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Dystopia Is What Results from the Attempt to Create Utopia

kirkcenter.org

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Re: Dystopia Is What Results from the Attempt to Create Utopia

#81

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>this world is fallen Makes the entire article essentially meaningless. How can I trust somebody with such a bizarre and unconnected worldview?

It's a mistake to process these ideas on the basis of trust. True, the religious angle is shoehorned at the end. But the author cites secular books and ideas throughout; these ideas and the relationships between them are worth considering.

Imagine that a person was trying to explain to you how we knew that galaxies and so on were a certain distance away. They show that we know how to figure out Standard Candles and luminosity etc etc etc. They also claim, at the very end, to say that the earth is flat. They don't mean the universe is flat. They mean the earth is flat.

Now, imagine you haven't read the article, somebody comments, "This guy said the earth is flat!" and you ctrl+f into the article and they did, in fact, write that. Should you be encouraged to read the article? They have some secular studies and ideas.

Re: Dystopia Is What Results from the Attempt to Create Utopia

#82
post #33

I don't strongly disagree on any particular point, per se, but the fact that the author's thoughts are rooted in a religious worldview felt like it was snuck in there at the end: "Moreover, this world is fallen, so it is by nature flawed...The utopian visions that animate real places...seek to remake humanity and society in someone’s image—and that is not the image of the Creator." For further context, the website it…

I disagreed with the central thesis, that dystopia necessarily arises from utopian visions. There are lots of dystopian settings throughout the last century that defy this - 1984, waterworld and mad max to name a few. For the author to go on to use this invented meaning as a counterargument to Trump's America being dystopian is disingenuous at best. I wouldn't call it a dystopia myself, but I'd hope to have better grounds for that than inventing meanings.

Re: Dystopia Is What Results from the Attempt to Create Utopia

#83
> Is Trump’s America a dystopia?

I would look at America over the last 40-50 years, instead of asking about Trump specifically.

This is one question asked in the article, and I think that the author does a massive disservice here, while simultaneously writing an article that suggests that any Utopia is also a Dystopia, but never asks the question: is there a subset of Americans that would consider America today to be Utopic. I would argue that yes, that is the case: Those who hold massive quantities of capital. They collect massive amounts from the economy, and pay relatively little in taxes, all by design, since Reagan. More speak against them today, but it is relatively new to see the arguments against their economic value, or whether such concentrated power is dangerous, at least for me.

I could go one step further and look at oil production and usage in this country, and probably be able to formulate utopia/dystopia from it.

However, neither of these are specific to "Trump's" America, and instead discuss an America that has existed and been going in this direction for some time. I consider inability to see dystopia and utopia in this system to be lack of creativity.

Re: Dystopia Is What Results from the Attempt to Create Utopia

#84
post #82
post #33

I don't strongly disagree on any particular point, per se, but the fact that the author's thoughts are rooted in a religious worldview felt like it was snuck in there at the end: "Moreover, this world is fallen, so it is by nature flawed...The utopian visions that animate real places...seek to remake humanity and society in someone’s image—and that is not the image of the Creator." For further context, the website it…

I disagreed with the central thesis, that dystopia necessarily arises from utopian visions. There are lots of dystopian settings throughout the last century that defy this - 1984, waterworld and mad max to name a few. For the author to go on to use this invented meaning as a counterargument to Trump's America being dystopian is disingenuous at best. I wouldn't call it a dystopia myself, but I'd hope to have better gr…

I don't think it was disingenuous because of the fact that he's clearly not a Trump fan himself. But, I do think it's a pretty minor semantic distinction to make.

As for the distinction itself, I was prompted to look it up on Merriam-Webster:

dys· to· pia | \ (ˌ)dis-ˈtō-pē-ə \

Definition of dystopia

1 : an imagined world or society in which people lead wretched, dehumanized, fearful lives

2 : ANTI-UTOPIA sense 2

So... the primary definition actually undercuts his thesis, while the second definition lines up. I mean it's an interesting subject of contemplation - dystopia's relationship with utopia - but he took an argumentative approach rather than a contemplative one, which I think squandered the topic a little.

Re: Dystopia Is What Results from the Attempt to Create Utopia

#85
Despite all the complaining, we're living in a utopia in the US right now. By any historical standard, life in the US is good beyond imagination.

For example, we're the fattest people on the planet, at all income levels, due to ridiculous overabundance of food. People throw away 40% of their food!

