93: Braver New World

Hello and welcome to classical stuff. You should know a podcast about classical education the ancient world and stuff My name is Thomas Magby My name is Thomas Magby. I'm joined as always by mr. AJ Hanenburg that is me and mr.

Graham Donaldson hi now gentlemen Think first I want to say thank you to AJ for posting last week's episode and for correctly 100% definitely the name of my child I don't want to knit like a little booties. Yeah, sure and put the name It would take so much to knit that I can't imagine being able to fit that for a long name. Okay with that Yeah, did you enjoy your your one or nearly one week? We're turning what it is and state right so we have one week.

Yeah, right? So I'm you know to thank us. Yeah, I do want you to feel like you kind of need to make an In some little extra hours here. Oh, so I do a couple extra episodes Yeah, the only thing that the that's predicted by law is the position itself.

So I thank you for an unpaid week off Oh, yeah, you're paid. You're just as much as you're usually anything You're receiving your usual So today we are going to be talking about Brave new world again, and you know, I just Isn't it wonderful that this podcast has such people in it? Let's start Yes, let's just say isn't it sort of a brave new world for you. Yeah, oh yes I'm not the same kind of brave new world that would go poorly the one of inescapable social destiny Yes, I guess that we've already planned out our child's future life.

Oh, yeah doctor doctor slash lawyer slash teacher And well obviously be classical classically educated so has to get a PhD in classics to you know doctor I'm a little bit as well. So yeah, yeah, so we are so on our first when we talk about brave world before we I meant more made Painted the picture of the world that Huxley had created a little bit of background on Huxley some of which listeners pointed out was incorrect Which is always great. I don't mean that's our class at the low sound I love getting those emails, but yeah Things like Huxley's grandfather wasn't actually on the ship with Darwin, but was a huge Darwin champion So that I mean I had just I had made that mistake my whole life. So that's that's good.

Well, he made the best away Come at me His grandfather was on what was the name of the boat Obviously, it's like the walking fish was on the beagle convinced me other Why sit in the middle of campus like all those videos that are telling you that it doesn't exist. Yeah, that's an internet thing That's the thing else really doesn't exist. Yeah, I've never seen it This was a lot of the students like to make fun of them anyway It's a whole line of videos. I don't recommend any of them.

Please pretend I've never seen a baby seagull or baby pigeon anyway, whatever What you're right? So We just a little bit of world building and I in the podcast I said we're not really gonna get to the story We're not really gonna get to the story but for this we are gonna talk a little bit about the story and these characters that are in the world and And then sort of draw what I think are some of the big and interesting themes or some of the ways that I go about teaching this book so If you if you are this is your first time listening to the podcast I would suggest stopping this right now and go and if you want to listen about Brave New World go and listen to the first podcast on the Brave New World And then come back and do this one because I'm gonna assume that listeners have a working knowledge of the world that we talked about And is there another podcast that did an episode we were notified about another rival podcast? Yes Just be clear are they they're rival only because they are also a podcast. Oh definitely yes So you're a member take all I've started I don't think that's how that works.

I've started carrying weapons just in case I meet them in the fields and I can start snapping Yes, and so they're apparently in the literature literary podcast landscape brave Hoxley is having a renaissance and we are in inadvertently a part of it Any of us listen to this I have we we were notified of and then Hanenburg and I were at the SC Society of Classical Learning Conference this week and you were domestic bliss SEL please accept our application This is the second year that we have been rejected for SEL. Let's let's keep it going keep on rejecting We'll try and be tradition every year we'll lie and you'll reject it. Okay. Okay I don't I assume we want to name so anyone wants to listen up so that's history in reverse It's the name of the podcast and sorry we have nothing to say about it because we will listen to it But anyway if you are history and reverse listening keep on working backwards.

I don't know or watch your back Yeah, just from Hanenburg. It's gonna be clear. I'm a pacifist P. 11 Canadian Anyway, unless we're on the ice So aren't you always on the ice?

So the story starts with painting the picture of this world There is this a gentleman He is taking a school group of alphas little bait little alpha kids or alpha younglings off to the Department of Catcheries And he's showing them how all these various children are bottled and born and they're having to write down notes because they're gonna have tests When they get home and this sort of sort of good as good world building next position exposition exposition For the reader to know sort of what's going on But then when the story gets into swing we're sort of introduced to three characters and these three characters all kind of have a Weird sort of feeling that the things are really perfect So let's start with the character of Bernard so and these are all Bernard Marx is An alpha and he has some sort of pencil pushing white collar job as an alpha. I can't remember quite what it is It's not the other guy. No, that's him holds he has some sort of administrative job There's an alpha wasn't he like an alpha minus no, he's an alpha and he should be like a pure alpha not an alpha plus But there's something about him that either during his his you know time in the in the hatchery or whatnot There was something he is a couple of inches and he's like an inch or two shorter than everybody else now All of the alphas are bred to the same height Baiters are a little bit shorter gamas delts is epsilon's are shorter and going down So you have this visual hierarchy into the system whatever happened to Bernard people whisper and say oh I think a little bit of alcohol spilled into his blood serum when he was going along the conveyor belt or whatnot So somebody was you know having a little a little GT on the job and and spilled it into the embryo But he he still gets to be alpha plus even though he's slightly shorter. Yes, so So this world isn't so clinical that every imperfection is completely dealt done away with but he sort of has lived with a little bit of a Social statement everyone is like oh Bernard, you know, he's sort of a little bit of the outsider and he's felt it He's got a little bit of an opponent like rest their elbows on his head all the time Yeah, I need to highlight that that that's high difference is not in feet.

