Clark Omo

8 March 2019

Societal Contradiction of the Utopic

As the literature attests, many of the theoretical societies explored so far in this semester involve and implement a myriad of restrictions and traditions present in their societies that both allow and disallow self-expression, leading to a highly contradictory society where open environments for living are promoted yet individual difference is erased. Indeed, this is the case that Umaymah Shahid makes in her research report “Crime and Punishment” where she explores the transparent aspects of human utopias regarding access of information and quality of life. Contrastingly, individuality is ultimately scrutinized in the utopian societies, and the freedom for self-expression becomes counterproductive to the goals of the Utopia or Dystopia, which is the argument put forth by Mel Hodgkin’s research report “Intentionally Selfless.” Also commenting on the lack of self-expression and individual differentiation among the citizens of a utopia is Jessica Myers in her essay “Utopian Paradox” in which Myers explores how the methods of characterization and techniques of dialogue in several of the stories studied in this class delimit individual expression yet somehow attempt to ensure a safe and secure state of coexistence. Each of these essays and reports describes an integral factor present within the utopian society: the necessary emplacement of policies and statutes that simultaneously promote a society where the citizens are free to do what they wish while repressing their individual differences.

Umaymah Shahid comments on the aspects of labor, punishment, and access to information in utopian societies and how each of these factors relates to the establishment of utopian institutions and the wellbeing of its citizens. She examines the presence of fundamental resources, saying that common necessities, such as food, water, and shelter are central to the utopian society. Furthermore, she states that “the success of a society lies in providing for their [the people’s] needs” and that this principle is “critical to having a sustainable society.” Shahid argues that this tenant is true within the Utopia, as the examples she examines such as Herland and Utopia both find ways to provide for all their citizens. She then goes to quote Parijs, in which she beings by stating that “providing an unconditional basic income, irrespective of how someone lives, whom they live with, or what they like to work in, will allow people to have the ‘power to decide what sort of life [they] want to live.’” These utopic examples, such as Herland and Utopia, want to provide in every way possible a sustainable and healthy life for their inhabitants. Ease of life and access to every available resource, therefore, is tantamount to the establishment of a utopia. This ease of access, as Shahid cites from Parijs, allows a Utopia’s citizens a greater degree of control over their lives rather than allow that control to be left to the whims of the unrestrainable markets and institutions that would normally provide for their essential needs. Indeed, according to Shahid, this free and unrestricted opportunity allows the utopian citizens to pick the trades and crafts that would most satisfy them. She states in the following: “Time and time again Utopian societies have shown to not discriminate on the labor one performs, as long as it benefits the society. When someone does not have to worry about their income’s source, they will work on what interests them.” Absence of economic strain and restrictive social mobility allows the citizens of a utopia to choose what they wish and to pursue their own interests, so long as it is beneficial to the society.

Another aspect that Shahid expounds upon regarding the Utopic societies’ allowance for ease of life is a free access to information promoted by governmental policies of transparency. As Shahid states: “Having information available to the public is essential to the smooth governance of Utopias because majority decisions are based on a democratic system, and so without democratic transparency, there would be no collective decision making”. Access to information through government transparency allows the citizens of the Utopia to freely assess the state of their government and chime in on important issues without the added bureaucratic obstruction by most modern media outlets. Shahid then throws in a quick comment regarding the state of Dystopian societies that often restrict and punish those who seek information outside the mediums initially provided for their consumption. Shahid states that: “One can pick up any Dystopian novel and find the prevalence of hidden information which results in curious citizens wanting to seek information and then be punished for doing so”.  Utopias prevent this from happening by keeping all outlets and pathways for informational distribution open and even, as previously mentioned, allowing their citizens to lend their voice to major political decisions.

