Many years ago I read a book by William Gibson called Neuromancer. This book was – at the early start of the diffusion of Internet 20-something years ago – rather prophesying as to the impact of the emerging technology. The Neuromancer became a cult hit and climbed up to be the Cyberpunk movement bible. And with good reason: William Gibson was able to accurately depict the effects of a world encompassing information network, and he did this many years before the Internet went commercial.
Besides that, of course, Gibson has invented the entire “Matrix” format, that was used in three motion pictures – plus 1: his book ” Virtual Light” was the basis for the film Johnny Mnemonic. It goes without saying that I have deep respect for mister Gibson and that I consider his writings a must for any SciFi lover who takes himself seriously.
Now Gibson has company. Good company, I must add. I think Ben Elton, the author of the book “Blind Faith” has written something of Neuromancer Magnitude.
Elton describes a world where reason and science have fallen victim to suffocating superstition, managed by a class of rulers who stop at nothing to keep the people dumb and docile, destroying the very purpose of their big brained existence in the process: reason.
I had difficulties getting through the first few chapters, because the world Elton describes is so brutal, so appalling and so cringingly aggravating, that it took some stamina to keep reading. But once you get used to the blatant stupidity of the characters in the book, you start to see the parallels with the world we live in today.
Blind Faith is prophetic in a way. Not in its depiction of the catastrophic ignorance of the people, I hope, but it obviously alludes to the HighPower Consumerism and SuperSize-Me attitude we currently despise the USA for. Maybe I am not entirely on the mark here, and is Elton actually describing his own people*.
Blind Faith is highly recommended reading for anyone who wants us to survive the pressure of the mass stupidity, that is so abundantly spread across the world by the mass media, the mass food industry, the mass opinion manufacturers, the mass superstition spinners and the mass gullibility exploiters.
In the mean time though, and possibly against better judgement, one hopes the opposite of the book to become reality and people to smart up fast enough to save our planet from ecological disaster and humanoid ignorance. Fat chance, I’m afraid…
* That wouldn’t surprise me at all, because the brief fling I had with an English woman living in London was very revealing in this respect. I have never seen so much superstition, ignorance, lazyness, shallowness, rejection of healthy reason, critical thinking and intelligence, as in that period, in that social network and on that Island. I still thank god, in spite of his non-existence, that I managed to close down that embarrassing episode in my life without any serious harm to my self esteem.
