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Comment by eli_gottlieb | Hacker News Reader

>Much like in Brave New World, we have soma-like drugs, distractions and trivialities occupying people while they accept the world as it is and even shy away from wanting to change things.

Now hold on. There are millions of people in the streets demonstrating on a regular basis these days. How many have to be trying to change things before we stop labeling them all distracted, sleeping, over-amused sheeple?

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"We were keeping our eye on 1984. When the year came and the prophecy didn't, thoughtful Americans sang softly in praise of themselves. The roots of liberal democracy had held. Wherever else the terror had happened, we, at least, had not been visited by Orwellian nightmares.

But we had forgotten that alongside Orwell's dark vision, there was another - slightly older, slightly less well known, equally chilling: Aldous Huxley's Brave New World. Contrary to common belief even among the educated, Huxley and Orwell did not prophesy the same thing. Orwell warns that we will be overcome by an externally imposed oppression. But in Huxley's vision, no Big Brother is required to deprive people of their autonomy, maturity and history. As he saw it, people will come to love their oppression, to adore the technologies that undo their capacities to think.

What Orwell feared were those who would ban books. What Huxley feared was that there would be no reason to ban a book, for there would be no one who wanted to read one. Orwell feared those who would deprive us of information. Huxley feared those who would give us so much that we would be reduced to passivity and egoism. Orwell feared that the truth would be concealed from us. Huxley feared the truth would be drowned in a sea of irrelevance. Orwell feared we would become a captive culture. Huxley feared we would become a trivial culture, preoccupied with some equivalent of the feelies, the orgy porgy, and the centrifugal bumblepuppy. As Huxley remarked in Brave New World Revisited, the civil libertarians and rationalists who are ever on the alert to oppose tyranny "failed to take into account man's almost infinite appetite for distractions." In 1984, Orwell added, people are controlled by inflicting pain. In Brave New World, they are controlled by inflicting pleasure. In short, Orwell feared that what we fear will ruin us. Huxley feared that what we desire will ruin us."

— Neil Postman (Author of Amusing Ourselves to Death)

I first learned about Neil Postman in the last year from Alan Kay's reading list. I've found myself wishing he were still alive to champion his ideas today - they seem just as relevant in the era of Facebook as they did in the era of television.

http://www.squeakland.org/resources/books/readingList.jsp

Both you and pdog have made interesting observations, I suppose, but as I said, neither book described our reality accurately. Our reality is far more complicated. As you point out, millions have protested, but tens of millions haven’t. As pdog remarked, the world in 1984 might be described as a totalitarian hellscape, in part, but parts of our world can also be described as such; pdog needs to look outside his locale, I’m afraid. Our world really is like a combination of those two books, even if your neighborhoods aren’t. We haven’t matched the world portrayed in either book, obviously, but it feels to me like were transitioning to a world a lot like a combination of those books. Let’s review things in a decade or two and see what comes to be.

>As you point out, millions have protested, but tens of millions haven’t.

On both an absolute and per-capita level, those millions are actually record highs. These are historically large demonstrations. I'd have to check where I read this, but IIRC about 3% of a country's total population is typically the amount you need demonstrating in order to overthrow a government.

We're possibly looking at a revolution in progress, and all you guys can say is, "Why aren't there more of them?"?

> "you guys"

I don't know what group you're imagining me to be a part of, but you have no idea who I am, clearly. That's fine.

Fair enough. I retract any implied criticism. You keep organizing!

I think it's important to note that the majority of these protests are happening in large urban cities on the coasts that overwhelming did not vote for Trump. There are no large protests in the Middle of the country.

I'd also like to see the source for he 3% number that leads to overthrow.

>>How many have to be trying to change things before we stop labeling them all distracted, sleeping, over-amused sheeple?

3.5 percent, according to research.

https://rationalinsurgent.com/2013/11/04/my-talk-at-tedxboul...

Well, that's roughly how much of the population you need to mount an ultimately successful revolutionary movement. And we're 1/3 of the way there already.

Also, if I had to venture a guess for why things have been improving, it's that modern economies rely on very fine, highly-skilled divisions of labor. If you're a marketing manager, you probably don't really understand how software goes together. This makes it very difficult to point a gun at a programmer and force them to work.

This means that in order to climb the ladder of value-added production, you need to keep your social organization nonviolent, and possibly even increasingly peaceful. You need everyone to cooperate, and when they cease to do so, even nonviolently, you start losing all that value you can't extract at gunpoint.

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