However, in light of this freedom of access to information and the opportunity for the citizenry of a Utopic society to pursue their careers not for necessity but for what suits them best, their does arise a problematic relationship between the aspects of freedom and of restriction present within Utopic institutions. Mel Hodgkins identifies this paradoxical issue in the following statement as she draws from examples in Thomas More’s Utopia : “Sameness is equated with prosperity and equality because cultural differences lead to conflict. By eliminating cultural difference it can be argued that a portion of individual identity is also sacrificed to the communal good”. While Shahid identified that in utopias there is a possibility for the pursuit of a person’s interests in the way of labor over necessity, there is a stress on sameness and uniformity over the individual desire of expression. Yes, one’s interest in their trade is a trait unique to every individual, but, at the same time, the utopic society is not willing to let the pursuit of self-expression go much farther than that. Furthermore, Hodgkins then pulls an example from the Twin Oaks community after analyzing a statement on their webpage. Hodgkins concludes these findings with the following statement: “The language behind this concept [referring to Twin Oaks], which would come to be known as operant conditioning in the following decades, denies the existence of an individually determined ‘mind.’” Hodgkins goes further, stating that this policy of denying the individual mind results in a theory stipulating that individuals “are socially conditioned to respond to various stimuli, both internal and external, based upon the positive and negative feedback we receive in response to our actions.” This assertion works as a foil to Shahid’s statement regarding the freedom to pick one’s profession in a Utopian institution. While these inhabitants may have the choice to pick their professions according to what they believe will give them the most personal satisfaction and suit their skillset, it nonetheless works as a conditioning mechanism since it relies on the stimulation of one’s personal inclinations to contribute to the betterment of the society. Essentially, the opportunity to pick one’s own trade without fear of being denied that trade takes advantage of the individual’s desire to please him or herself, and then channels that desire into a working program that benefits the Utopian society.

Furthermore, Hodgkins examined and explains an attempt at creating a Utopic society by casting off all kinds economic systems (socialism, communism, capitalism) to replaced by a more egalitarian system. However, as Hodgkins relates regarding a portion of the Venus Project’s FAQ page regarding individuality in which the question was asked if people would be the same, the answer was: “Yes, in these ways: Interested in latest science and technology, Never accept anything unless fully explained, Not judgmental of different cultures, Curious of things that are new, Instead of few people carrying the nation many will participate”. Even though these rules are demanding that people treat one another with respect and be pursuant of furthering the welfare of their society, the Venus Project in this statement of doctrine nonetheless demands that all members of the state must adopt this inclusive and advancement-based ideology, which implies that any sort of deviation or difference of opinion is not allowed. Through the guise of equality, the Utopia stimulates the individual into serving the purpose of the perfect state. Hodgkins summarizes the findings of this report in the following quote: “What I have found is that in order to provide the greatest good, there is inevitably a price to be paid in exchange for this ‘stability.’ Fiction has long identified this price and my research has largely confirmed that hypothesis. This price is the giving up of the concept of total free will and individuality.” While the utopia does allow a certain magnitude of control over one’s opportunities for a better life, it nonetheless asks for a price in return that may result in the loss of choice outside the available selections.

This contradictory state of affairs present within the institutions and standards of the Utopic society is further explored in Jessica Myers’ essay “Utopian Paradox”. In this essay, Myers examines the relationship between the methods of characterization in few of the literary pieces so far studied and how the lack of different characters represents this absence of individualization in these ideal societies. Myers’ pulls an example from Herland where she describes the issue of characterization in the following: “When they [the women of Herland] explain their traditions, they always refer to themselves in terms of ‘we.’  We are introduced to six women characters, and although we learn their names, we really don’t learn anything that sets them apart as individuals besides their age and which men they interact with the most.” Herein lies the paradoxical underpinnings of the utopian society. While this literature boasts of having come up with a more perfect way of administrating society, the civilizations described in Utopian literature encounter the problem of properly allowing for individual difference amongst their citizens. Thus, the Utopia has a potential for becoming Dystopic from another’s perspective. Which is where Myers transitions into an examination of the Dystopic world presented in Ayn Rand’s Anthem. Myers returns to the ‘we’ over ‘I’ mentality, where she explains the following: “Although this is actually a dystopia, the society Prometheus describes was originally a utopia. Rand’s use of the term “we” … strongly emphasizes this mentality of thinking about the needs of the many over the needs of the individual.” According to Myers, Rand emphasized this devaluing of the individual in favor of the collective good, which culminated in the society contained in Anthem transforming into a Dystopia as opposed to Herland’s utopia.

