Year 5, Day 232: Shakespeare Institute (via London) - Dystopia, Utopia, and everything In Between.

Can you visualise a dystopia?  I can.  I don't need to try either as it is the thing that wakes me up at night.  The only thing the fiction writers got wrong was that, when we get there, the 'magic' will still be in our minds, and super-heroes will not rise up to save us all.  It takes no effort at all to know that men in power have little to no imagination when it comes to the possibility of war, or famine, or all-out-destruction.  Historically, it has happened that men in power are always surprised when something goes wrong, even though it has been staring them in the face for, what feels like, their entire lives.  The rich get richer, the poor get poorer, and we all die young.

I've been fed that crap for so long, I don't even remember the first time I imagined that this world would end in my lifetime.  I don't remember when I first started thinking that it would be a good idea to train up just in case I had to fight for/ hunt my own food one day because all the markets would close forever.  It happened, but I don't remember when I started thinking it.

We, as a species, have figured out how to tell the dystopian tale.  The great war of the worlds, the Jurassic Park, the Twilight Zone, the steam-punk James Bond, a killer is on the loose and only a cheerleader can save the world,  the "Jim. With Endless Love we left you sleeping.  Now we are sleeping with you.  Don't wake up"-kind of story.  We, the artisans and dreamers, thought it up first, and the rest of the world has bought it hook, line, and help!-I'm-sinking sinker.  Why has fantasy fiction become the world that no one wants to live in, yet everyone feels is inevitable anyway?  Would you really want to live in a world with superheroes, if you were still you and only a few out there had a magical superpower?  What about a world filled with zombies?  Even that online quiz you took a year ago said you'd last only a month into a zombie apocalypse, so why would you want to imagine being there?

I liked watching I Am Legend because it was interesting for me to imagine New York City with waist-high grass, and playing golf off the end of the Intrepid (the giant aircraft carrier sitting in the waters of Manhattan).  I liked watching The Day After Tomorrow because it was interesting to imagine New York City flooded to the point where a cargo ship could float along 42nd street.  I did not like Independence Day, and did not see the sequel, and I don't enjoy watching The Last Man on Earth but I get it.  Dystopias are interesting for their composite parts, not for the reality they present.  I also get that stories, like I Am Legend, have thematic messages such as, "Live and Let Live" or "Take care of our planet" but all too often we, the artisans and dreamers, can only hear and see: "It takes a priveleged American man who can run fast and does the science-ing thing to cure zombie-ism" or "The world will just freeze up for a few years, a new Ice Age if you will, and all the world's pollution will magically disappear afterwards," or "The Postman will rise up, conquer the Tyranney [sp?], the new capital of America will be in Minneapolis, and everything will return to normal just as soon as THAT happens."

I think the trick of it is to find a way to imagine a utopia that doesn't bore you to tears.  Rock concerts and getting drunk are not the sole province of futuristic Biff Tannen and his Pleasure Paradise.  We can not go back in time, but we can imagine a time and place that would enjoy a modicum of pleasures from 1950s households without the latent racism, sexism, and laminate flooring.  (It took me until I was thirty, thinking back on the slew of words my grandfather would use when he was angry ("Of all the cotton-pickin'---") to realise exactly how ubiquitous that stuff was.)  There is a way to imagine a world better than ours where no one is waiting for the other shoe to drop, and still find the story compelling.  When did Star Trek move from finding brave new worlds and exploring new cultures to let's accidentally corrupt someone to our way of thinking and playfully court-martial the only guy who can save the world again and again?  Wars are not boring, I just don't want to live in one.  Fear is exhausting, so it is time to pick a new character trait and move on.  The focus should not be on the day to day lives of our leaders, watching the 10 Downing Street/1600 Pennsylvania Avenue show.  Imagine a world you (actually) want to live in, write the story, and bring me with you.  I want to go there.  Is it a world full of compromises and healthy discussion?  Collaboration and cooperation?  Or did you fall back into the world where Japan and Germany actually won World War II and we have to go back in time to fight the evilness?

(There can be a whole other blog post about how collaboration and cooperation are not the boring, happy concepts that conservatives might have you believe... a healthy discussion is one where you spend an hour preaching your gospel, listening for an hour to your opposition preach their gospel, agreeing on some points, disagreeing on others, changing laws/policy/insurance premiums to reflect those things agreed on, and then promise to come back next week with an open mind so that you can argue other points.  Plural thinking, an open mind, and a passionate belief system is the opposite of those that would close the borders, collect the taxes, and stand on the shoulders of their constituents, not to see farther by their great height, but rather to keep those beneath them down and down.  You must be compassionate where they are obstinate.  You must look to the quality of a man or woman, not the quantity of their wallet or liberal blog post likes.)

I will leave you with a poem written in a time of great turmoil, like this one, and that has hung on the walls of great people wishing to remind themselves that they too can spiral out of control, and maybe, just maybe, there is a moment of peace to be had if only we knew where to look for it.  It was the same year as Lindbergh made his Hop over the Atlantic, and the same year as the Great Mississippi Flood, it was nine years after the War to End All Wars, and twelve years before the Holocaust and the Nazi party decided to annex Poland:

"Go placidly amid the noise and haste, and remember what peace there may be in silence.
As far as possible, without surrender, be on good terms with all persons.
Speak your truth quietly and clearly; and listen to others,
even to the dull and ignorant; they too have their story.

Avoid loud and aggressive persons, they are vexations to the spirit.
If you compare yourself with others, you may become vain and bitter,
for always there will be greater and lesser persons than yourself.
Enjoy your achievements as well as your plans.

Keep interested in your own career, however humble;
it is a real possession in the changing fortunes of time.
Exercise caution in your business affairs, for the world is full of trickery.
But let this not blind you to what virtue there is;
many persons strive for high ideals,
and everywhere life is full of heroism.

Be yourself. Especially do not feign affection. Neither be cynical about love;
for in the face of all aridity and disenchantment it is as perennial as the grass.
Take kindly the counsel of the years, gracefully surrendering the things of youth.
Nurture strength of spirit to shield you in sudden misfortune.
But do not distress yourself with dark imaginings.
Many fears are born of fatigue and loneliness.

Beyond a wholesome discipline, be gentle with yourself.
You are a child of the universe no less than the trees and the stars;
you have a right to be here. And whether or not it is clear to you,
no doubt the universe is unfolding as it should.

Therefore be at peace with God, whatever you conceive Him to be.
And whatever your labors and aspirations, in the noisy confusion of life,
keep peace with your soul. With all its sham, drudgery and broken dreams,
it is still a beautiful world. Be cheerful. Strive to be happy." - Max Ehrmann, 1927.

"There is nothing good or bad, but thinking makes it so." - Hamlet (II.ii)

Year 5, Day 232 - Words Written: All of them.