It's pretty minimal It's like an inches if it may even just be like one or two inches. It's not big But it's enough that with everybody being a uniform height He sort of feels inferior and so that's given a bit of a chip on his shoulder and he's kind of grown up and you know sort of developed into someone has a little bit of an outsider mentality he and One of the things he absolutely hates or does not like taking is he doesn't like to take soma He doesn't like to take it and feel kind of inauthentic and fake There's many times that he sort of makes references to the fact that That by taking so much. He's yeah, he's lacking authenticity now this kind of makes sense with him being you know Shorten and you know grumpy about it that he sort of he he craves some sort of real authenticity and and real connection with People because he's always sort of feeling like everybody's like oh, hey shorty every time that they hang out So so he's got this little bit of a chip on a shoulder He doesn't just want to like deal with it by taking so much so that's Bernard He is not a very I mean he's very sympathetic at the beginning of the book But he turns into a bit of a twit as the book goes on and the seeds of his twit twitness his Twitter Oh wait, that's a different hit Twitter. Yes Is evident in in sort of these early chapters, okay?

So there's Bernard then there is Linina Linina named after Lenin all these characters are named after a basic like centralized planners and communists and socialists We have marks we have Lenin we've got There's a there's a Mussolini in there somewhere I think Pasta is actually doing this as a criticism of those people I think he's just saying that like or this is just as they look back in history and they think about like who are the names that we Want to emulate it's these people that thought about strong central organization like how we look back and say I'm gonna name my kid Joshua or I'm gonna make my kid Ezekiel or whatever I just wonder about it because so Ford is their god Henry's yeah I'm saying like so if capitalists are very highly praised but then also these centralize planners are highly pretty It's not just that he's a capitalist it's that he's an inventor of the assembly line and that that's sort of more of it Okay, so there's Linina and she's a beta But she's one of those betas who has not been sterilized and who can bear children As Huxley points out that the women who are sterilized tend to somewhat develop a little more on the masculine side As they develop and those who not not greatly like it's not a grotesque thing But he is saying that those that have not been sterilized generally have more of this like sexual attractiveness to them And Linina is one of these and as a beta She is very highly sought after all of the alpha and beta Citizens and so she has been dating it's not even dating it's just essentially going on dates and sleeping around with many many men over the course of her life and She at the beginning of the book Confesses to her friend the delightfully named Fanny And I think definitely that Huxley is is thinking like Fanny like your bum because Again sort of this this this sexualization is sort of play for me a T H no no with it with an F not Fanny like like like Thanos That's what I heard Anyway, so again you even see this Sort of the sexualization or the sort of the infantile is of the whole thing even baked into some of these characters names and Dispositions and what anyway? So Linina is like man She's just not feeling the dating very many people think and she has been seeing this guy named Henry for a month exclusively I know and Fanny is like like girl. That's not good. That is unhealthy This is and then she's like why are you doing this?

So we I guess we're in the brave new world in 1984 being tied or related So there's no fear of someone coming in and imposing something on her is there no Is there any threat to her if she stays in this relationship? There isn't there isn't at the same kind of threat of 1984, but there's more just generally like a concerned friend saying Oh, like this is this is not good for your for your health Right for her to just sleep or to yeah, be committed to one person for longer than like a night. Yes, not okay Yeah, so it's less like you know the the big black boots are gonna come in and drag you off if you don't conform to social norms But it's more oh, this is not healthy for you, and I'm concerned for you as a friend It's so baked into their development that you know, yeah We hang out with one person for too long gets in all sorts of emotional trouble and you're not sharing yourself with everyone else and having Kids to have yeah, and although there is a system in place of those who can't really fit into the system There is a place where to ship them off to and we'll get to that at the end of the book So lina has been seeing Henry and she says essentially that she just can't really quite put her finger on why but just sort of feels like She wants something a little more special than just running off to bed with the first person that she or the next person in line And she doesn't really know why and then but she just wants to spend more time with Henry She started developing and as we as outside readers are like yeah, she's developing feelings obviously For him she's she's starting to fall for him and fanny's like you know girl you gotta get over this girl You gotta you know find some other some other dude, so she's kind of you know feeling a little weird feeling like everything's just not Working for him. I knew we have the character of him holds and him holds is an alpha plus he is the top of the top He is handsome.

He's tall. He's smart. He's accomplished. He has a great career He has this mixture of what would be considered like an academic position But the academic position is not something to do with with learning it's something to do with advertising So I mean he's he's a persuader Psychology persuasion he writes jingles he comes up with with sentences that get stuck in your brain and he's one of the people that writes the things That when you go to sleep at night That plays in your pillow and you remember it and then and then it sort of helps determine or condition your actions But it's not that he's working in Madison Avenue It's just they talk about it He's more in what we would consider more of like the Oxford setting but it has nothing to do with knowledge has everything to do with With sort of the advertising so and Bernard and Hamilton bodies and Bernard comes to him holds and they start talking and Hemmelt says you know I'm the best at what I do but I'm Hemmelt says man.