Indeed, the narrator becomes a more dynamic character than some of the people he or she interacts with in several of these Utopian novels, which further distances the concept of individuality from the audience. Myers comments on this tendency as well: “In both of these pieces, we know much more about the narrator and their opinions about the society they are encountering, than the ideas and opinions of the individuals they are interacting with.” Individuality is sidelined once again in favor of presenting a monogamous society where each voice is in agreement with one another, which attests to the goal of eliminating infighting and faction development which many Utopias strive for. This examination brings the paradox of Utopias back to Shahid’s research. While Shahid correctly and aptly concluded that the Utopic society provides ample opportunity for its citizens to pick their desired occupations and have a say in the governance of their homes, the Utopic society nonetheless asks its citizens to sacrifice something in return. They are undertones of having to agree to the collective mind, and, although it may seem a natural thing to do since the society must provide, as Shahid states, “all citizens access to work, income, and information” to secure its egalitarian status and, as Myers understands, “meet the needs of all people equally, but at the same time take care of the environment that they live in so that they can sustain their mode of living”, the vacancy in the characters’ personalities is nonetheless troubling and the requirement to conform to a single definition, as Hodgkins noted of the Venus Project, denotes a purpose to sacrifice differing opinion and one’s own personal views in favor of sustaining the collective whole.

The establishment of a utopia is a tricky endeavor, to put it lightly. As Shahid outlines in her research report, a utopia as it is described in several of these novels presents a unique opportunity for a society to explore social and economic equality that would empower its citizens to have a more vocal presence in the administrations of their government as well as have greater control over their choice of work. However, as both Hodgkins and Myers attest to, this land of opportunity as it seems to be portrayed has its drawbacks. To sustain itself, a Utopia would require to its citizens to adhere to that society’s communal and idealistic requirements. As Hodgkins noted of Project Venus, anyone wishing to join that project was required to have the same goals and views regarding advancement of technology and acceptance of differing ideas. Such requirements intrude into the individual’s mindset and are aimed at eliminating any sort of dissent. Jessica Myers capitalizes on this tendency of Utopias as well, in which this limiting of the individual voice emerges even in the way the Utopian novel is written, the evidence of which is displayed via the lack of distinction among the characters’ personalities and voices. Utopias certainly are not a uniform whole as much as the outsider might think. As with any society, there are pros and cons with establishing an alternate way of life, but in the case of the Utopia, one must wonder if this obsession with hammering down any opportunity for divergence from the goals of the community bears a sort of religious fanaticism that is in danger of brainwashing its adherents.

The Utopian Genre: Discourse and the Speculative

The utopian literature so far studied has followed many paths. In many of these tales, from More’s Utopia to Gilman’s Herland to Rand’s Anthem to Callenbach’s Ecotopia, audiences are presented with several different constructed civilizations that have either abandoned or discarded most modern conventions regarding economic, social, and governmental institutions. The abandonment of these establishments has led each of these fictional societies to create different ways of meeting their citizens’ needs with the sole goal of creating a society free from infighting, political and economic strife, social ills such as crime and poverty, and assuring their citizens lead a healthy and ultimately blissful existence free from pain. Often this involves a means of separation from the world, such as in More’s Utopia where the people are separated by a canal that disconnects them from the rest of the world. And it is this idyllic community or nation that drives the force of the stories seen in all the texts so far studied. Each of these tales involves an inherent search for the answer to creating a more equality-based society that is liberated from most the issues that plague the modern world. This journey is often relayed via large conversations and discourses that shed light onto the utopic worlds present in each work. This convention has its advantages as well its drawbacks, both of which culminate in my own unique experience of the genre.

