How relevant is this novel today?

 

In a modern society as today, the novel has its relevant parts.

Some things we should look out for, like the super-consumerist society it portrays, or the Bokanovsky’s Process with the recent strides made in the ways of genetic engineering.

However, some things would require an enormous amount of effort to change in modern society. Our views on equality and class-based systems right now are pretty much set in stone.

 

What can we, as individuals, do to avoid a superficial existence?

 

We can make sure everyone has the ability to find their own, personal reason to be, to exist. Albeit through giving out free access to information or to not limit one’s freedom in physical and mental aspects, people should be able to plan and achieve their own personal goals.

Furthermore, we should make sure everyone knows what other people did to avoid a superficial existence. It’s about finding a reason, and when you get in touch with so many reasons to live, it can really help with finding a reason to exist.

 

What can be valuable about challenge, strife, suffering, and pain?

 

When everything in life goes smoothly, you don’t feel like you have to improve. You become a person that never changes, because apparently it isn’t necessary to change. If we have challenge in our lives, or pain, or suffering, you learn as a person. Often times you can understand people better if you have gone through a similar pain as them, but if we were too live in a world described by Huxley, we think that many would lose their understanding for their fellow people

 

What are we losing when we embrace a hypersexualized society?

When it is normal to have sex with anyone you find attractive, you lose a lot of what makes a romantic relationship so very special. Instead of having a moment of passion with your loved one, it becomes a moment that you have experienced many times before (even as a kid if we were to live in the word of A brave new world.)