The only crisis in America is a crisis of whiners, which has reached epic proportions.

Re: Dystopia Is What Results from the Attempt to Create Utopia

#86
post #72

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Even a broken clock is right twice a day?

Which is still no good, because nobody can tell which are those two times when it's right by looking at it.

That’s the point; it’s illustrating a technicality which in no way impacts the uselessness of the clock.

Re: Dystopia Is What Results from the Attempt to Create Utopia

#87
Dystopia or utopia, both seem rooted in the idea we could ultimately shape and rule the world as we wish. I constantly see the reliance on some kind of system to somehow apply constraints to preserve order against chaos. And every time the perfect and all-powerful *topia fails in some unexpected way.

One's long life indeed benefits from a controlled environment able to consistently provide food, water, air or protection from potential dangers.

But why would society's survival works like my own? The dinosaurs didn't last but life itself did. Abilities to evolve and adapt to change or the multiplicity of methods to keep going proved themselves as some of the reliable skills to survive.

Anyway, I'm eagerly awaiting any future story of a society able to provide each one with a promising and somewhat reliable environment while managing as a whole to evolve and overcome any new challenges the universe constantly throws at us :)

Re: Dystopia Is What Results from the Attempt to Create Utopia

#88

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>this world is fallen Makes the entire article essentially meaningless. How can I trust somebody with such a bizarre and unconnected worldview?

I’m not religious myself, but I think you’re letting some weird biases get in the way here. The point is that the world and the work of human beings is flawed, fallible, and imperfect. Whether or not heaven exists in heaven, it certainly doesn’t exist on earth and essentially never can.

Even the existence of a god wouldn’t necessarily imply that a heaven could exist the way it exists in Christian theology. Frankly if you’re going to pick a religion for intellectually compelling narratives Christianity isn’t it. Gnosticism is pretty interesting, and arguably the notion of a flawed and infantile creator tracks better with both historical and various scriptural narratives. The choice of “heaven” alongside hell always struck me as an utterly naked temporal carrot and stick arrangement.

“Heaven: the Coney Island of the Christian imagination.” Elbert Hubbard.

Re: Dystopia Is What Results from the Attempt to Create Utopia

#89
post #25

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's a great way to justify all sorts of exploitation. Describing is not the same as justifying. Nature is what created us as individuals. Humanity could have been a vast society of clones (like an ant colony) but it isn't. We take all of the good and all of the bad together when we accept our individuality. primarily a positive work describing existing material conditions and relations is utopian It sounds to me l…

> Describing is not the same as justifying. Nature is what created us as individuals. We have little means of empirically separating what is natural versus social construct (or even qualifying what such a distinction means) when it comes to human behavior and society. Claiming that our nature makes inevitable that societies require some significant portion of their constituents to suffer is not simple description, it…

Claiming that our nature makes inevitable that societies require some significant portion of their constituents to suffer is not simple description, it's a conceit that, like most naturalistic fallacies, is consistently used to excuse and justify existing social order.

If you eradicate violence then those who love violence will suffer. You can't please everyone. This is not a normative claim, it's a fact of individuality. If your Utopian society is free of violence, then you must exclude people who love violence. How you accomplish this without committing violence is another matter.

you must admit the fundamental contrast to something like Moore's Utopia

I don't, actually. More was every bit a critic of his contemporary society as Marx was of his. The difference between More and Marx is that More was one of the most brilliant rhetoricians of all time. Taking the form of a Socratic dialogue, Utopia employs a pair of interlocutors, one of whom is the author himself, in order to present a critique of enclosure and the excesses of nobility that flew right over most nobles' heads. To call it "primarily concerned with describing the order of its hypothetical ideal" is to completely miss the author's point. I suggest you read it again.

Re: Dystopia Is What Results from the Attempt to Create Utopia

#90
post #78
post #75

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Useful for either the survival of the species or the individual. Still, hell for those suffering them. That's the broken part.

Which logically would mean it’s the universe that’s flawed not humans. Though, that gets into some very odd arguments. History would be rather boring in a static or cycling universe.

>Which logically would mean it’s the universe that’s flawed not humans.

Logically you can argue either way. Logically one can say the universe doesn't give a fuck, so can't be flawed any more than a rock is.

Humans however both crave unity and love and compassion and so on (and know those things for good), and also do the cheating, lying, killing, bullying, racism, and so on. So, one can justifyably call them broken.

Heck, tons of our books, movies, and songs call us just that.

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