To begin, it would benefit this essay’s discussion to understand what exactly would lead someone to write in this genre that possesses the problem of being so bereft of conflict and inciting incident. The genre itself follows a lot of the argumentative structures scene in ancient philosophy such as Plato’s Republic, in which it is standard fare to have a character take the voice of the author (in the Republic’s case, Socrates) who then is challenged by and conversed with by an opponent, which then results in the authorial character deliberating (at great length) upon the matter in an attempt that the text justifies as successful in convincing the inquirer of the answerer’s superior logic and unassailable truths. In the Republic, there are speakers such as Glaucon who fulfill this role compared to Socrates. In our utopian literature selections, this structure of narrative is implemented in both Callenbach’s Ecotopia and Gilman’s Herland. In both stories, the audience is put into the mind of a single character that relates the story via first person POV. For Herland, the story is related through the eyes of the character Van who questions and interviews several of the land’s female inhabitants about their laws and other customs. For example, Van asks questions to Somel who would then reply with an answer that would shed light on their customs: “Education?’ I was puzzled again. ‘I don't mean education. I mean by motherhood not only child-bearing, but the care of babies.’ ‘The care of babies involves education, and is entrusted only to the most fit," she repeated.” This convention then reiterates itself in the opposite occurrence, when another character, Celis, would ask a question that would shed light on the men’s thoughts of their homeland: “[Celis speaks] ‘Are the women in your country so weak that they could not carry such a thing as that?’ [Jeff replies] ‘It is a convention," he said. ‘We assume that motherhood is a sufficient burden—that men should carry all the others.’” These moments define the utopian genre in most of its iterations as a heavily dialogue-based genre with its argumentative goals incorporated into the conversations themselves.

The stories of utopic literature often involve exploring ideas outside the practice of the current society, and this form allows for vivid and detailed explanation that bears a certain amount of historical precision. This method allows the ideas proposed in utopian literature to be fully explained and expounded upon. For instance, in Callenbach’s Ecotopia, the primary character, Weston, either asks questions directly to the inhabitants regarding their practices and social viewpoints or finds himself in situations that warrant further inquiry and investigation. An extreme example is Weston’s participation in the wargames of Ecotopia. After having witnessed the sacred ritual and attempting to take a picture of the injured participant, Weston is taken aside by an elderly member of the nation and given a history lesson on the custom: “’Well, Ecotopia came into existence with a Judeo-Christian heritage,’ was the reply. ‘We make the best of it. You will find many expressions of it in our culture still’” (81). Here, Weston inquires about a critical practice amongst the Ecotopians, and then a gets a bit of insight into how the Ecoptopian culture has developed outside the influence of the US. Another instance occurs regarding personal relationships amongst the Ecotopians, when Weston complains to Marissa regarding standards of privacy. “Don’t you have a sense of privacy?” Weston asks to Marissa (89). Marissa responds with the following: “What are you talking about? These people live with me and love me. Naturally they want to know what is happening with me! So I tell them” (89). Several of the  utopian literary works so far covered constantly implements this tactic of discussion and explanation.

Thomas More’s Utopia follows a similar method of explanation and rebuttal. More includes in his story the same discourse-like conventions seen in both Gilman’s and Callenbach’s works. For example, the narrator of Utopia inquires of Raphael regarding the island of Utopia: “We asked him many questions concerning all these things, to which he answered very willingly; we made no inquiries after monsters, than which nothing is more common; for everywhere one may hear of ravenous dogs and wolves, and cruel men-eaters, but it is not so easy to find states that are well and wisely governed.” Once again the method of inquiry and discussion is employed as it is in Plato’s Republic. Dialogue, particularly one-sided dialogue in a lot of cases, plays the role of informing both the inquirer and the audience of the many wonders of Utopia, as does Gilman and Callenbach. And like Callenbach and Gilman, More also accentuates the implied superiority of Utopia compared to the rest of the world via Raphael: “After Raphael had discoursed with great judgment on the many errors that were both among us and these nations, had treated of the wise institutions both here and there, and had spoken as distinctly of the customs and government of every nation through which he had passed”. This is another characteristic shared by the utopian literature so far studied and the philosophical dialogues of Plato: the inherent superiority of the utopic society as compared to the rest of the world.

