Drug consumption in „Brave new World“ and in our society
In the book „Brave new World“ Aldous Huxley describes a utopian society which is completely based on the consumption of the drug „soma“. Every displeasing feeling gets replaced by an intoxication of soma. One can find a lot of examples for this handling with drugs in the book. Whenever Lenina and Bernard are visiting the reservation of „the savages“ in New Mexico, Lenina has problems to confront herself with the conditions there without taking any soma. She perceives it as very dirty and old-fashioned in the reservation and states a lot of times that she wishes to have some soma with her. This example shows in a very striking way how the citizens of the „brave new world“ depend on drugs, because they are not able to resist in situations which new and hard for them.
One can find this dealing with drugs in some ways in our society too.
In contrast to the „brave new world“ we have several drugs of various effects and strength. Some string one up, with the others one gets calmed down again, whereas soma is something like the „universal drug“, for every state of mind in the „brave new world“
In our society we have a lot of people who are just taking some drugs occasionally, but otherwise people who are addicted to drugs and are in danger to die of their drug consumption. Drug addiction isn't only usual in poor regions anymore, where children are sniffing glue, because they are suffering from insufficient food supply; very rich managers are also taking drugs to be more concentrated at work, young people are taking drugs to stay awake in the club and maybe housewives comsume drugs, because they want some variety in their lives and so on… drug comsumption concerns nearly every social class and every age group. So one can see the main differences between the drug consumption in the „brave new world“, which has the aim to suppress displeasing feelings of every inhabitant, and the drug consumption in our society, which is very variable, and doesn't exist of only one drug, with only one effect and a single reason.
Dystopia of a drug ruled world
Dear diary,
today, I don't feel very good. My stocks are empty and I had to talk to my mum in a sober status! The smell in the streets gets worse every day. Nobody cares for the corpses who are just lying around on the streets and on the public toilets. Every minute, no every second, one can hear a crash outside. Another driver who was too tired or too nervous to watch out for the traffic. The city is full of old looking people who are walking around without any expression, I can't even remember how a children or a baby looks like. We have about 50 or 60% stillbirths and if a baby gets born it either dies after some weeks because of all the diseases it already suffers from or it dies of hunger. As a result of the extreme drug abuse of the mothers, the babies are already drug addicted when they are born. Mothers are afraid to get pregnant, because children don't have a future anymore and they need all their money to pay their drugs. The world is dirty, unfriendly and nobody cares. Nearly everyone is infected by HIV because the needles are passed around till they are totally blocked. I don't have friends anymore, friends aren't important for us, our dealer is the one and only who has some importance in our life, just because he has the power to help us through the day. I don't know if it's day or night or which time we have, I don't even know what happened to my old school friends, if they still live or not. Probably they're dead anyway. I don't see the sense of life anymore, I can't imagine that anyone of us sees a sense in his life nowadays, but I don't want to end up like all these dirty corpses who seem to be dumped like some scruffy piece of meat.
Comments:
I loved your text about a drug ruled society. The diary entry was a great idea to underline the state, your character faces. I really liked the way you described the relations between people and that friendship does not exist anymore. In addition to that, I think you did a great job describing the differences between soma and the drugs that exist in our world (since there are a lot more …). You also pointed out how much Lenina needs soma to get along with the situation in the savage reservation. One grammatical thing I thought to point out is that in the beginning, you wrote "every displeasing feeling…" but in my opinion it has to be "every displeased feeling…", maybe it was just a mistake (from tiping) though… ;) So, really well done!!! (Steffi)
Dear Anni, i liked your text about a society ruled of drugs. You did a good job on your introduction, you managed it to explain the role of drugs in the 'Brave New World' and then to get the connection to our world. That was elegant. :)
I also liked your idea of describing the world if everyone would take drugs in the future as a diary entry. You really did a good job on this, especially by using short and concise words and explanations. Well done! (Andy P.)
Dear Anni, you wrote a good, well structured text about a world ruled by drugs. I like that you also wrote about the differences between soma and the drugs in our world and that drugs are taken in every group of people (rich managers, children etc.), I, for example, forgot these points in my text. Your idea of the diary entry is great, I haven't read something like this in another text.
Good job :) (Marie)