For me at least, one of the most shocking aspects of Brave New World’s World State is soma. At a first glance, soma is quite a foreign concept in a few ways. For one, soma has minimal direct side effects, so there doesn’t seem to be much of an incentive to not take it when offered. This contrasts with every hallucinogen or stimulant drugs I can think of, which explains why some humans on earth don’t do drugs on a regular basis, but practically everyone in the World State does. Furthermore, the World State hands soma out to citizens and even hypnotizes them into taking it frequently. From what I understand, drug production is very expensive so it would seem quite irrational for any society on earth to hand out drugs to citizens, and even more so to encourage rapid consumption of them.
After some closer inspection, it becomes clear that the oddities surrounding soma aren’t independent of each other, and the World State isn’t actually acting irrationally at all. The fact that the World State has a monopoly on a cheap substance with such positive effects and few drawbacks is exactly why their society is the way it is. The incentive to provide an otherwise positive and beneficial life to citizens suddenly vanishes when the World State can cover everything up with bags of soma. Once the World State becomes egregious in its treatment of citizens, soma serves to control and distract its citizens. And, for the most part, the citizens themselves wouldn’t want to do anything about it. Although many might realize that their society is suboptimal, the soma is just too good, and the potential lack of soma implied by revolting in some way is not worth the risk. And at the end of the day, maybe living in the World State isn’t so bad… so is our society any better?
If we agree that fundamental qualities of soma are that it has positive effects and is distributed by the government to distract and control, I’d argue that there are many aspects of our society that bear a resemblance. Historically, there have been a few blatant examples of “soma distribution” by world leaders. To give a less well-known example, in 1978, Argentina was in midst of a military dictatorship and “La Guerra Sucia” (the dirty war) and World Cup, which was being hosted by Argentina. Leading officials were disappearing and being killed, people, the economy was tanking, etc. Long story short, Argentinians love soccer and are on the brink of being eliminated from the world cup in the group stages (they need an extremely unlikely shoreline of 5-0 or better to advance). After a few alleged phone calls and threats, Argentina pulls off a 6-0 and goes on to win the world cup. Suddenly, everyone is celebrating in the streets and forgets about the dictatorship. Or, in the language of Brave New World, a heavy dose of soma is passed around. Similarly, one could argue that other aspects of society are efforts by the government to cheaply keep control and distract its citizens.
A more widespread and perhaps more controversial example would be religion, which has unequivocally have had positive influences for humanity, particularly in times of hardship (the situations where one might take a dose of soma). Historically, many governments have funded and supported religious institutions, and one could argue that some of these governments have done so to distract and control their citizens. What do you think?
--Kevin
--Kevin
I agree that soma production and distribution is absolutely crucial to the ability of the World State to maintain order. It is traditional 'bread and circuses', but completely optimized. Every citizen can take it almost whenever they desire, but can only get it from the government, and, all the while, they are completely conditioned to take it whenever they feel bad.
ReplyDelete-Sasha
Soma is a really good way to keep order because instead of creating a society where everyone is happy, you instead give them drugs to distract them from anything bad. I agree that our world doesn't really use drugs but other things to distract people from realizing that the way they're living sucks. Just like in BNW, it's hard to realize that you are being purposefully distracted and it's even harder to convince everyone else.
ReplyDeleteGreat post! I'm especially intrigued by your remarks about the parallels between religion and soma. Besides just drugs, before reading this post I had never really thought about the alternative forms in which "our world's soma" may exist. I believe that both governments and everyday people have obvious incentives to find contentment; The real question is how exactly to do that. As you mentioned, small and large scale, convenient distractions can do wonders to keep people at ease with whatever chaos they may be facing. I mean, take something that many Uni students know and love, isn't that the point of procrastination?
ReplyDeleteI think this is really interesting. The idea that "Soma" can be things other than a drug is very interesting. There are so many horrible things going on in the world constantly and we are always using Soma of some form or another to ignore it or forget about it. nice post
ReplyDeleteYour notion that spectator sports are essentially a pacifying drug like Soma makes a lot of sense to me. Russia seems to have a habit of timing any actions that could be seen as aggressive with the Olympics, so that the whole world is distracted by the wonders of international sport instead of worrying about whatever Russia is doing.
ReplyDeleteI don't think religion functions completely as a pacifier or an entirely positive influence on humanity. Not because of the nature of religion itself but because of the way people use it to justify their actions, it can sometimes create or inflame conflict (e.g. the crusades or other "holy" wars, or homophobia in various religions). It is definitely something people turn to in conflict, but the result is not necessarily pacifying.
ReplyDeleteI definitely agree with you when you say that soma is crucial to the World State running as effectively as it does. I think your examples of the pacifiers of sports and religion are very apt analogues to our world. Your post has made me think a bit about how governments try to deflect attention on their darker aspects with non-serious stories, and this happens all the time. Do you think Huxley made soma as a direct analogy to these pacifiers?
ReplyDeleteYour analogy involving the World Cup is very interesting. I also agree with your religion comparison with soma. Soma was also very shocking to me because without it, the World State would be strikingly different. The World State's dependence on soma is important to ponder when reading the book. Great post Kevin :)
ReplyDeleteI would argue that the "socialized soma" is used all the time and is actually called "public relations". For example, the POTUS will often dump bad news on Friday afternoons (so nobody will see it) and follow it up with good news like reports of economic growth or some foreign policy thing. Anyway, the point is to cover up bad news with euphoria
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