Naturally, this is the genre’s point to imagine a world where things are better and there is a proper method to achieving this goal. More’s, Callenbach’s, and Gilman’s work all exemplify this, and it is an example that goes all the way back to Classical philosophy. Also naturally, this leads to tones of pretentiousness amongst the speakers. It is hard not to hear a certain amount of condescension in Raphael’s tone: “Mr. More, both in your opinion of me and in the judgment you make of things: for as I have not that capacity that you fancy I have, so if I had it, the public would not be one jot the better when I had sacrificed my quiet to it. For most princes apply themselves more to affairs of war than to the useful arts of peace.” Raphael clearly holds a great amount of disdain for the world outside his experience of the island of Utopia. Callenbach echoes this convention in his work as well, where he relays another episode of interaction between Weston and an Ecotopian: “An intolerably smug people: Young clod about 20 telling me ‘automobiles are such a 19^th-century contraption—why are you still so hung up on them?” (88). Citizens of a utopian society have an instilled attitude of self-righteousness when approached by those from outside of their new society. This method of approaching dialogue and relating the stories of each these utopic works serves their purpose well, as they are, like philosophy, meant to be a corrective sort of literature.

Ayn Rand’s Anthem, though displaying a sort of dystopic alternative compared to other three, also assumes this sort of arrogant tone when prescribing remedies for that work’s portrayal of social ills. Rand’s work creates a world that is highly dystopic at its onset, with much of humanity having reverted to a state of pseudo-medieval levels in terms of technology and a sort of oligarchical state of government. This situation leads the main character, who later renames himself as Prometheus, to venture to escape this dystopic society in search of a world that will value the individual over the collective. However, this dogmatic search is still tinged with a level of superiority akin to many of the utopic novels already discussed. Consider the following line from Anthem: “Gaea is pregnant with my child. He will be taught to say ‘I’ and to bear the pride of it. He will be taught to walk straight on his own feet. He will be taught reverence for his own spirit.” Granted, the emphasis on the ‘I’ concept is purposed to be a strike against the universal loss of the individual under the superimposed ‘we’ identity in the dystopic world Prometheus escapes, it nonetheless is mired with a resonant tone of superiority. Prometheus sees the ‘I’ as the supreme answer and the sole identity that a society should stress and value. To add even more emphasis upon this concept, the protagonist of this story takes the identity of a deity known for giving fire to man, aka knowledge. Prometheus rationalizes this change of identity as such: “He took the light of the gods and brought it to men, and he taught men to be gods. And he suffered for his deed as all bearers of light must suffer. His name was Prometheus." Prometheus wishes to emulate this example of giving liberation through knowledge of self-empowerment over the collective. Though this dialogue is in most ways a direct counter to the collective and identity removing policies of stories such as Herland where the female characters are largely indistinct and More’s Utopia where most the information of the island comes from a single voice, it nonetheless possesses the same rhetorical qualities of both the utopian works and the genre in general. Rand’s Anthem promotes one way of life over the other, drastically contrasting her proposed society as superior to the one that Prometheus escapes. Again, this assumption of superiority is a rhetorical device that harkens to Plato and his discourses to Glaucon and the other speakers in the Republic. And it is curious to see Rand attempting a similar method, albeit for the opposing side of the collective argument.

This being said, a clear definition for the genre can take form. As has been explained to an extent and with the possible exception of Anthem, the utopian genre is not so much concerned with relating a compelling story laced with intense conflicts and character development, but instead is occupied with describing and arguing about an idea. True, several of these works do attempt to frame these concepts around a story. Callenbach’s Ecotopia does involve a reported going to a land whose reputation has been surrounded by much skepticism and criticism, only to find himself succumbing the allure of the naturalized world around him. Weston states: “This new me is a stranger, an Ecotopian, and his advent fill me with terror, excitement, and strength…But I am ready for it at last” (180). Weston is convinced of the beauty and superiority of the Ecotopian society, which is the true development of the story, rather than the character’s own personal issues. The Ecotopia, and so the utopia, is argued as being better in every respect. It promotes a healthier life, a more stable economic and political establishment compared to our current one, and more substantial and wholesome relationships with family and friends in contrast to most modern lifestyles. More’s Utopia works off the same principle, as, in this tale, an attitude filled with detest for materialistic wealth has been so ingrained into the society that the children play with jewels as though they are common toys. Utopian literature then can be defined with this single characteristic: construction of a society through discourse and examination of civilizational apparatuses as well as the common behaviors of its inhabitants that is then argued against the contemporary world to instruct and inform on possible solutions for social issues and political conflicts.

