Over the main entrance of the Central London Hatchery and Conditioning Centre, the words “Community, Identity, Stability” (1) stand tall. These three words are the pillars on which Aldous Huxley’s dystopia is built on. However, in this new world, these words have slightly different meanings than the reader may think. Here, community refers to the population of five castes, all of which are born from test tubes, and grow up to become worker bees in the hive. Identity, in Brave New World is not defined as “who someone is” but which caste one belongs too. Rather than individuality, conformity and conventionality are stressed. With the cooperation of the first two ideals expressed, stability can easily be achieved with the help of soma and
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Stability is seen as the most important aspect in Huxley’s society because it is believed to ensure happiness and prevent war, uprisings, advancement, and corruption. Several drastic measures are taken to secure balance in the World State. Firstly, one’s individuality is taken away at birth through extreme conditioning. The Controller mentions, “No civilization without social stability. No social stability without individual stability.” (42) By creating everyone alike, the need for competition is eliminated and the government can more easily manipulate the population. Those who, for some reason, “have gotten too self-consciously individual to fit into community-life… who’ve got independent ideas of their own…” (227) are cast off to an island where they can not disrupt the social order of the World …show more content…
As each portion of the motto serves a crucial part in creating a functional world, it seems the order of the motto has significance. While community is important in teaching the concept that everyone belongs to everyone, individuality, or the lack of it, brought on by the caste system appears to be more valuable to maintaining the greatest pillar: stability. Without stability the whole system would fail leaving a competitive and corrupt system as seen in the Alpha experiment described by Mustapha Mond. This experiment resulted in “nineteen out of twenty-two thousand being killed, the survivors unanimously petitioned the World Controllers to resume the government…” (223) Therefore, while this motto of the Word State likely comes across as ludicrous to a reader today, it achieves its purpose of creating a safe, structured and controlled environment. “Everybody’s happy now.” (75) the characters repeat throughout the novel. But when happiness is all they know, how happy can they really
Stability is seen as the most important aspect in Huxley’s society because it is believed to ensure happiness and prevent war, uprisings, advancement, and corruption. Several drastic measures are taken to secure balance in the World State. Firstly, one’s individuality is taken away at birth through extreme conditioning. The Controller mentions, “No civilization without social stability. No social stability without individual stability.” (42) By creating everyone alike, the need for competition is eliminated and the government can more easily manipulate the population. Those who, for some reason, “have gotten too self-consciously individual to fit into community-life… who’ve got independent ideas of their own…” (227) are cast off to an island where they can not disrupt the social order of the World …show more content…
As each portion of the motto serves a crucial part in creating a functional world, it seems the order of the motto has significance. While community is important in teaching the concept that everyone belongs to everyone, individuality, or the lack of it, brought on by the caste system appears to be more valuable to maintaining the greatest pillar: stability. Without stability the whole system would fail leaving a competitive and corrupt system as seen in the Alpha experiment described by Mustapha Mond. This experiment resulted in “nineteen out of twenty-two thousand being killed, the survivors unanimously petitioned the World Controllers to resume the government…” (223) Therefore, while this motto of the Word State likely comes across as ludicrous to a reader today, it achieves its purpose of creating a safe, structured and controlled environment. “Everybody’s happy now.” (75) the characters repeat throughout the novel. But when happiness is all they know, how happy can they really