I feel like people don’t dream of utopias much any more. Probably aspects of a utopia are seen as naïve, and moreover (paradoxically), impossible to achieve. I don’t believe this. I believe utopias are good, actually and moreover, possible.
Here’s a quick selection of concepts and trains-of-thought that are relevant to utopias, to give hope, to avoid common pitfalls and to save us all time.
I do have a point relevant to the title – I’ll come to it last.
“If everyone…”
A utopia can’t be based on everyone following one behaviour. It’s unworkable and also, challenges a component we would all hope for in a utopia – freedom. Our utopias need to allow for a range of pursuits and behaviours and opinions and capabilities.
(Future) Technology Will Save Us (Later)
Look, if the invention of mechanised factories in the 1800s, which allowed a population explosion, or at the very least, the combine harvester, which allows one person to harvest enough food for 100s and 100s of people, or women entering the workforce or the internet or all of the many inventions that liberated SO MUCH time and energy of the entire population, over and over again, and we *didn’t* somehow so far build a post-work utopia, then technology isn’t actually the bottleneck, is it. Civic and emotional and conceptual technology for wanting and imagining and building a utopia is what is missing.
Currently there is a big fear that “AI will take my job”. But I thought we all wanted to be freed from our jobs? In a utopia, all the basic needs are met, and all the boring jobs are automated, leaving humanity free to pursue activities that it truly wants to pursue. Shouldn’t we be glad that AI is taking our jobs? Oh wait you think humanity would have zero worthwhile pursuits if we didn’t work bullshit jobs in offices all day 🤔. Are you sure you want a utopia? Do you want nice things?
Never fear, I have a bunch of ideas for worthwhile pursuits that all of humanity could pursue in a post-work utopia, and that will form part of a later essay on Topias.
Nobody Dies
This is a basic rule for utopias that cannot be broken or you’ve made a hell-realm. Sorry that’s just how it works. No transition into a utopia can have anyone, anyone, much less a huge group of people, dying in order to achieve it. That is evil talk. Always, no exceptions. And lazy to boot. Yes I’m looking at you Left-wing ideologues you’re just as bad if not worse than all the other ideologues and individuals that advocate for huge groups of humanity to go extinct on the daily. NO!
Communities of Work
A failure mode I see in already-existing utopic communities trying to make it against the grain of the wider culture is to have to be constantly working to maintain one’s home environment and survival. Members who cannot constantly work are looked down upon or seen as a burden, while the workers toil and suffer.
This is not any better than what we have now, given there are these days quite numerous and broad liberal freedoms in the capitalist society we have already.
Utopia shouldn’t rely on un-chosen labour to function. We already got there!
Monotopia
There cannot be just one utopia. That’s an eternalist fallacy (“one system to rule them all”) that I think most people see through or at least sense at an intuitive level. There is not one perfect system that will make everything and everyone alright.
But that doesn’t mean we shouldn’t try for many utopias, or topias as I might now start calling them, that are suited to different contexts, different environments, with different solutions and different goals. Every physical environment needs its own solutions, every social environment needs its own boons and remedies. Constraints make us creative, and difference gives variety. Learning from each other is excellent and having many options for our souls to explore is important. Let 1,000 topias bloom!
Topia – All That’s Missing is U
When faced with the overwhelming sense that changing the world, or even moving the needle of the world, is basically impossible, a person wants to give up. It’s true that trying to change the entire world intentionally is too big of a challenge and really, just a fantasy. What’s the antidote?
Terence McKenna put it best when he said “The nexus of space and time where you are now is the most immediate sector of your universe… what is real is you and your friends and your associations, your highs, your orgasms, your hopes, your plans, your fears.”
The only part of reality that you have access to, is U. I invite you to live deeply in that reality.
A “topia” is a kaleidescope of ideas, attitudes, stances, emotions, objects, actions and most importantly, desires of how life could be. U is where it gets enacted. Only two things are required, some kind of embodied vision of how you want things to be, and U = a willingness to meet it, enact it, in your immediate sector of this universe, right now.
Willingness to meet a desire is an act of courage. I won’t downplay how much courage that really takes. I know. I am right here with you. It also takes belief. Maybe even faith. It is extremely cringe, especially if other people are watching. But it is a way through, that is not overwhelming. In fact it builds on itself. The courage gets rewarded. It’s a way to shimmy oneself onto golden timelines. Once there’s a leap of faith, it’s easy, especially since plenty of people will want to join in. God has a bias towards love, let’s do it the easy way for a change 🙂
Leave a Reply