, can anyone be truly happy? I don’t know, but certainly controlling
people’s thoughts, forcing them to sacrifice their freedom for the sake of
order, is not a good way to run a society.
Sure,
freedom has its downsides. If everyone was mind-controlled, there would be many
fewer problems in the world. Maybe I’m speaking from a biased point of view.
After all, as someone who doesn’t have to worry about putting food on the table
and doesn’t have to worry about being killed when I go outside, it’s easy for
me to say “yeah, I would rather have freedom than order.” So, I suppose
everything I say should be taken with a grain of salt. But in my opinion,
sacrificing everyone’s freedom of ideas and thought for order, or the sake of
the creation of a utopian community is not a good option.
Plus,
this is all hypothetical, because it isn’t possible to condition people from
birth like they do in brave new world, or at least not to the extent that they
do. People will still be individuals, and as of now, it is not understood how
to control thought. Until that changes, I think I can safely say that a
“utopian” society will never pop up.
I agree. I don't think it's possible to reconcile freedom with equality in any society. There are always, as you said, people that want more and will destroy equality in order to gain it. There are also people that over-emphasize the idea of equality and therefore sacrifice freedom in order to gain equality. I think it's mainly a question of if it's worth gaining absolute equality if it means that no one is free.
ReplyDeleteThis is something I've really struggled with but I think I agree with you. Realistically I can't see any way to ensure a conflict-less society without like literally changing human personality or sacrificing people's freedoms. That feels a little disheartening. I would say probably it's almost possible on a smaller scale where the community is so influential and present, but I'm not sure. As much as it might not be possible though, I'm not sure if that means we should stop trying. I think we should always be striving for political and social systems that value compassion, and prioritize equality, equity, and human rights.
ReplyDeleteYou make plenty of good points. I guess i'd say that the distinction you draw about bad people is not necessarily one that makes utopias infeasible. Even if you had people who were all "good" by some metric, they wouldn't all agree about what is good or bad, so as you said, controlling them would be necessary to enforce some common idea of "good."
ReplyDeleteI agree, and although this is not an adequate comparison. What do you think about the idea that are freedom is already gone. We just think we do. Not only are there laws that prevent us from certain actions, but societal norms dictate almost everything we do.
ReplyDeleteI think I agree with you. In an ideal society, it's hard to reconcile absolute freedom with absolute peace on a worldwide level without sacrificing some essential element of human nature. However, there are cases where I see utopian-like societies functioning on a smaller scale, in our world. They have conflict protocols, understanding that everyone is not going to get along. This would probably not work at a larger scale though, simply because there are so many people who have so many different values that they would have to be controlled somehow.
ReplyDeleteI definitely agree with this sentiment - I think that human nature is ultimately too variable and volatile to make a truly idyllic society a reality. We're all unique individuals, and no matter how a community is structured, I think that considerable sacrifices will be necessary to maintain order. Modern societies can certainly be improved, but disagreements, conflicts, and compromises will never be truly eradicated. Minor improvements might gradually bring us closer to a real utopia, but the closer that we get, the harder it will be to further improve. Almost like an asymptote of a function, I think that a utopia is something that we can always approach, but never actually achieve.
ReplyDeleteI agree that it is difficult to incorporate both freedom and equality in a society. Even in a perfect society, having freedom means giving up order because people would do whatever they want without considering the consequences, but on the other hand, having order means restricting the freedom and the ability to do what we desire. Since it's hard to reconcile both of these qualities, it is important to consider what the goal of the utopia is and whether freedom or order is more important.
ReplyDeleteI think scale is a big factor. You can't create a worldwide utopia like they tried to in BNW without significantly taking away from people's freedom. But much smaller communities (think villages, or classrooms even) have a shot, I think. However, everyone there needs to communicate well with each other, earnestly desire to make things good for everyone, and earnestly believe that everyone else desires that too. And while human beings have the potential for that, it's tough because we tend towards selfishness unless we consciously make an effort. So, I still think tiny pocket utopias are possible, but not probable.
ReplyDeleteI think that your proposed 1% of bad people have very little to do with why utopias can't exist. Rather, the reconciliation of freedom and equality that you bring up makes the typical notion of a utopia possible. Absolute freedom is directly in conflict with absolute equality just as it is with responsibility. Since people are different from each other on every possible axis, achieving complete equality on any axis stifles the freedoms of all those who would not naturally fall at the designated location on that axis. And since people are so complicated and different, it is only possible for a society with complete equality to have a single person with freedom.
ReplyDeleteWhile I do think a true utopia will probably never exist, I don't think lack of freedom could be categorized as the main problem. While I understand that freedom is something important to us as human beings, I think we like the illusion of freedom much more than we actually like freedom itself. We get easily overwhelmed with too many choices, and can easily be manipulated into choosing certain things while feeling like we're actually the ones "winning". That's why advertisements work so well. So even though I know a utopia is not plausible, I think giving up some freedom would not be where we draw the line, otherwise we would have drawn that line a long time ago.
ReplyDeleteI think freedom being at odds with order is a reason for why utopias are problematic. People are individuals who are all different, so by definition we are not equal, which is essentially why I value individual freedoms over equality and order. Personally, I see the underlying reason for the unfeasibility of utopias as humans being individuals and thus having different ideas of what is good and bad, which is pretty similar to yours. This is also the reason why I hesitate to say 99% of people are good while the 1% of bad people stop us from creating a utopia. I think the truth is closer to different people each seeing good and bad differently, and thus having a different percentage of people whose ideas for a possible utopia are compatible with their own (so sort of "good").
ReplyDeleteI agree with many other commentators that the scale of the utopia is one of the most important factors when it comes to the removal of freedom. The larger the group that you have to control, the larger the range of individuality that they present, and the more that that individual has to conform to the communal utopia.
ReplyDeleteI think the term utopia requires a vantage point. So to some a utopia may be exactly their situation but that isnt a utopia for others. You pointed out some good ideas, and reasons why a utopia for all can be not feasible
ReplyDelete