Beyond the Veil-
The Pipedream of Utopia
While More’s sardonic Utopia playfully pits the idealized, fictional island nation of Utopia against his own less than perfect, factual English society, it takes an interesting look at how humankind has struggled to create fair and equitable societies throughout the course of history. In many ways, the utopia created by More is, in fact, a contradiction, in that giving up pride, property, and power still creates a society where all of these things are still present in thinly veiled forms.
Pride is a difficult attribute to pin down, define, or put into words because it comes in many forms. One can be proud of their kids, take pride in the work they perform, or simply be proud of the life they have built …show more content…
Once again, More details the great differences that exist in his homeland of England against the “idealized” situation that is present in Utopia. Raphael describes the Utopian people as a nation of individuals who own no tangible the land they work on or the homes they live in; these particular items are shared on a rotating basis or used for communal gatherings and purposes. While on the surface, this makes perfect sense, as a collective civilization that is ruled and governed by the same collective, they do in fact share ownership of said lands. If there was not tangible “property” ownership, the entire nation of Utopia would have to actually exist as a nomadic tribe that only occupied a particular space for a limited amount of time and then moved on to a new space. Though this could be seen as splitting hairs or taking a look at what constitutes property as too literal, membership of a society that permanently occupies one particular place or space is still a form of property ownership. While Raphael has described a place in which no one person owns land property, as a collective society, the Utopian people do still possess a sense of ownership in the very land they work, homes they rotationally live in, and communal spaces they occupy. Simply put, the subject of “property ownership” has been placed in a different context, but it still exists …show more content…
In the fictional creation of the island nation of Utopia, many of the traits that the character Raphael extolled about had all been eliminated by the Utopian society, at first blush. However, as details of how this grand society unfolded, it is evident that many still existed, only in different forms. Human tendencies towards intangible things such as pride and power still existed in the fictional land of Utopia. Instead of being outwardly set on display by its citizenry, the Utopian populous simply gave these human tendencies a different look. A denial of personal pride might have been absent, but pride in the society that one belongs to is pride nonetheless. On the same token, power still existed, albeit in a lesser form, in Utopia; instead of being born into it, as is the case with European Nobility, power was placed in the hands of elected officials. Once again, the view of what “power” is and how it manifests has just been shifted from one group to another. And finally, as far as the elimination of property ownership, while no one individual may have held land or a homestead of their own, the collective population of Utopia still brandished ownership, in that they permanently occupied, as a nation, the island known as Utopia. It is interesting to see how More used a shift in perspective and
The Pipedream of Utopia
While More’s sardonic Utopia playfully pits the idealized, fictional island nation of Utopia against his own less than perfect, factual English society, it takes an interesting look at how humankind has struggled to create fair and equitable societies throughout the course of history. In many ways, the utopia created by More is, in fact, a contradiction, in that giving up pride, property, and power still creates a society where all of these things are still present in thinly veiled forms.
Pride is a difficult attribute to pin down, define, or put into words because it comes in many forms. One can be proud of their kids, take pride in the work they perform, or simply be proud of the life they have built …show more content…
Once again, More details the great differences that exist in his homeland of England against the “idealized” situation that is present in Utopia. Raphael describes the Utopian people as a nation of individuals who own no tangible the land they work on or the homes they live in; these particular items are shared on a rotating basis or used for communal gatherings and purposes. While on the surface, this makes perfect sense, as a collective civilization that is ruled and governed by the same collective, they do in fact share ownership of said lands. If there was not tangible “property” ownership, the entire nation of Utopia would have to actually exist as a nomadic tribe that only occupied a particular space for a limited amount of time and then moved on to a new space. Though this could be seen as splitting hairs or taking a look at what constitutes property as too literal, membership of a society that permanently occupies one particular place or space is still a form of property ownership. While Raphael has described a place in which no one person owns land property, as a collective society, the Utopian people do still possess a sense of ownership in the very land they work, homes they rotationally live in, and communal spaces they occupy. Simply put, the subject of “property ownership” has been placed in a different context, but it still exists …show more content…
In the fictional creation of the island nation of Utopia, many of the traits that the character Raphael extolled about had all been eliminated by the Utopian society, at first blush. However, as details of how this grand society unfolded, it is evident that many still existed, only in different forms. Human tendencies towards intangible things such as pride and power still existed in the fictional land of Utopia. Instead of being outwardly set on display by its citizenry, the Utopian populous simply gave these human tendencies a different look. A denial of personal pride might have been absent, but pride in the society that one belongs to is pride nonetheless. On the same token, power still existed, albeit in a lesser form, in Utopia; instead of being born into it, as is the case with European Nobility, power was placed in the hands of elected officials. Once again, the view of what “power” is and how it manifests has just been shifted from one group to another. And finally, as far as the elimination of property ownership, while no one individual may have held land or a homestead of their own, the collective population of Utopia still brandished ownership, in that they permanently occupied, as a nation, the island known as Utopia. It is interesting to see how More used a shift in perspective and