“And if ever, by some unlucky chance, anything unpleasant should somehow happen, why, there’s always soma to give you a holiday from the facts. And there’s soma to calm your anger, to reconcile you to your enemies, to make you patient and long-suffering.” (Huxley, 237-138)
Drugs are everywhere. Although it may not seem that way just scratching the surface of U.S. culture, the reality is that culture, especially adolescent culture, is infiltrated with drugs. What has initiated this, you may ask? I mainly attribute it to media and social conformity, the latter being most significant. Today, songs blasting from radios confirm the benefits of getting drunk and high, the benefits to escaping reality and the world right in front of you. “I smoke the drug
…show more content…
To further distract from the singularity and free expression of emotion that constructed the previous world before them, the World State prescribes soma, a drug which keeps its’ user from simply feeling or expressing emotion. Rather than confront or deal with a feeling other than happiness, the World State citizens are conditioned to laugh, pop a few grammes of soma into their system, and instantaneously feel fine. “A gramme is better than a damn” (Huxley, 3.232), right? Wrong. Reliance upon soma has eroded each citizen’s sense of morality, appreciation of the life they have, and ability to truly express what they think and feel. Mustapha Mond, the guardian of this society, puts it best:
‘Now, you swallow two or three half-gramme tablets, and there you are. Anybody can be virtuous now. You can carry at least half your mortality about in a bottle. Christianity without tears- that’s what soma is” (Huxley,