I'm just kind of sick of like all these girls wanting throwing themselves at me I'm Bernard's like Bernard who's a little bit shorter and has not not really experienced girls throwing themselves at him It's like oh my child. I'm so sad for you. I got one thing to say in And so Bernard's like uh-huh and and Hemmelt is like and I love writing I love coming up with these sayings he says that Where when I put these sentences together I just love seeing it hit somebody and go inside somebody like an x-ray Or like they just sat on a pin that these words have this effect on people and he says but you know what's good But I'm just writing about like crap like I'm just writing about average, you know advertising things and and nothing's really Meaningfully says I wish I could write something Well here, let me let me just read to the book what he says Hemmelt says do you ever feel he asked as though you had something inside you that was only waiting for you to give it a chance to come out Some sort of extra power that you aren't using you know like all the water that goes down the falls instead of the turbines He looked at Bernard questionly you mean all the emotions one might be feeling of things were different Which is a very Bernard answer and I'm hope Striches said not quite I'm thinking of a queer feeling I sometimes get a feeling that I've got something important to say and the power to say it only I don't know what it is and I can't make any use of the power If there was some different way of writing or else something else to write about he was silent then you see he went on at last I'm pretty good at inventing phrases, you know the sort of words that suddenly make you jump almost as though you'd sat on a Pin they seem so new and exciting even though they're about something hypnotically obvious That doesn't seem enough. It's not enough for the phrases to be good what you make with them ought to be good too, and he goes on to say But what on earth's the good of being pure spine article about these sort of inane silly things Besides can you make words really piercing like the very hardest x-rays when you're writing about this that sort of thing Can you say something about nothing?

That's what it finally boils down to so Hemmeltz has the capacity or the gift of being able to turn a phrase or to be able to He knows that he can say something that affects people he has rhetorical skill, but he has no content He has no grammar. He has nothing important to talk about He has all the skills to say something important and nothing important to talk about all he has is just like you know Buy this car or whatever he will eventually say something though. We'll eventually say something so this is the beginning So these are the characters and this is their problems is there so we talked last time about how the lower tears lower cast Whatever is they are hindered in some way. Yeah, I'll call or whatever So are the other pluses just like a regularly developed human?

Yes, and I think that so they're regularly developed and the pluses I don't think coming any sort of cognitive ability but come in like physical appearance and They don't really address how different the alpha pluses are from the alphas But they're just going to be a little bit of a height and a little bit of like even if you want to think of British society Like an airstalker seat kind of thing. Are they also sort of selected as the genetically superior specimens? I think so. Are they all like attractive?

Yeah, they are muscular and tall and so I guess yeah This is why we will never ever videotape an episode because then we could be wrong because we gotta be like mah Yeah, like we're you know, we're just eating like bags of grease and sitting and waiting pools Anyway, so so these are the three characters and then so when you when I teach this I say okay We sort of diagnosed the study these characters and when as we sort of peel across the layers We say it's sort of what's really bothering them and eventually the students get to some sort of answer by saying They want human things that this society doesn't provide anymore So we're like the human what are these sort of natural human things that they want that this society has kind of bread out of the Okay, so well Yeah, Lina wants when Lina wants meaningful relationships somebody to love somebody to share her experiences and her life with and Maybe that translates into family as well, but at least Although she wouldn't put it in these words somebody who cares for her and nobody else you know somebody who loves her and not Others care for yes and someone to care for someone to cherish and to be cherished by which I think is a very You know that is a very human need Loneliness is one of them. You know a terrible a terrible thing if you're feeling like there isn't no one you care for and no one who cares for you Lina yes wants to be cherished and want someone to cherish. Okay, what about Bernard? He's a little harder Is it is it capacity for advancement has he been has even naturally yeah stunted so he can never he can never prove himself He can never advance he can never because he is an alpha and maybe a lesser one he can never make alpa plus I think so I mean as part of that There's also he wants to be seen as Sort of important in the eyes of others and that becomes very bastard I'm terrible later on the book because when he comes back and has a sort of trophy everyone's like whoo And are you so smart and he gets all this praise from not he gets what he wants and it's bad for him He becomes a terrible he comes a jerk bag But there's okay, so he becomes a jerk bag He wants recognition and praise in the eyes of others because he's been teased his whole life Well, there's got to be a good desire behind that kind of ugly human You can call it self realization or potential yeah or desire to be part of the community wanting to be Like honor yeah, I think respect is it and then he falls in the same pitfall that many people fall into is that he wants respect without being respectable Without having to be respectable.

Yeah, okay, and then him Holtz is probably one of the easier ones to point out What is him Holt sort of mean me board meaningful work creativity? The man's a poet the man is an artist the man wants to he wants to do what he means do which is to express oneself beautifully He wants purpose some sort of actual purpose beyond just and it doesn't and he doesn't feel rewarded when he's the highest paid Adman or the highest paid word worker in the industry. It's like being the fastest swimmer across the kiddie pool Yeah, maybe fastest the bag agrees So yeah, so he he wants I mean the kind of thing that like what? Why do our students?

You know learning spend all these hours trying to play learn how to play guitar or what drives So what drives all those communities of people to like curate Wikipedia? They're not getting paid there There's this idea of like of purpose meaningful work maybe even legacy I'm adding value to the world and he thinks that what he's wasting his light on valueless things Okay, so there are these three characters, but they're not they're not like appealing their life for this This is just a little knowing dissatisfaction that they have in the back of their minds Okay, any sense that other people feel this or do we only know that we really get these characters insight There's plenty of other characters who are like sort of glassy eyed like everything is awesome and then you know And just talk about like how great everything is today. They're bought in their body cool. It's cool.

