Associate I earn from qualifying purchases. Dystopian fiction is social commentary with a side of terror. It uses hyperbole to try and help us see that we are the frogs in the water that is starting to boil. It takes situations that some people are currently giving the side-eye, projects them into the future, and magnifies them x100. According to Rare Books Digest, the first dystopian novel was written in Russian but was banned and had it’s first release in the U.S. in 1924. What better way for such a form to make its debut than as a banned book? Aldous Huxley and George Orwell quickly took up the mantle, and dystopia soon became required reading in every high school English class. Most of us can’t get a diploma without reading Brave New World, 1984, or Fahrenheit 451. Now that it’s the 21st century, students are even reading female-authored dystopia such as Suzanne Collins’s The Hunger Games or Margaret Atwood’s The Handmaid’s Tale . If you loved The Handmaid’s Tale, you will want to read Vox by Christina Dalcher.
Despite all my rage…
This book made me angry. I named this blog Given Context, because there is often an uncanny overlap of the things I read and events in my life. Vox was a selection for my sci-fi book club, but I couldn’t attend the discussion because it conflicted with my tap dance class. I wanted to read the book anyway, so I put it on hold with the Overdrive app. I had to listen to the audiobook when it became available, but this was not a good time in my life to be listening to this book. Either that, or it was the perfect time. While I was reading/listening to it, I wrote this post about feeling like I had nothing to say. Is it ironic that a book that is meant to spur women into speaking up seemed to have the opposite effect on me?
Someone told me that something like this book could never happen. But I see far too clearly a world where women are ready and willing to hand over their power. I see it happen every day. I see myself doing it. I see women lined up to exchange their Apple watches for torture devices… better yet, there’s probably an app for that. I won’t pretend to be a history or political science expert, but didn’t something like this happen in Saudi Arabia? Didn’t women there formerly have rights and freedoms that were rescinded “for their own protection?” You don’t have to get very far down any #familyvalues comment thread to find a woman who has internalized misogyny to the point that she is eager to sign up for “protection.” These aren’t people talking out of their (blanks) … these are real women who really believe that someone else is better qualified to make decisions about their life and livelihood because he’s a man… and oh yeah, god said so. And no amount of rational argument is going to change someone’s mind when they really believe this… so we don’t argue. We let them be and keep our mouths shut. We keep the peace and assume it will get better. This book brings all that up, and my rage-meter was off the charts for several days after finishing it.
Words count
In Vox the counter on a woman’s wrist tracks how many words she says each day. Each woman is allowed 100 words. At this point in this blog, I have already written nearly 600 words. I think carefully about each word, because I am going to publish this, and a lot of my friends are English majors. Women are not allowed to use sign language or gestures. They aren’t allowed to write. They aren’t even supposed to read. Words are off limits beyond those 100 sacred utterances. The counter resets at midnight, there’s no saving up for tomorrow. Little girls are rewarded for staying silent at school. They are strapped into a torture device before they learn to speak, so they learn not to speak. If a woman exceeds her 100 words, this device delivers a shock. Each subsequent transgression earns an exponentially increased shock until she faints from the pain or until the shock is lethal. But this was for their own good.
What is a woman without words? How many times have you heard stereotypes about women talking too much? Have you ever called someone a chatty Cathy? I was once instructed that when talking to a particular male colleague I should “be bright, be brief, and be gone.” My reaction was to avoid any interaction with him from that point on. I’m not opposed to people being thoughtful about what they say, but I think it’s imperative as we move toward more inclusive cultures and work-spaces that we acknowledge that people don’t all think the same, and we won’t all talk the same. Stop trying to change women, and create spaces where we can really all be our authentic selves. Or else stop paying lip service to inclusion by only including those who fit a certain narrow concept of what is acceptable. Silencing women is so deeply ingrained in our culture, but that it’s hard to see all of the ways that it happens, even when you’re the one it’s happening to. I want to use my words right now to ask us all to look closer at all the ways this is happening. From when we speak and don’t speak to the words we choose. Listen closely.
Newspeak
Language is what separates us from the animals. George Orwell explored the intersection of Politics and the English Language in his 1946 essay. I might write an entire blog sometime comparing what he says there to the use of newspeak and the Ministry of Truth in 1984. Suffice it to say, for now, that language and the control of language is a central theme in dystopia. That being the case, Vox doesn’t introduce to anything new. It is, however, a distinctly modern dystopia. Most of the latest dystopian novels I have read take place in a world that has reverted to pre-smartphone lack of technology. In Vox, the technology is available, but only half the population has access. Education is available, but only half the population has access. If the book was set in another country, I would say it is all too believable. There are real countries on earth where girls, future women, do not have access to education, information, health care, feminine hygiene products, and other basic necessities that would enable and empower them. And I feel powerless to help them.
Now that you’re thoroughly depressed…
Let’s make sure that nothing like this happens in our great country. Let’s take note of when we are being silenced or when it is happening to someone else, and let’s speak up. Let’s pay attention to what is happening in other countries and use our privilege and influence where we can. Let’s read more books and write about them. And if all else fails, listen to some Rage Against the Machine. Just do something!