Society In Brave New World

Throughout the entire world there are issues with our societies brought upon by the lack of clear thinking and/or compassion. Many of these issues may not be problems necessarily but just topics discussed when the word “issue” is brought up. One can clearly compare our society to the society described in Aldous Huxley’s novel Brave New World. In this novel the society Huxley has created is meant to be a utopia, made up of a hierarchy known as the caste system. Social classes in both societies create issues due to the fact that everyone has always had different standings in society.

Cursed to a life of isolation because of his appearance, values, and outrageous thoughts, John was alienated mentally, emotionally, and physically in both the Savage Culture and the World State Culture. Torn between keeping true to his virtues and conforming to society, the treatment of John highlights the values of both cultures in Aldous Huxley's Brave New World.

In Aldous Huxley’s 1932 novel Brave New World, John (referred to as “the savage”) is the voice of freedom in a society ruled by an inexorable pursuit of superficial happiness. In the dystopian setting, the world controllers maintain public satisfaction “but at a very high price—the sacrifice of freedom, individuality, truth, beauty, a sense of purpose, and the concept of God” (Neilson). John’s unorthodox beliefs about monogamy, God, drugs, and freedom clash with that of the overwhelming majority of people in the totalitarian London utopia. This barrier is rooted in John’s natural moral development as opposed to the artificial conditioning of the rest of society and it leads to John’s complete isolation from the people of London.

John defines happiness as a society where no human emotion is subdued, which is in contrast with Brave New World. As John talks to Mustapha Mond, the controller of the society, John says that he desires God, poetry, danger, freedom, goodness, and sin. However, Mond replies by saying that John’s desires will make him unhappy. John quickly replies, “I’m claiming the right to be unhappy” (Huxley 240). John strongly believes that to be happy, you have to first experience unhappiness. Factors that are negative will allow people to understand different emotions. Brave New World controls and conditions citizens from the moment they are born. Furthermore, these citizens are taught not to feel, which opposes humanity. Therefore, John believes that they

When John was led back into life in the futuristic society, he was mocked and treat as a strange attraction. He was at the awful end of a sick joke - people came from all over to understand this simple “savage” who has spent his life in curiously primitive manners. John was so poorly received, he went as far as wanting to commit

John the Savage’s view of civilization was greatly enhanced after he left the sheltered community of his tribe. When he first arrives in “utopia” London, he is amazed by the aesthetic of the city and the people who live there; here he recognizes how different the paradisal city is from the barbarous environment of his tribe. John exclaims,“how many godly creatures are there here! How beautiful mankind is!” (129). John is exemplifying the value of learning a new culture and religion from the perspective of one who has been sequestered

Brave New World In Brave New World, Aldous Huxley illustrates alienation through the character John “the Savage” to develop the theme of isolation. Being an outcast in society John understands the feeling of isolation more than anyone throughout the novel. Although the World State viewed isolation as “political inefficiency” (page 237) John saw it as an opportunity. John begins to understand the importance of art, religion, self-discovery, and literature the more he is in the World State.

He refers back to the time when his children were starving, saying that “I would rather cross the Atlantic ten times than hear my children cry for victuals once” (Dowe 43). John is explaining how he would rather risk his own life by crossing the ocean than have his children cry from hunger. Dowe hopes to make his wife realize that it’s worth the long journey. Coming to America is worth the risk because him and his family would not be hungry anymore. In the last paragraph, Dowe puts in writing how America “is a country where a man can stand as a man, and where he can enjoy the fruits of his own exertions, with rational liberty to its fullest extent” (Dowe 59). Dowe says ‘fruits of his own exertions’ as a metaphor for how nobody can take away a person's freedom to live and enjoy life. He needs his wife to understand that they will be safe to do as much as they want in their new life together in

In the novel Brave New World, by Aldous Huxley there are a few major characters that must be explained. One of these characters is John. John is an outsider in the story and has different goals and ideals than the other characters. He is the son of the Director and Linda. Even though he is the directors son he does not know about him and as a result Linda had him on the Savage Reservation and kept John a secret from his father.