The genre of utopian literature focuses primarily on world construction and the contrast of that world to ours. Often this involves isolating the constructed world from the rest of the thriving societies. Ecotopia is nestled in the Sierra Nevada Mountains, Herland is located in a remote region of world sealed off by a landslide, and Utopia is removed by a canal that separates it into an island. The world itself then becomes a sort of character in its own right, developed and understood by discourse provided through the voice of another character. These discourses provide detail ranging from everything from the history to the most minute details of lifestyle and routine. Ecotopia contains chapters that go into great detail describing living conditions, education, material manufacturing, industry, housing, utility systems, furniture, clothing, transportation and other sorts of minutia that, at first may appear wholly unnecessary and mundane, but, in reality, are not only critical in understanding the constructed world, but are also endemic of the genre. Utopia provides its audiences with sections covering clothing, gardening, government, and even how the houses are arranged on this imaginary island. Herland focuses a good deal on history, the appearance of its inhabitants, planting, forestry, hunting, education, and rituals of motherhood. Each of these pieces do what the genre is intended to do: provide a world that is separate from ours to serve as a foil that reflects our own civilizations pitfalls and shortcomings. True, this may in fact alienate a good deal of traditional readers that are accustomed to finding a thrilling conspiracy or enthralling, edge-of-your seat conflict, or even a story that focuses on the struggles of its characters as personal issues that apply to the individual human across all borders. But the utopian genre focuses on issues that affect society as a whole, perhaps with the goal in mind that if the society can be fixed, than the humans within can be healed as result.

Out from this definition and understanding of the genre’s tropes and purposes comes a somewhat strange connection to my own interests. Having been an avid fantasy and science fiction indulger for most my teen and adult life, I was interested to see how this genre fit into the realm of speculative writing. So far there have been some interesting parallels. For instance, Utopian literature relies on constructed worlds that impact the narrative and, indeed, end up driving a lot of the force the story possesses. Science fiction and fantasy fiction are no different. Tolkien’s realms of Middle-Earth, C.S. Lewis’s Narnia, Niven’s Ring Wold and Herbert’s Dune all rely on the power of imagination to create world that, at first glance, may appear uniquely alien to our own but, at their core, tell stories that are human to every degree. Utopian literature attempts to provide an outsider’s analysis on the issues that plague our societies today by providing a world that casts off much of our conventional institutions and social structures. Similarly, the speculative realms also take what we know and infuse it with knowledge and worlds borrowed from the tomes of history or the songs of myth to create reality that converses with much of the ideas and values contemporarily accepted. In addition, there is also an element of nostalgia present in some of these utopic tales that further solidify their relationship to the speculative. More’s Utopia, Gilman’s Herland, and Callenbach’s Ecotopia all involve worlds who have given up most of the modern conventions for living in their own periods in exchange for a lifestyle much removed from current trends. This alternate lifestyle involves being more involved with nature or removing systems of hierarchy. Much of fantasy relies on this nostalgic element as well, for much of the stories in its genre focus on times long gone that were grander and more fulfilling compared to story’s current state. This is perhaps the greatest gain I have received from likening the utopic stories so far read to my own interests. Both the utopic and speculative genres of science fiction and fantasy depend on looking on our world from the outside through the construction of societies that either try to remove our ills or reimagine them to fit a specific style of analyses and garner in-depth reflection.

So far the journey through the utopian genre has been as intriguing as much as it has been rewarding. The level of rhetorical methods and superior tones of the narrators of the tales is both an interesting take on storytelling style as well as a modern implementation of past philosophical discourse. In addition, the use of the constructed world to accomplish this goal shows a clear relationship to other speculative realms of fiction, such as science fiction and fantasy fiction. All display a similarity in narrative goals in terms of using a fictional world with its own people and customs set apart from our own to continue a conversation regarding the current world’s ills and shortcomings. With this being said, the journey through the utopic worlds I have yet to encounter will certainly bear some interesting fruit in terms of how the genre continues to adapt or reimagine these conventions in order to reach its readers though a drastically different method of storytelling not often utilized.