Amusing Ourselves to Death by Stuart McMillen - cartoon Recombinant Records

October 26 2009, 5:06am

You can download a four page, printable version of the cartoon here (6.28 MB). You can read the foreword from this thought-provoking book here. You can watch a 60 minute lecture by Neil Postman on technology and society here. I also found this article about George Orwell's Nineteen Eighty-Four writing process to be fascinating.Back to post / website. View/add comments for this article.Amusing Ourselves to Death by Stuart McMillen. Aldous Huxley vs. George Orwell. 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, Huxley added, people are controlled by inflicting pain. In Brave New World, they are controlled by inflicting pleasure. In short, Orwell feared that what we hate will ruin us. Huxley feared that what we love will ruin us. All words by "Amusing Ourselves to Death: Public Discourse in the Age of Show Business" by Neil Postman...a book about the possibility that Huxley, not Orwell was right.