He is born from Linda, who is “civilized” but stranded at the reservation, forced to live among savages. John is a sort of outsider because of his mother and the way she acts (”Whore”). He is later brought to the civilized world where the reader can compare two different worlds at once. He criticizes their society and points out what he sees as morally wrong or inconsistent with the values he was raised with. Saying this, he is consistent with the values and expectations of his society because he only has eyes for one lover and denies “temptation”so to speak when she forces herself upon him.

John stays away from the temptations of women and rejects the New World’s values of mentally leaving the world with the help of Soma at any unhappy thought. As John states in his conversation with Mustafa Mund, “Getting rid of everything unpleasant instead of learning to put up with it. Whether ‘tis better in the mind… But you don’t do either. Neither suffer nor oppose.”

Throughout the novel, Brave New World written by Aldous Huxley, the second protagonist John, views the world through Shakespearian eyes. “But I don't want comfort. I want God, I want poetry, I want real danger, I want freedom, I want goodness. I want sin.” In several significant ways, John's knowledge of Shakespeare empowers him to be able to speak of his reactions and emotions and to be able to criticize the World State values. With his viewing the world through Shakespearean eyes, it allows John the power to realize all the values the World State had abandoned. Since John is the outsider to all the World States Value’s, since he will never and can never express his love for Lenina, and he is forced to suicide, he shows most of the traits

Any one person who opposes conditioning by showing the slightest sign of uniqueness is instantly questioned as a fault in society. Huxley conveys a utopian world lacking individuality, utilizing symbols and hyperboles to annotate the increase inhuman promiscuity. Huxley places double entendres to express loss of personal identity due to promiscuity overtaking the individual. The recurring theme throughout the entirety of the novel consists of an individual's validity of showing cultural distinctiveness and specific characteristics in order to establish a sense of uniqueness.

John has always considered himself to be an outcast of society since the beginning when he was born, as most of the Savages within the Savage Reservation immediately excluded him and his mother, Linda due their light skin, light hair, and their other-worldly habits. On one occasion, John is supposed to go through an initiation ceremony with the other boys of the village when he was pulled out of the line, struck, and told “Not for the son of the she-dog,”. This is when John begins to feel the pain of being alone because he has been “driven out” (Huxley 136). When Bernard and Lenina visit the Reservation, John finds a companion in Bernard as Bernard sees himself as an outcast to society as well and John agrees to return to the World State with them. John finds himself in a confusing position as he is welcomed as new member because he is the only naturally birthed person that the people have ever seen and is even given the nickname of “The Savage” (158). But John struggles with his inner beliefs about sex. John is disgusted by the society’s impertinence with the details of sex and sexual relationships. After seeing a feely with Lenina, John tells her “I don’t think you ought to see things like that,” (169) and hastily drops her off at home and leaves. John also struggles with the easy-going, stress free aspect of the World State in which citizens are given soma to deal with their problems. After the drug leads to his mother’s death, John feels remorse and tries to convince the residents to throw their soma away but soon becomes angry at their ignorance and has an “intense overpowering hatred of these less than human monsters,” (212). Outraged at the unawareness of problems in the society after a discourse between himself and Mustapha Mond, John leaves London to find his own unhappiness within the forest. Admirers invade his privacy including Lenina who tries to visit him, but is attacked by a power-hungry John

According to philosopher and economist John Stuart Mill “social and scientific progress occurs through vigorous debate involving opposing points of view. To generate different points of view, people must have freedom of thought and speech. Progress cannot occur if the majority uses its power to suppress minority viewpoints.” These points are markers of scientific and social progress for an ideal civilization. This does not mean that there are ways to achieve only scientific progress by doing the complete opposite of these. The advantages of scientific progress are evident in Brave New World by Aldous Huxley, but there is little social progress caused by their lack of scientific freedoms.