It's cool. It's just the ready to go Okay so a couple of things so then Bernard so Linina takes Fanny's advice and decides that she is going to go on a date with somebody else and To kind of like stick it till these other boys that are all these like handsome boys that are vying for attention She decides to go on a date with Bernard little awkward weird Bernard And Bernard is excited because Lena is attractive and is you know all the boys want her Yeah, and Bernard gets a little bit of reflected respect from his mom. He thinks his respect He gets a little bit of that a feeling of I people want what I've got now, but it's Lena and that's a terrible thing Nobody whenever you see like I don't know when someone drives a fancy car Everyone driving a fancy car says everybody wishes they were me But everybody see the cars like man I want that car and doesn't even think about the person driving the car anyway Not to compare Lena to a car Well, I am because that's what how this world is set up Which is a terrible thing is that women are these objects to be one and to be and to be conquered and That is and I always talk like is that any does that ring true today kids? And they're like oh you're getting me of course it does and and by seeing it in this extreme way They are sort of maybe even for the first time awakened to kind of how dehumanizing and terrible that is okay so we're not really going to go on the state and So they go on their date and it's really hilarious they get their helicopter and they go to Amsterdam and they watch a lady wrestling competition I don't know why Huxley thought that was what we would do in the future but there we go Maybe because it's it's kind of like I don't know we have lady wrestling now.

I was gonna say was WWE big in the Huxley's time like yes I think it was something he thought would be scandalous a scandalous thing to watch and we're like we have that anyway And then Bernard is taking Lena home And he stops the helicopter over the English channel and he hovers it there and he turns off the radio And there's a storm sort of coming on the horizon and he just sort of hovers there in the silence He's like let's just sit here and hover in silence and just Bernard is doing what you should never do in a date We just try like manufacture a moment and he's trying to like really connect with Lena And Lena is freaked out. It's weird, but now it's like let's just listen to the silence. I don't want to talk I I just want to like I just want to exist in this moment without everybody around us. No, what he's watching us It's just us Lena who has been bred like everybody else to distrust and hate silence is very uncomfortable without in without any distraction She immediately turns on the radio She's needs to have something distracting her and she doesn't want to have this moment with Bernard And she doesn't want to have some sort of conversation and she sort of saying like are we gonna hurry home and like go sleep together Because that's what happens at the end of dates and he kind of gets upset He's like really like we're just gonna we're just gonna do that like everybody else We're just gonna and he has a speech where he says we're just gonna like jump into bed together like kids Which is weird saying but what he's getting at is is we're just going to Angel's ourselves like we like like we sort of been trained to do in their world children are encouraged to engage in that Exactly that's messed up, but when he says like kids in their world, that's actually a thing But he's also feeling like there's a He's got this intuition that there's an immaturity to it or that there he sort of has these glimpses that glimpses that delayed gratification is maybe a good thing And whether there's maybe something more to a relationship.

Yes, just jump in yeah And then when he is like I don't know Are you just happening or not? And he's like fine and he and he takes so much off the go and some more Okay, and then they're gonna go on another So is Lina actually wants that family connection that you just talked about they didn't she just rejected she is there's sort of hints that she's doing this also to see if Henry gets jealous I think yeah, she's not really interested in Bernard And she's kind of like her friend got her head all twisted around saying that she was unhealthy and hanging out with Henry so often Should we talk about I don't I feel like we probably should talk about orgy porgy Because it's play such a big role at the end of the book. I have to we kind of have to okay, so Should we give a yeah, we should be a little bit of a disclaimer I mean if you've been like much I'll just fine so far then I mean keep going I guess but yeah But you might want to if you've got kids are sensitive ears in the car this next little bit is a little is a little pretty sensitive so Some people have talked about this book as that there's no need for religion I don't think that's necessarily true There's a character at the end of the book that says there's no need for heaven or God or sin or or or the idea of like Need to reward ourselves by virtuous living for the reward of heaven But there is still as far as Hoxley seems to be concerned a need for communal liturgical practices as in as religious expression And he has this in the world as basically the world's worst Bible study. Yeah It's called the it's called the solidarity service and six men and six women are put together We don't really know how but they go to essentially a church building or they go to some sort of community church center and They are they go through liturgical service they go through through service and Hoxley is obviously thinking of you know Church of England and Catholicism as he serves structures of service and has elements of that I'll describe the service and then I'll talk a little bit about why I think Hoxley has this in in the story in their lives Like their condition at life and at birth.

Why do you need to have a religious service? What sort of service service does it serve purpose as a serve so six men and six women the twelve apostles Come together and they chant and they sing songs basically about How together we meld into one another and our individuality is is is put together into a unified one And they use like in dust room metaphors about metals being melded together to make steel and and water certain drops of water slipping into one Ocean and I sort of we drink to our annihilation It's this idea of the individuality is stripped away and we are all we're all one you guys we're all we're all the universes love We're all that's not your way of preventing maybe conflicting worldviews if someone has a different view out there This sort of draws them all back together it gives them something to believe in yeah Also blunts the edge of individual right so what they do is then they what they don't really realize is that Liquified so you know aerosol so much being pumped into the room so they're getting sort of high on the soma they pass around The Eucharist but instead of being bread and wine it is a strawberry milkshake and cake or something or some away first and you know very Indulgent in there what they eat and they eat this they drink this eat this cake and drink this strawberry soda laced with soma And then everybody is sort of all hopped up and all feeling great And then someone yells out is sort of this fever pitch of emotion the music is getting more intense people that chanting gets more intense It's almost sort of tribalistic and then there's this great emotional release and this great sort of physical release and it's it gets to this You fork pitch and they yell orgy porgy and then it is insinuated that they all sleep together But there is a sort of a six-man the six women have well you know what the word means And then and then it's done and then the passions have been quelled and the high emotions have been exercised and everyone's sort of like okay Oh man, that's like it's feel like we just had some real good community We're just doing life together, you know like and everybody goes life together and every and every I know I'm trying to be I'm Tensionally using the sort of language right using church show why I think Huxley's doing this and so they have this this grotesque and terrible Ritual and then off they go back to their regular lives and it's sort of you know marks their week Okay, so it's like it is functioning as a church service for them and Huxley is I Definitely a member of the school that Looked at the anthropology of religion and what went sort of as a himself not a not a If you believed in God, I don't think he I don't think he did but but saw religious expression as sort of this weird anthropological thing and studied it and he probably takes a similar kind of view as many Psychologists stuff his day that religious expression is Just sort of this natural human expression that helps give people order and meaning to their lives regardless of whether or not it's true So you can swap out you don't need the God part of it. You don't need Jesus You don't need God you just sort of need to have some you see have a regular meaning of people who are Holding up values that are good for the community the values being solidarity and not unselfishness and working together And if someone if they believe it fine if they don't believe it, but it actually sort of like gets him through the week That's great. I'm reminded of sort of when Jordan Peterson is asked do you actually do believe in God?

