Children In Brave New World

When children are intrigued by the concept of time travel, their parents often warn them of the danger of killing a butterfly when visiting the past. A child’s favorite animal could become vastly genetically different or even extinct, catalyzed by the untimely killing of that one particular butterfly. While a child traveling to a former time is simply a naive whim, modern science has made altering nature’s evolutionary means a glaring reality, which exhibits the same dangers as a child killing a butterfly. Humans have feared the impacts of artificially altering life for centuries, but the possibility of doing so is now falling into the grasp of today’s scientists. The longing for discovery seems to outweigh the practical consequences that

Children in Brave New World do not even know who their parents are, as they are just the product of artificial insemination in a fertilizing centers. Most people in the society do not even know what parents are; even the Alpha students touring the Hatchery must have the concept of parents explained to them. The Director says, “‘the parents were the father and the mother.’ The smut that was really science fell with a crash into the boys’ eye-avoiding silence” (Huxley, 24). Similarly, when John is worried about his mother’s impending death and merely used the word “mother,” the nurse “glanced at him with startled, horrified eyes...was all one hot blush” (Huxley, 199). In such a disjointed and impersonal society, even medical professionals rebuke suggestions of parental figures. In the place of children being nurtured by parents, the state conditions children and brainwashes them how to think and act through hypnopaedia, or sleep-teaching. While children do not really have to be taught how to survive because the totalitarian government does everything for them, they are taught subjects such as Class Consciousness and Sex. Children of different castes are taught how to fulfill their role in society and dislike other castes to maintain the status quo; Beta children are taught phrases such as “oh no, I don’t want to play with Delta children” and “I’m really awfully glad I’m a beta” (Huxley, 27). The seclusion of children from their parents shows how evolution has been completely rebuked in Brave New World’s