Why is it only when we learn about the history of failed endeavors at utopia, do we realize the importance of how our own society functions? When people take a look at dystopian societies and how life was like for the members, the greatness of how our living environment operates is revealed. We live in a world that is neither a utopia or dystopia, simply because it is the only viable alternative to a perfect society. Although not everyone is completely content, it happens to be extremely different from the dystopias of past and present.
Yet, there are a select few similarities that define how we human beings think and fantasize, and those resemblances may just represent the limit of pleasing everyone, or what we still have to improve on. An ideal depiction of a dystopia can be found in the nonfiction story “Night” by Elie Wiesel, set during the Holocaust when Nazi Germany believed in a utopia created by the eradication of Jews. The traits of this society are significantly disparate from those of our lives in the modern day world.
Nevertheless, there are still parallelisms between the two societies, which are mandatory for the proper control of connections between people and government. Our and Elie’s stories describe two lifestyles that may seem utterly contradicting, but the underlying correlation may be stronger than initially expected. Our modern day society in the United State of America is considered to be a “land of laws, not men… ” This means that in order for everyone to live happily and have freedoms, there must be strict rules and regulations to guide us in our daily actions.
Along with these, a government is constituted to form the laws for the people. The society in Night and our modern one both have a governing power and strict decrees to maintain order within the community. However, the capacity and influence of the authority is what happens to set our world and the dystopia apart. In the novel Night, the government was a dictatorship ruled by Adolf Hitler, the chancellor of Germany. As a result of an autocracy, the dictator was able to enforce any regulation he wished, which caused a restraint on the freedoms and individuality of each person, which showed in the lifestyle as the source of power changed.
Near the beginning of the Holocaust, Elie states “The officers were billeted in private… Jewish homes. ” Even more decrees were created including: “Jews were prohibited from leaving their residence under penalty of death… [and] every Jew had to wear the yellow star,” (page 11). Although this may not seem like a large topic of controversy, over time, self-rule decreased furthermore to the point where the places and method of transportation were controlled for a certain group, the Jews.
In our society, the government may seem to decide many aspects of our life, yet compared to the Jewish people of Europe, we should be grateful for many liberties. Each citizen of the United States, whether naturalized or not, is treated exactly the same and granted the identical rights. We get to determine most of our actions in day to day life, but there are still set laws that make sures others’ rights are not violated in the process. In Nazi Germany, Hitler gained the capability to punish those who broke rules, even though his actions defied most of them.
Our government consists of people elected by us, and the rule of law states “no one is above the law” which clearly depicts the major contradiction between our authoritative power and that of the dystopia. Despite these two societies sharing the idea of a central government, they still are distinguished by the aptitude to influence the members and the impartiality towards groups of people based on racial values. We are treated as humans in our society and are allowed to make use of our “inalienable rights”, while Jews during the Holocaust experienced no such hing. “Government” might be just one word, but it has multiple perspectives which makes it such a critical factor in determining utopia or dystopia. Another large component of a society that separates our modern day one from Elie Wiesel’s is propaganda. It is the act of deliberately spreading information, ideas, or rumors to help or harm an institution. This may seem like a harmful act that is conducted everyday around us, but on a large scale, one person was able to take over multiple nations and gain power to exterminate millions of people.
In order for the Nazis to validate what they were doing to innocent Jews, they had to convince everyone else that Jewish people were actually wrongdoing. Through controlling the media, such as newspapers and radio broadcasts, the government was able to brainwash citizens into believing falsified information. According to the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum, “… [the] Jews were blamed for the loss of money after the war because many of them had occupations as bankers. Despite the fact that the followers of Judaism did not cause the economical downfall, controlling media input and output allowed the authorities to curb the thinking of the citizens, to the point where nobody knew the true actions and intentions of the government and surrounding events. Since this action, in turn, led to the formation of a dystopia, it may seem quite questionable as to why propaganda is legal in the United States. In our modern day society, we are also allowed to influence the thoughts of other people by spreading information via media, such as the Internet.
Our divergence from the dystopia is caused by who is responsible for the media in the society. The first amendment of the Constitution describes the freedom of press, which grants people the ability to publish opinions without censorship by the government. Every citizen of the U. S. A can state their opinions of the government and any other topic, which allows readers to get a broad view of how the society is operating. This is a complete opposite from Eliezer’s community, where the media itself is controlled by the government, to put themselves in a favored position, and the Jews as the scapegoats.
We receive almost all of our daily information from the news, commercials, and blogs, and even if they are trying to influence us, we are assured that those people in power do not filter the material. As you can see, media is an essential part of both the dystopia and modern-day society. It is the single most popular method of spreading facts and opinions to either help or harm a group. Nonetheless, the reliableness and source of media is what lets us be members of a society and not just “minions”, whose ideas are directed by a central government. Labor is yet another thing that Elie’s dystopia and our contemporary society share.
It may not seem like it, but labor is basically the backbone of any society. There has to be a certain amount of people who dedicate their time to the industrial aspect of a community. In order for buildings, roads, transportation, and necessary materials to be available to members, there must be humans to construct them. In the concentration camps during the Holocaust, prisoners were forced to do manual labor with the fear of being killed if not working properly.
This is demonstrated on page 64 of Night, where Elie said “We were transported to Buna, a labor camp… very single prisoner dared not take a break as they would be shot on spot. ” The Nazis were essentially enslaving the Jews as they were conducting strenuous activities without being rewarded. In our society, we have the same number, or even more, of members who directly participate in physical work to produce items for our everyday wants and needs. A considerable variation is that we are paid for our spent time and energy. Citizens of the United States work in factories, textile shops, farms, and other industrial workplaces in order to ensure a better lifestyle and afford their normal requirements.
We contribute our energy thus receiving a monetary accolade that further motivates us to continue working in the community. On the other hand, prisoners stuck in concentration camps wanted to endue manual labor to save their lives. Our method has definitely proven to operate more effectively because there will always be a voluntary wish to work if it means bettering one’s life. Whether labor in a society is done willingly or compellingly, it is an imperative aspect, and the lack of it can turn any world into a dystopia. As Benjamin Franklin once said, “No man [ever] was glorious, who was not laborious. “