He says I act as if I do Because you get all these he serves as you get sort of these psychic benefits you get this Those are these benefits that come to help give meaning in order to an an organization to your life and whether or not he exists or not It's kind of secondary. What's primary is is the sort of framework to live and I think Huxley is is that's why he's given the more G-Porgi is here's another hero is in kind of the same book. Oh gosh here is not the same boat He's he's a he's a fold about Jewish, but if you ever ask like what is God his view on God is is less than than Then the old scriptures. Oh, I know his views on who God actually is closer to the edges of then what he is about Yeah, I know that sort of this cycle this cycle analysis of religion and religious expression is having a moment now precisely because of Peterson And so I bought to the 12 rules.

I bought this I'm gonna read it. I'm gonna see what's all the hype is about Anyway, cool. We should probably we should talk about for a few minutes I think he has what we would call a Christian worldview, but it is not require belief in Christ. Yeah, him and there's another Is he Serbian?

What you know, I don't know Or compelling. Oh, you know, I'm not a social needs and no, not so I'm talking about a modern He's a Serbian or Polish. I mean I can't remember his name But he is there also someone that says I love reading Chesterton and Tolkien and Lewis and you can only understand paganism if you're a Christian But he's not Also Anyway, so this is you see a 4G porgy and it's again another tool of control and it sort of helps blunt the edges of any kind of feeling of Individualism or outside earnest and that's that's a threat to the system Bernard hates our G porgy Okay, story moves on that we hear about that from his perspective right where he's like he doesn't want to be a part of it But he has it because he feels like he sort of has like something courage him Yeah, we got like a social responsibility to do it or if you don't come there's only 11 and people are gonna be like Amen, we're gonna see a church on Sunday is everything okay, and you know, it's not kind of thing. That's a social reinforcement Yeah, okay So Bernard and Nina are continuing their dating experience and they decide to take a road trip together or a helicopter trip And they go off to they're gonna go off and they're gonna go primitive.

They're gonna go an experience essentially a zoo But it's not a zoo of animals. It's a zoo of people so they fly off to me, Mexico and in He just picked a state. Yeah, do we know where they're located where Lena marks like the civilization is located It's I mean, it's in this it's in this made-up place called New Mexico. No, no you said New Mexico's where they're going for the primitives Yeah, well, where are they coming from?

Oh, they're coming from London London. Yeah, he picks the United States That's where that's where he has a lot of money. He picks the United States. Yeah, I know this new way I know this new Mexico is in the United States because we have a new Mexico What's happening right there's a new Mexico?

Yeah, you really know what I'm gonna say What is happening right now? We have a new Mexico. I think it's funny who pick that the people's you is the new And so then they go and it's a tribe of people that exist, you know without outside of this brave new world outside of this Conditionings people that live like a tribe and it's a very primitive tribe and it's it's the ways It's it's sort of described the way that you would consider primitive tribes to be to be structured It's a proverb. It seems impoverished outsiders.

It's got a hierarchical hierarchical structure There are families women are revered for their for what they bring in terms of their femininity to the group the men are Revered for what they bring in terms of masculinity to the group You know, it's a tribe Lineena Bernard are horrified because I've never seen old people before right because everybody doesn't age in this brave old people or a lot of Disease that's easy They're just sort of like her writing teeth and that kind of thing yeah, and they're they're grossed out because there are babies Like attached to moms and so they're running teeth No, but this is the right world. I'm just I'm just getting them back for picking in the US as the That Brits so they go to this and they witness a religious service in this tribe and what happens is it's there's some sort of There is the threat to the tribe as sort of symbolized by these snakes There is a sacrifice for the tribe as symbolized by one of the young men of the tribe the young man whips himself and draws blood and then members of the tribe whip him and draw his blood and then his blood is dipped in white feathers and then the White feathers are painted on the snakes and then the snakes are burned and then the man is carried off as a hero and it's unclear As to whether or not he lives or dies. I read it a bunch of times I still can't remember if he's actually killed for the tribe or if it's just a prestige But anyway, the symbolism is kind of clear like you know one person coming in and their blood is sacrificing themselves for our wholeness of the tribe Similar themes going on in both of these religious services But with different with different things in one someone is sacrificing willingly their individuality for the tribe and the other one Someone is being almost stripped of their individuality for the social cohesion of the group All right, and then as they're there this handsome young man who does not look like he is of the same Sort of ethnic makeup of the tribe members comes forward crying and everybody in the tribe is sort of like I'm gonna get out of here you weirdo and he comes and he sees La Bernard and lo and behold he can speak English and And Bernard and Lena his name is John and Bernard and Lena are like who the heck are you and Lena is like hot dang John is attractive and John tells his very sad story So John's sad story is that he is from this brave new world that you wouldn't that you and Lena come from my mother is from there And lo and behold There's a story where this mother her name was Linda and her lover did the very same thing that Bernard and Lena did They went off on vacation Linda was also someone who could bear children and while in vacation She lost her little belt with the pill on it and got pregnant Did know she was pregnant and then she got lost on one of these trips and was lost in the desert and her her date Was like oh my god She's dead and went home to London and she pregnant was lost in the desert and was taken in by this tribe She gives birth to John and the tribe is like He's not one of us and Linda proceeds to live the way Linda does so Linda tries to sleep with everybody in the tribe Linda really wants Soma There is no Soma but the next best alternative is this alcoholic beverage that she indulges in she hates being part of this tribe because she's now a mother Which is you know Terrible thing a shocking thing a disgusting thing. She's done the worst thing that can be done is because to give birth to a human Remember right doesn't doesn't she sort of long for the distractions of the city like she wants magazines Yeah, she misses magazines.

