A DYSTOPIAN SOCIETY OR THE MORAL DECAY OF HUMANITY Stăncuţa Ramona DIMA-LAZA, Lecturer Ph. D. “Vasile Goldiş” Western University of Arad Faculty of Humanities, Politics and Administrative Sciences, Arad Mobile phone: 0740/496.114 E-mail: lazastancuta@yahoo.com
ABSTRACT. The present paper analyses an anti-utopic society, emphasizing the importance of individual liberty over doing the right thing as described and satirized by British writer Anthony Burgess in the book entitled A Clockwork Orange. This matter of choice and free will is characteristic to dystopian societies which represent a futuristic universe in which the oppressive control of the state changes people’s lives. It depicts in a shocking manner the effects a dystopian society has over the individual. Dystopian characters make use of human weaknesses in order to set forth and to prove the destructive power of authoritarian rule. Dystopian societies demoralize people, deprive them of the ability of taking decisions while their personal desires either good or evil, are taken over by the state.
Key words: society, dystopia, imaginary future, fear, violence, control
Utopia versus dystopia If some people have a positive view of the future and consider it a utopia, that is, a clean place, and an era of technological developments, others regard it as a system that “gradually unravels [and] city dwellers feel the effects in diffuse ways. Food prices rise until many people cannot afford enough to eat. Poor refugees appear at the edges of the city looking for a way to survive. Diseases seem to crop up from nowhere and spread rapidly. Riots explode out of hunger and desperation. A frightened population turns to the government to enforce order by any means necessary.” (Tanzil 2004:1) An anarchic and undesirable society, referring to a bleak future in which things take a turn for the worse and which displays images of worlds more unpleasant than our own may be called a dystopian society. The inhabitants of such a society lead a dehumanized and fearful life; they struggle for survival. The