Bradburys Predictions

Jimmy Nguyen
English
Petrow
Ray Bradbury’s Predictions
Ray Bradbury's Fahrenheit 451 portrays a materialistic society that has forgotten social interaction with each other. Writing in 1953, Ray Bradbury warns readers about a future that could happen. Bradbury notices dehumanization in society as technology makes people become less individual and incapable of independent thought. In Fahrenheit 451, Ray Bradbury makes predictions of the future that is frighteningly accurate to what life today is like. Some of the predictions Bradbury makes had to do with the way people and machines intermingled with each other. Ray Bradbury predicted news media portraying the world through destruction and violence, society losing social skills with friends and family because of a ‘digital wall’, and children being shoved through the school system only to go to places to destroy things.
News is the main outlet our society uses to communicate with each other. Whether it is national or local news, or the lunch your friend posted on Facebook, it is supposed to unite the community together and help people gather information. Today in this digital age, however, the news broadcasts more violent things in the world. In the book, news media is used by the government to find Montag. In the end, the government ended up killing an innocent man just to satisfy the people watching the news. That scene was the pinnacle of reality, showing the foul and sinister side of society, showing how much they love to see someone else suffering. Bradbury looks down upon live media coverage and describes the harsh reality of our social minds. Fahrenheit 451 is full of warnings of where society could be headed if it is not careful. However, these predictions are still remarkably exaggerated, when contrasted with today's society especially mass mediocrity and censorship. Modern media is able to bring to important issues to the public's attention, while media in Fahrenheit 451 bring only the entertaining issues to the public's attention.
Oftentimes, we try to distract ourselves from the real world through the 'digital wall.’ Much of Fahrenheit 451 is devoted to depicting a future United States society bombarded with messages and imagery by an omnipresent media. Instead of actually showing any signs of social interactions, the characters in the novel live their lives in rooms with a giant television the size of a wall. These TVs portray dramas in which the viewer's name is woven into the program and the viewer is able to interact with fictional characters called "the family." Scenes changes rapidly, images flash quickly in bright colors, all of it designed to produce distraction and awe, but no one is able to comprehend it. Media outlets such as Facebook and Twitter have worked wonders for many people, allowing them to connect instantly with friends and family, but have also shut people out from their social routines and habits. As a society, we are becoming more and more antisocial. People are always on their phones, texting or emailing friends and family. We do not really see people face to face anymore, there’s always a screen between them. Bradbury predicts that children hiding behind this ‘digital wall’ are sucked into a zombie-like state as a screen sucks the life away from them. This is true today because digital interactions and social media is the most convenient and easy way to talk to someone. Throughout the novel, Bradbury portrays mass media as a veil that obscures real experience and interferes with the characters' ability to think deeply about their lives and societal issues. Bradbury isn't suggesting that media other than books couldn't be enriching and fulfilling, but that society intertwining with mass media is depriving people from the imaginations found in books. As Faber tells Montag, "It isn't books you need, it's some of the things that once were in books.... The same infinite detail and awareness could be projected through the radios and televisions, but are not."
Children are shoved through the school systems both in the book and in real life. Children are told what to do, when to do it, how to do it, but never why they do it. In this dystopian society, it seems that nobody knows why they do it as constant distractions such as perpetual announcements of time and commercial advertisements. In the book, Clarisse tells Montag about her school life and tells him she's left school because they think she’s uncooperative and different because she’s always asking questions. She describes the school day to Montag—TV class, lots of sports, making pictures, transcribing history, and memorizing answers. She also describes what passes for sociability among her peers—going to a Fun Park, breaking windows, daredevil games in cars, shouting, dancing, and fighting. Bradbury’s predictions are eerily accurate because children in real life face that problem every day. They are shoved through the school system, as teachers try to cram information in the students’ brain while the student’s are trying to process the information. What little information they do process down from that class is then lost as they are pushed into a new class repeating the same processes. In the end, the student’s are so stressed out they have to go to special stores and areas to break things without destroying things you aren’t meant to break. This relates to our modern day videogames where we simulate violence without causing anyone or anything to get hurt.
Fahrenheit 451 is full of warnings of where society could be headed if it is not careful. In conclusion, Bradbury's book shows the downfalls of his dystopian society through the evils of the community within it. In Fahrenheit 451, Bradbury shows how the modern way of living will eventually alter life on earth completely. Ray Bradbury makes predictions of the future that is frighteningly accurate to what it is like today with news media portraying the world through destruction and violence, society losing social skills with friends and family because of a ‘digital wall’, and children being shoved through the school system only to go to places and destroy things