Dystopia In Brave New World

Aldous Huxley’s Brave New World has garnered many debates from readers and critics. This novel follows the story of utopia-like world in which every aspect of society and citizens’ lives are regulated. With defining elements that play into the overarching idea of a controlled society, many are mistaken to believe that the novel features a world that is extremely perfected. However, these very elements are what characterize this society not as a utopia, but as a corrupt and oppressive dystopia. Contrary to many beliefs, the sterile, uniform, and industrialized society Huxley creates in Brave New World is one that should actually be characterized a dystopia disguised as a utopia through its precise uniformity, its impressive technology, and,

From lack of self-expression to drugs to the process of birth to predestined futures to the process of death, the society of Brave New World extends control over essentially all things. Even ways of life that would normally be considered an autonomous decision are regulated and in the hands of the government. For example, this includes the births and deaths of citizens. People in this society are actually not birthed but hatched. Multitudes of identical embryos are formulated in a lab and “[predestined] and [conditioned] [,] [...] [decanted] [...] as socialized human beings, as Alphas or Epsilons, as future sewage workers or future” (Huxley 11). This showcases that not only are citizens produced in unauthentically in laboratories, but they are also given a predestined future and conditioned to fit the standards of the government, legitimizing the power and control the government holds over the people of the society. The vulnerability and helplessness of the citizens is showcased here as they are subjected to the government’s control and manipulation. This signifies that Brave New World is in fact a dystopia because of its practice of utter control in all aspects of life. Even the death of a person is twisted by governmental standards and views, as the people of the society “unnaturally [...] take death with ease” and consider “dying [to be] nice as they are taught so” (“Brave New World Utopia or Dystopia”). By constantly brainwashing and using technology to instill different ideas in people from such early ages, the government has now succeeded in desensitizing and dehumanizing the citizens. They are not disconcerted, bewildered, or even simply saddened by one’s death, but rather think very insignificantly of it. Another way in which the corrupt and dystopian society controls the people if through