Even though the utopia of Brave New World sounds perfect, it is far from it. In fact, it is the exact opposite. You would think that a world without problems would be great; they get what they want, and they never want what they cant get as Mustapha Mond would say. With no desires for anything more than what you have, it is believed that you are happy. But if you look behind the ignorance you realize that everyone and everything is being controlled.
In Brave New World the controllers keep the society stable by determining peoples lives. Even before birth, each person has a predestined life that they are to fulfill. Babies are born from test tubes, eliminating family and giving them a lack of person identity. Without family they are able to reconstruct society because instead of being known as a unit, they are all individuals. Babies are born into classes; the Alpha class being strongest and most intelligent, while the Epsilon class endures oxygen deprivation and alcohol treatment making them weakest. The five classes consist of different groups of people because they have found that people will not accept society if they are all in the upper classes. Realizing this, the controllers then created lower classes and trained them to agree to the life they are given and not long for the upper classes that are trusted with the jobs that use the most intellect. The caste system organizes the civilization, but unlike real human people, the lower classes are not envious of the upper classes.
Even as children the people are trained to accept the life they are given. Hypnopedia is used while they are sleeping to teach moral values so they understand the rules of the society and do not desire anything more than what they have. Each class is taught to think about the good parts of being in that class and not to focus on the bad. For example, even though the Beta class is not depended on for the jobs that require the most intelligence, they are taught to feel that they are still very important in society. They believe that they are in the more important working class and that they are still better than Gamma, Delta, and Epsilon. Babies are taught to hate books and flowers using a technique involving electrical shock. As time goes by, the children will have an inborn hatred of books and flowers. A loathing for books is set in the lower castes to prevent them from reading books that might decondition them. The controllers know that books would be the downfall of their perfect utopia because they would screw up the ideas and morals that they have set. A hatred for flowers is also set to increase the consumption of goods. As the children grow older they are forced to play sexual games, as casual sex is considered a norm. Through all these processes and procedures, it is only just the start of their fully engineered civilization.
Feelings are not a part of peoples lives in the novel. Huxley describes this perfect drug, soma, which is used to suppress any sort of negative feelings that might arise, along with the positive feelings as well. More pleasurable than gin or heroin without the dangerous side effects, this drug is used numerous times daily. The result is numb, satisfied people who are content with their lives. A device that is also used to inhibit feelings is the Very Passionate Surrogate or VPS. This machine is used every one in a while to get feelings like jealously, anger, hatred, and even love out of their systems so they can continue on with their meaningless lives.
Behind the seemingly perfect utopia of Brave New World is a deeply sickening society. People are content because they are taught not to want what they cannot have, but they arent truly happy. The society in general has lost all feeling; most are under the influence of soma to numb any feelings that might come about. The truth is that ignorance is not bliss; it is just unawareness that exudes the sense of a
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