She misses civilization you guys she misses sports and magazines and so I can just have a s Magazine yeah, I'd be happy but no she has this kid who like is weirdly affectionate to her and she has these discerned inner turmoil Where she loves feels loves him, but is disgusted by him because he has everything he has turned her into this thing that you know It's disgusting the mother and then she tries to sleep with everybody and everybody in the tribe, you know It's like whoa, so many all the boys come to John like your mom is not cool or cool And Of course John is an outsider and John wants to win in the tribe how do they feel about it? Yeah, they throw rocks at John whenever he's around he wants to be part of the group so he tells a sad story his growing up He wants to be my mom because she's not trying to sleep Exactly John wants to marry somebody in the tribe one day can't get married she married somebody else and he feels this great loss And his mom's like oh, Maron's like Maron's just so like oh Savage yeah, and John is feels this loss John wants to be initiated into manhood like all the other men and go into the cave and do whatever their sacred ritual is to be to Emerges man, but they won't let him so he is he is un unmanned he has he has not initiated into into the tribe and And there's no sort of work There's no one who service taking him under his wing and training him John is not completely ignorant of the world as a young boy He found in a garbage heap two books one a book that was like an instruction manual for like a toaster or something And he like learned he learned some basic mechanical things by reading this manual the other book that he found was the complete works of Shakespeare And he read the complete works of Shakespeare and this ended up create being for him his moral and human and worldview shaping framework So when his when he tried to kill his uncle then his mom was sleeping with this guy named pope John hated pope because he felt like he was disrespecting and besmirching and and his mother and that they were living in sin And so when he read hamlet about King Claudius sleeping with Gertrude and he was like ooh that you know Wasting away in their inseemed bed gross John's like oh, I know what that feels like I know how that I know what I know What's feeling right now and all these feelings of wanting to be involved? He feels like a fellow an outsider I'm a fellow is probably the most like noble honorable Shakespeare hero and and he is Suspective crimes because of his because he's African and so John sort of feels the same thing because he is not of the tribe He sort of sympathizes with a fellow He meets and then with someone John sees Lina he is sort of inflamed with a new love for her He lost this first girl to a tribe, but he sees her and he's like oh man She is cute and so then I'm gonna say pneumatic yes And so then Romeo and Juliet floods into his mind and that she burns like a torch She teaches a torch is to burn bright it seems she hangs upon the cheek of night like a rich jewel underneath the ope's here Like these things pop into his mind. They won't take a lesson of Romeo and Juliet.

They'd be like So John says listen, I have no anchor here I have no feeling here Linda's like can we take me home? I'm gonna get out of here and John says well Yes, I want to come and I want to meet my father and go and find my place this place My mom keeps telling me that I would be happy if I was home And I want to go home and they're like fine cool And Bernard's like everyone's gonna love this guy So they take John home and John and it's immediately turns into like a Pocahontas story or like what's the other? In the 19th century colonialism They would you know bring these oddities home to England and show the king and queen like look this is a princess of India I'm like oh wow so weird And you know these terrible these terrible stories and there's a similar thing going on where John is paraded around You know the upper crust and they ask him questions like you savage have a father and he's like yes Oh how gross whoa savages are they fascinating right and That father is like one of them yes They get to that no and then Bernard is welcome into all these like high society parties because he's the guy that brought the savage That is like the you know specimen of the hour He's the gatekeeper. He's the gatekeeper.

Yes. He's a gatekeeper to I get the feeling if they wanted if they could have just John They would have just John mm-hmm. I'm but I know knows it which makes me even meaner but anyway, and then John gets to meet his father and his father is one of the directors of the hatcheries and when John sees him he is father's getting a tour and Linda comes waddling in she's like do you remember me but she's all like Yeah, and yeah, and and and John comes in he's like father How I've missed you and then the dad runs out horrified and not interested everyone sort of insinuates he's gonna lose his job Or he's just gonna be seen as like whoa that guy's got a weird past is he right to be giving tours to children if he is this kind of miscreant so And then John is devastated Linda sorry Linina feels her affections growing for John and also John refuses to sleep with her They go on a couple of dates at the end he's like good night and goes upstairs and then is like Because it cheapens it right for him he idolizes her and if she just pops right in the bed with him That's right because that's what his mom was doing and he doesn't see that is he sees that as like He's a So she would be reduced in his eyes and he'll want to do that and the honorable the honorable Virginal woman. I mean he's thinking of of what's her name in Which is the one where like they love each other but they always hate it But they always are mean to each other is it any other should know not to is it much to do about nothing great?

