Alcoholism In Brave New World

Human nature leads to emotion and insecurity. When real passion becomes too great for some to bear, they turn to unreal substances to acquire fake sentiments. Aldous Huxley is the author of Brave New World and he perfectly displays that people use drugs, alcohol and other substances to replace real emotion; he also describes that the media can warp the way the public views these pharmaceuticals.

When individuals experience great emotional pain, they will sometimes use certain substances to drown out those negative feelings. In Brave New World by Aldous Huxley, a common “drug” that they refer to as soma. Soma is used by nearly every person when any unfortunate event or glum feeling occurs. They use it to forget all of the issues or inconveniences

In our current day society, alcohol is often put in a positive light. A group of young adults were put into two separate groups to watch two different movies that both displayed alcohol usage. In one movie, alcohol use was brief and illustrated in neither a positive or a negative way. The other movie described alcohol in a very positive manner and it was used quite frequently. Each group was put in a separate room and both were stocked quite well with snacks, soda and alcohol. After the movie was over, Rutger C. M. E. Engels, Roel Hermans, Rick B. van Baaren, Tom Hollenstein, Sander M. Bot the authors of article “Alcohol Portrayal on Television Affects Actual Drinking Behavior” and the creators of this experiment tallied up the number of drinks each individual consumed. They reported that “viewing a movie in which alcohol is portrayed appears to lead to higher total alcohol consumption of young people while watching the movie”, and this shows that yes, popular representation in the media has an effect on people. In Brave New World, soma has a slogan: “One cubic centimeter cures ten gloomy sentiments”; the government spreads this slogan through people and the media, forcing all in this society to view soma in a favorable manner. Media portrayal can greatly alter the way the public views drugs and alcohol, and it will pressure society to use them. Huxley included the numbers “one” and “ten” to show the difference. Just “one cubic centimeter” can cure all of those “ten gloomy” ones. It appeals to those that hear it, causing them to subconsciously think of how easy using soma is. Without taking too much, you can help yourself out immensely. Aldous Huxley remarkably uses well thought-out words and relatable to real world examples to affirm that the media molds how appealing products are to