|by Kurt Vonnegut (follow up's ?)
Life in Vietnam
There wouldn't be any societies that are perfect without some supportive, special and intelligent people. Therefore, I disagree with this concept. Competitions are necessary for a country to grow and develop, especially a developing country like Vietnam. Why people compete each other, because they want to have more money than others, and that is the motivation which make a country develop. However, if everybody is equal, is there going to be any competitions exist? The reason why our human society have a modern life like today because in the past, there had been so many competitions between talented, smart people, followed that are series of new inventions that bring the human society to a new level of technology.
You are designing a society in which everyone is equal. What are the laws?
- No one is smarter than anybody else. (wearing earphones that send noise every 20 seconds)
- No one is more beautiful than anybody else. (wearing masks)
- Quick and flexible people are required to carry heavy things.
- If anybody try to take off their equipments, go to jail for 2 years.
- Everybody only has $1500 per month to live.
- Companies are all under control and required to pay taxes every month (pay taxes until every companies leftover with $5000).
- Everybody only wear clothes the government give (with the same price).
- Each household can only have 2 cars and 2 motobikes.
- Children that born in the same day, month and year study together.
- Whoever believe in racism would go to jail for 1 year
What would you do to help people who were less capable mentally, physically, or socially to “catch up”?
In year 2081, technology is absolutely moderner than now, so it would not be that hard to create a machine that help people face problems with their intelligence, health or interactions. Or besides complicated machines, volunteered university students can open a free class only for those people. We can check their health every three months and invent medicines that are able to heal sickness. People like that need some encouragement from us so they can be brave when they socialize with other people.
What problems can you foresee that might come in a society with laws that force “equality for all”? How would you handle those problems?
There would be 3 groups of people, the low intelligent people, normal, and talented, intelligent people. The first two groups would please as what they have, but the third group would rebel against this concept. It would be very hard for the government to control because their rebellion group of people are mostly talented and smart and they would be the big threat. The only way the government can do about that is using force. The government can kill, punish or imprison rebel people. Another way is to persuade them to work in the government, so we can take advantage of their intelligent to rule the country.
Do you believe that total equality is possible, or would human nature make sure that some people would eventually dominate others?
Total equality has never appeared to my mind. It is human nature from 5 thousands years ago people fight each other to have power, divide into coutries, naturally form a human society like the one we are having. Despite every single citizens are all equal, a country itself is already unequal. Every country has its own government, the control of the government already reflects that it is nature that some people control and dominate others, otherwise where are all laws come from?
In what situations have you felt similarly to any of the characters? What persons, places, or ideas from your own experience came to mind while you were reading this story? Try to list as least two examples.
When was in grade 4, I used to study with a student who had problems with his intelligence. Like the camera man in the story, he always had trouble figuring out which way should pictures look like. Everybody in my class can all write our own essay, but to him, he always wrote wrong spelling and no one can understand what is his essay about. I felt pity for him that when he was born, he did not have as good brain as normal people. The second person the remind me of the workman near my house is the beautiful ballerina. The ballerina was punished for being such a beautiful girl, well, this man only works for his food. Every time I go back home from school, I always see that man, under the bright, blindingly dazzling sunlight, he carries tens of cement bags, lays them on the sidewalk, next to a big construction. Whenever I see that man, I wonder myself, "Does that man have enough food to eat?"
