Hey. Isn't this a Utopian future?

[Naheal]

This is a dystopia, Huxley variant. People are, in the main, content and provided for, but social institutions and order have completely broken down. We've been dehumanized by our technology to the point where we can isolate ourselves from each other.

If I meet someone on campus, chances are good I can't chat them up because they're tethered by the ear to their iPods. It's an illusion of a crowd, but in reality it is naught but a collection of individuals completely socially disconnected.

We've achieved material comfort, but at the cost of our souls. That's not Utopia to me.

While we're not a utopia, I don't believe that we've quite gotten to the point of being a true dystopia. We are definitely moving towards a cybertech era, but we're lacking the seediness necessary to add the dystopian element as of yet.

The seediness can be discovered by cracking open the politics section in the newspaper. We've got the corrupt government required (America just dropped out of the top 20 "Least Corrupt Governments" according to Human Rights Watch and Amnesty International, which means we're rapidly headed toward junta/regime/insert pejorative Third World noun here territory.

You know, I was going to cite a lack of supercorps, but my roommate just pointed to Wal-Mart.

We're in the middle of a cyberpunk setting. Congrats, people.

 

[PurplePlatypus]

We live in a part of the world in a time which is rather privileged in many ways. It?s as good as it has ever been for us, people might say otherwise but mostly that?s the nostalgia and rose coloured spectacles talking. I suspect this general trend of getting better will continue for a while yet, until some shit really hits the fan in one form or another. Things aren?t utopian though, far from it, I don?t even know if a utopian society can exist. I can?t help but feel there would always be something wrong somewhere, even if it?s just because different people have different ideals and they would not consider it utopia. You can?t please everybody.

 

[Treefingers]

So please, stop whining about how miserable your life is. It's fan-fucking-tastic.

Tell that to the starving children in Africa.

 

[Snake Plissken]

It will never be a Utopia until people stop calling it "pop"...

 

[Kurokami]

This is a dystopia, Huxley variant. People are, in the main, content and provided for, but social institutions and order have completely broken down. We've been dehumanized by our technology to the point where we can isolate ourselves from each other.

If I meet someone on campus, chances are good I can't chat them up because they're tethered by the ear to their iPods. It's an illusion of a crowd, but in reality it is naught but a collection of individuals completely socially disconnected.

We've achieved material comfort, but at the cost of our souls. That's not Utopia to me.

Ability to chat up a girl = soul.

Finally there's a definition, granted I might not have that, but I'm hardly unable to socialize with people, technology hasn't ruined us in any way, its simply changed us.

You missed the point. An opportunity for social interaction is lost because someone has isolated herself from the world. She exists in her own shell, any attempts at communication drowned out by the music---unless she's also texting on her phone while listening. But even then it's a closed-loop system.

People need to be more approachable and technology gets in the way. That's what I meant by creature comforts ripping out our souls---we can't talk to each other because of those walls we put up.

Why do people need to be more approachable though? I don't really get that as a problem, I can still talk to whoever I want, be they wearing Ipods or texting on their phone. Nowadays people can stay virtually connected at any time from any place, they can communicate for longer periods of time.

I'm not saying that technology has made the way we socialize better, I feel it is simply different than what it was. I still walk around and occasionally strike up conversation with strangers, I seldom leave my house when I don't need to as I can still socialize with people via technology, which admittedly isn't quite as good as meeting up, but when I live a 20 minute drive from people I care about (/1.5 hour walk) it's a much more convinient alternative (even more so since I don't own a car). So yeah, its got its downsides, it also has its upsides, we've still got a while before we stay at home for ALL of our interactions.