Yeah, there it is I think he's thinking of like you know the honorable women the virtuous of virginal women who you know Don't hold themselves cheaply and he thinks Linina's like that and then and then okay, so John is being toured around and as he sees the way that this Civilized society works he is horrifying. He hates it He goes when he is taken on a tour the Department of Hatcheries and this is how children are born He he is sick violently behind a dumpster. He just he is horrifying to him it all comes to a head when Linina can no longer control herself and he and she basically on a date strips off all of her clothes and she's like John this is happening and John and not having been Realizing that the world is not what he thought it was and is in a bad place emotionally frees out at Linina and calls her very very mean names regarding her chastity and It's almost violent with her and Linna is terrified and lost herself in a bathroom and John's idea of that this woman was supposed to be this virtuous Beauty this virginal virtuous beauty is in fact in his eyes a harlot He is very much like his mother he is enraged and he is horrified and the situation is only Diffused when he gets a call from the hospital saying that Linda is dying And so he goes off to the hospital and he's by his mother which is like he comes and he's like where is she she's dying And everyone's like why do you care? He's like he's my mom.

I was like whoa gross And he goes and he's by her and Linda's always been Uncomfortable with displays of affection of son to mother because it reminds her of this sort of the gross Relationship of what she thinks is a terrible relationship But she's also happy that he's there meanwhile She is on so much so much that she doesn't even think straight right and so John is there next to his dying mother And she is on so much and she and and he says mom do you know that it's me? Do you realize that she's like John and he's like yes, and she's like go away And then she starts calling out Pope is name in sort of organic ecstasy and the the The soma drug is where is giving her this sort of ecstatic almost like Sexual experience subconsciously in her mind and she feels she thinks that she is with pope and as she's dying her last words are everybody belongs To everybody and then dies and this is John next to her being basically told by his mom to go away because she's with her You know with her lover in her mind and he frees out or he is so sad and then it turns out that there's another two A group of bunch of little kids going through the hospital and the kids like oh, she's ugly she dead and then John loses his mind and smacks the kid and he starts crying and then there's this whole big hullabaloo Where basically? John kind of goes nuts and he starts thrashing destroying everything and then he sees someone coming with Soamitablets to give to the workers because it's their payment and he like throws a somatablet self the window and he's like workers unite Throw off your chains You don't need to live in the system of hierarchy and and abuse and they're like dude That's my soul may throw the window and it gets into such a big he gets into such a big tizzy that the police have to come and he's subdued with soma with a soma gas and The savages lost his mind and everyone's like man Dangerous animal civilization All right Hema meanwhile John and Hema Holtz have been talking member Hema Holtz the poet and John showed him Shakespeare and Hema Holtz is like man This is good stuff except about all that mother father and like people falling in love and wanting to be a getter crap No, this isn't what I'm looking for. I'm looking for something real not not this sad trash and John's like well crap This is the best thing about you know this is Shakespeare and Hema Holtz is like no That's the only thing it's Shakespeare toaster and so yeah I don't know the character but the tragedy is that the conditioning and Hema Holtz is so strong that when Shakespeare is given to him He can't shake his conditioning and he sees it as sad because he sees it as kind of gross in body because it's talking about moms and dads And lovers he can't shake it.

Yeah Yep, very piercing Thanks for joining in I appreciate that. Okay, so then so that's that's sort of a non-star so Hema's like no I'm looking for something else not Shakespeare. I want real I want real art Okay And then so Bernard is responsible for this whole thing John is like I want out of here Hema Holtz is realizing that he thinks he wants he's not he wants to maybe go off and and Anyway, so they're called in front to the world in front of this guy called the world controller And he's kind of the top of the hierarchy and I'm not going to go into the conversation because it is definitely the high point of the book It is the world controller gives a speech and a in a defense of their world that is as I think rich and interesting as the grand inquisitor narrative in Dostoevsky's brother's karamazov and I Say it's similar to that because like the grand inquisitor You can kind of read this this conversation in isolation from the rest of the story and find interesting Basically what the world controller says is if God exists we don't need him because we have everybody's happy now We don't need sin or virtue because everybody has all of the things that they would ever want We have got rid of the things that made us miserable like families and and passions like high passions They made us miserable because they created conflict. We don't need conflict We we've given everybody sort of their bodily desires and if anybody wants more than that They're just not going to fit in here and we're in and they should leave So the world controller is like you know if God exists it doesn't matter We don't need him we have Christianity without the tears is what he says in other words He says we have the kingdom of heaven without Christ salvation or virtue or sanctification But you know it's a kingdom of heaven that all these characters Are not are unhappy with it's not driving with their human nature's or whatnot Anyway, so ham holds his ham holds takes the package and he says i'm gonna leave and he goes off and and he's going to try to seek after This art himself on I think he goes to the falcos he goes to like some sort of I said the falcos are Iceland He goes to some sort of desolate place to try to um to try to uh, uh, uh, uh, seek after this art himself Bernard is sent Iceland to one of these communities.

Um, he's sort of committed too many Infractions and he's sort of been on a shortly shiny way because he's so short Um, thank you. Thank you. Well done. So, um, did the proving looks at grand shortly She's been on a short leash because of how tall he is and um, so they don't like him And they sort of see him suspiciously so off he goes kicking and screaming and it's very sad and it's very pathetic And then john's like can I go these islands?

I went out of this world and like nobody You're so cool. Everyone thinks you're so fascinating You guys stick around and like you know entertain us because you're so such an oddity and john's like well not to you guys i'm out He goes off and he lives by himself in the woods and he tries to live this hermetic lifestyle He grows his own food. He builds his own little house and he is by himself. Um, he writes Walden pond Yes, and but he is again searching for meaning want some something meaningful the whole anina episode has scarred him And he wants he needs some sort of spiritual output like everything is welling up inside of him And he has he has no home.

