How Is Fahrenheit 451 Relevant Today

It is vital importance that we consider the impact technology has on our lives. An over-dependence on technology can lead to a loss of human interaction, addiction, and profoundly ingrained emotional problems in friendships, marriages, and families. Ray Bradbury's Fahrenheit 451 is more relevant now than ever before. The iPhone and social media's meteoric rise has led to a constantly disconnected and distracted society that is more connected to screens than others. This dependence created on technology is the root of problems such as apathy for others, suicide disconnection, and depression. Ray Bradbury's Fahrenheit 451 depicts a futuristic dystopia where everyone is always chasing the high of happiness and doing whatever they please. They

As Montag leaves the city and his old life behind, drifting in a river, a sudden peacefulness rushes over him; he feels "as if he had left a stage behind and many actors. He felt as if he had left the great séance and all the murmuring ghosts" (RB 133). The people in Fahrenheit 451 have always been present but not there, alive but not truly engaged; they live careless lives, raising careless kids doing careless things and wasting their lives watching TV. In this quote, people's true colors shine through; they go out in cars driving at mad speed and kill people and animals without a second thought; they ignore death, avoid deep questions, overdose and die on pills; they divorce and abort children like its nothing, they are genuinely empty inside. They have been conditioned that nothing matters as long as they remain happy, but no human can go out and ignore death or feelings and stay happy. Montag's rush of happiness comes when he disconnects and leaves it all behind, something, not many people do today, even though memories in nature and with our loved ones being present are those that last a lifetime. Later when Montag questions Mildred about where they met since he could not remember, she avoids the question and turns to her pills, then Montag comes to a cold realization that "if she died he was certain

Granger tells Montag about his Grandfather and the way he learned how to achieve real happiness, "It doesn't matter what you do, he said, so long as you change something from the way it was before you touched it into something that's like you after you take your hands away. The difference between the man who just cuts lawns and a real gardener is in the touching, he said. The lawn-cutter might just as well not have been there at all; the gardener will be there a lifetime" (RB 150). The true meaning of this quote is that even though people do the things they enjoy and are always happy, they do not do the things in their lives that matter and will leave an impact behind them; they go through the motions of life, living but not there, married but not in love, having fun but killing themselves. Suppose people go through the motions all their lives. In that case, they will not live a life that they will be happy with and proud of, they can do all the same things as those that care, but in reality, the difference between the two lives is in the caring and engagement, without that there is no way anyone can be truly