By NANCY PATRICK

I recently rewatched the movie The Book of Eli starring Denzel Washington and Gary Oldman. Filmed in New Mexico in 2009, the movie presents a thoughtful dystopian view of a possible future for the world.

This dismal, dangerous, and hopeless society bases its premise on the idea that something catastrophic had happened that destroyed a good world, replacing it with a world devoid of humanity.

In one scene, Solara, one of the young female survivors, asks Eli, “What was it like before?” 

He replied, “People had more than they needed, people didn’t know what was precious 

and what wasn’t, people threw away things they kill each other for now.”

If you need a refresher course, dystopian, as opposed to utopian, reflects a dehumanized society in which people live robotic, programmed lives without thought or reason. Two prominent dystopian British writers George Orwell, who wrote 1984, and Aldous Huxley, author of Brave New World, wrote novels that have actually become reality in many aspects. 

Both these writers, in addition to many others, seemed to write with a prophetic inspiration. Those of us of a certain age remember when as teens we used to laugh when we jokingly talked about future phones having screens showing the parties in real time as they had their conversations. 

I said more than once that I would hate for that to happen because I might not look my best when the caller rang. Well, I have eaten my words since then. At least we can control whether we want to communicate that way or eliminate the visual part, but I absolutely love the ability to Skype with my loved ones whom I don’t get to see in person very often.

So many issues addressed by George Orwell and Aldous Huxley have come to fruition that what we once thought of as science fiction has become reality. Some of those inventions and practices have proven beneficial while others have become invasive and downright dangerous.

I think we all know that we now live with Big Brother who spies into all our seemingly private communication. Orwell referred to Speakwrite, a program that converted spoken words into text on a screen. My husband uses a similar program when he prepares a new Sunday school unit in which he uses AI (artificial intelligence) technology to convert written text into human-like voice for a Power Point.

Orwell also introduces the idea of the Floating Fortress. This concept illustrates the military’s ability to wage war from a distance. As a matter of fact, most advanced military forces today use the technology. For example, computer operators in the United States, as well as other strategic military points, can operate a joy stick to direct bombs at targets across the world.

One of the most intrusive prophesies that I hate to see entering many aspects of society is the AI that immediately gleans all my preferences and interests when I make an internet search. If I research a certain type of household cleaner, my email suddenly receives dozens of recommendations for similar cleaners that I might favor. 

Huxley’s Brave New World actually portrays not a brave new world but a mindless, amoral, and soulless world that I find myself often in today. In spite of all our efforts to show fairness and civility to our fellow human beings, we have become more biased, less imaginative, and more addicted to dangerous practices (alcohol, drugs, sex, pleasure, luxury, pretense, and hypocrisy) than that of past generations.

Instead of seeking truth, honor, integrity, morality, gratitude, and humanity, many of us accept promises and lies from charismatic demagogues who deceive their followers by seducing them into a Stepford Wives’ mentality as they blindly follow without challenge or question what their false leaders have told them.

I sometimes want to join Walt Whitman on his roof top, shouting my “barbaric yawp” for the world to hear. I don’t want to annihilate technology; I truly appreciate much of it. But I want to use my own brain rather than using a device for everything. I sometimes balance my checkbook without a calculator just to retain my basic math abilities.

I want to think and evaluate what I hear before I make a commitment or buy a product. I don’t intend to abnegate my reasoning and self-reliance to others. All over the world, countries deal with people whose tyrannous hearts try to seduce them to follow rather than to think.   

 As our country enters yet another season of seemingly endless political debate, our citizens will hear from many people that their personalities and backers have the only power to fix what is broken in our country. As we listen, watch, think, research, and evaluate these people, let us keep our minds open, our thinking clear, our ethics and morality intact, and our hearts honest. 

Nancy Patrick is a retired teacher who lives in Abilene and enjoys writing