He has no place. He has no people he has no purpose And he doesn't know how to express this he takes to whipping himself He takes to trying to create some sort of elaborate system of rituals to uh to give his life some sort of meaning But he can't do it by himself. Um, a filmmaker Finds him in the woods and sees him one day whipping himself and sees him in his sort of ritualistic life Of this hermit wanting to be left alone seeking seeking is you know, it's very much like the her the desert Permits of early christianity going off to the desert to try to find to try to work out one's souls Um, um, perfecting by oneself. Um, it's very much what it evokes and so this filmmaker's like man Oh, this guy's fascinating comes back with the camera Uh does like an nature documentary of this weird savage whipping himself and sort of living this aesthetic life in the woods It becomes a sensation in the towns.

Everybody watches this movie and thinks it's so weird And then this huge crowd comes to john to try to sort of look at him gawk at him Summer holiday let's go watch the crazy wood man and john is like get out of here Leave me alone. I hate all of you. You are all doing mon you live monstrous ways The way you live is disgusting. Uh, and he's like whipping people and and throwing it at the mouth and he's furious with him And lina shows up and she runs to him and the crowd is so loud that nobody everyone sort of is getting into uh, an emotional fever pitch And uh john is is pacing back and forth enraged swinging his whip around telling everybody to get away People are just enthralled and think this is amazing and interesting lina comes forward on her knees saying something to john that no one can hear She's crying And john is full of rage and is a high emotional state and then somebody in the crowd yells out or g porgy They start singing the songs of their liturgy and then in this giant group of people they have orgy porgy The book ends with john waking up looking at this crowd of people all Satiated and docile and laying on the ground after whatever horrible acts they have committed with one another And he gets up and he walks into his house and he hangs himself and that is the end of the book It's terrible.

Yes, it is it is soul crushing the story But the last the last few sentences are famous masterfully written Yes, they're not really written I don't want to give it away, but man at the end of the book is just some yes tip-top writing But it is it is clearly a book that is at the end of it every time I teach it every time I read it even just me discussing on this podcast right now I just feel so grieved for john and I just feel so hopeless for the world that is created um and and huxley uh sort of has has has his fingers on the pulse of the zeitgeist That we live in and that he saw sort of coming in the 1930s that when you when you when you read this book um and yeah That there's there's just sort of this this absolute feeling of tremendous sadness at least that's how I feel every time I read it And doesn't that mark a good dystopia? It's every dystopia should end in a warning like that if it ends a happy or kind like that's why dystopia Yeah, that's why I think that hunger games have sort of failed dystopia and sadly but not like it needs to or if you went to the island It was like hey, this island's all right, and he lived and it's like everybody kind of got what they wanted Yeah, then it wouldn't it's not a good dystopia It's a decent dystopia should be a warning against some future societal state that we should be afraid of yes and the and for me When I read this and think about this the future societal state is is Aspects of human nature that are catered to but deficiency but are very deficient other things Yeah, you sort of have everyone has a nymic soul Everybody is hungry for real purpose and doesn't have it Um, there is a crisis of purpose people are talking about sort of nowadays especially with with the youth With the youth how will do I sound um no, but there's um the uh, you know this comes up in talking about uh, opium deaths and um The sort of loss increases the increased suicide rate and these kind of things. Um, and this is there are many Wonderful podcasts and just sort of people are talking about this now And are linking these things together and this book is part of that conversation Or at least I think is a helpful part to have in that conversation I mean a crisis of meaning is the only possible outcome if everything is relative exactly and everything is relative and nothing has meaning Then you're gonna have a crisis of meaning and if the polices geared towards catering to um to sort of cheap and easy Stations of desires food sex entertainment that kind of thing Um, so we didn't really get to the question which I want to talk about which is um a question that someone Email just asking us to talk about is does man have a right to be miserable or should the society work to eradicate what they think are What generally makes people happy is what society should be for but generally makes people miserable is what should be Stamped out by at all costs or should people have a right to be miserable? We don't have time to have that conversation.

I reply that I thought the right to be miserable is what people are exercising when they listen to this podcast So Hey, um, but anyway, that is brave new world. Um, that is that sort of the primer to the story. Um I yeah go read it for yourself. It is a book that I think um, um, um, other I think I think non-christians or people who are not in the classical Christian world are in or sort of um are in this sort of classical conversation When they read they have maybe have a different reading of it or have a different sort of interpretation of it or um, I feel like it's so um, um, um, um, I feel like it's so cult captures the current zeitgeist and it is so um, um, um Um, on the nose art sort of observational with it that you can't read the book and then go back and look at your world The way that we live in now and not be a little scared.

It's kind of like watching an episode of black mirror, right? Right? Yeah, uh, you can't help but look and say You can't you can't help but grow a little bit more in conservatism. I think when you read it saying we need to conserve things I don't know what we need to conserve, but there's something that we need to conserve that we're that we may lose If we don't watch it.

Um, maybe that's a provocative statement. No, that's that's a good dystopian. I should have it. Anyway, so that's brave new world.

Uh, we're coming up We're at the hour mark, uh, we could keep talking about this, um, but um, we literally can't because if it's too far over an hour, I can't upload a lot of fun like this. So I'll wrap it up. So this has been classical stuff you should know you can find us online at classical stuff.net You can email us at classical stuff at veritasacademy.net. You can find us on twitter at kliscollstuffclsst