psibomber t1_iu4sb6v wrote
Reply to comment by ggill1313 in TIL that Fahrenheit 451, a book about a distopian future where books are banned and burned, was banned and burned by the apartheid regime in South Africa with other tens of thousands. by open_closet
Wow, I wasn't expecting such a long response.
>“When I heard about Hitler burning the books in the streets of Berlin, it bothered me terribly. I was 15 when that happened, I was thoroughly in love with libraries and he [Hitler] was burning me when he did that
Do we not feel something similar in the modern day? Maybe not with censorship, but with propaganda, misinformation, and certain beliefs spreading?
>But at the time I wanted to do some sort of story where I could comment on what would happen to a country if we let ourselves go too far in this direction, where all thinking stops, and the dragon swallows his tail, and we sort of vanish into a limbo and we destroy ourselves by this sort of action.”
Not just a country, it is a possibility worldwide.
>Bradbury took care to characterize the lifestyles, archetypical beliefs, cultures, etc. which might produce a civilization that would be apathetic and more interested in panam et circenses, so to speak.
Older people have said that's where we are at now. I think many people do care though. I was in a reddit talk with other people who did care and had many ideas, and someone came in screaming "Why do you care?". It wasn't the first time I've been asked that. So there are a few people at that phase, but hopefully they learn to improve their 'onus of individual thought' or they stay a minority.
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