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Utopias Becoming Dystopias 29768 Views
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Description:
This video defines utopias and dystopias, and investigates how a utopia might become a dystopia. Can a seemingly perfect world actually be a dystopia in disguise?
Transcript
- 00:01
“Utopias Becoming Dystopias” a la Shmoop. Wherever you live, it’s far from perfect.
- 00:12
You might have too much traffic.
- 00:14
Excessive pollution.
- 00:16
The most fun place to hang out in your neighborhood might be the Bingo & Cross-stitch Hut.
- 00:24
Or you might live in a place with real problems… like persecution based on race or religion,
Full Transcript
- 00:32
or…war. What if there was a perfect city?
- 00:36
A… utopia?
- 00:38
No traffic.
- 00:38
Clean air.
- 00:40
Awesome hangouts.
- 00:41
A place where everybody is beautiful and always young.
- 00:47
People of every race and religion would get along. There’d be no war, just peace and
- 00:51
happiness for everyone.
- 00:53
Perfection, right?
- 00:54
But wait, there’s no traffic because no one has a car… what if we want to leave?
- 01:03
Sure, it’s got awesome hangouts, but we’re… kind of tired of just hanging out…
- 01:10
What if they bulldozed all the parks to make room for the movie theater, the bowling alley,
- 01:14
the Cantonese-Greek Fusion Restaurant and Hibachi…
- 01:18
What if the powers-that-be went even further to make society perfect? What if everyone
- 01:25
had to wear the same perfect clothes?
- 01:30
What if there’s no race conflict because only one race is allowed?
- 01:34
And… what if there’s no conflict between people of different religions because the
- 01:38
government only allows one religion?
- 01:45
What if there’s no war because there’s only one government that controls every iota
- 01:49
of every person’s life?
- 01:50
Something is seriously wrong with this picture.
- 01:53
We’re beginning to think this place isn’t a utopia at all.
- 01:57
Maybe… something’s rotten under all the apparent perfection. There must be a word
- 02:03
for such a place...
- 02:04
Oh, yeah...dystopia.
- 02:06
It’s not perfect – it’s controlling and oppressive.
- 02:09
In the end, the line between a utopia and dystopia might be a lot finer than we think.
- 02:16
And suddenly we might realize that there may have been better, though more complicated,
- 02:21
answers to the world’s problems.
- 02:24
And maybe, deep inside… we might just miss the Bingo & Cross-stitch Hut.
- 02:28
That is …if the powers-that-be haven’t had our memories erased.
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