Critical Essay on Gender Equality in Brave New World

Introduction

"Brave New World" is a science-fiction novel that was written by Aldous Huxley in the year 1913. Its setting is in a world where science is used to capitalize on people's happiness and thus to eliminate the possibilities of making a decision. The story is set six hundred years in the future where all people are in a totalitarian state, which is free of hatred, war and poverty and full of entertainment while humans are formed in factories by use of technology, raising children and adults left to work and entertain themselves. Despite this, the novel still reflects the same old gender equality issues, and as such, the paper will focus on explaining why there is still gender inequality despite the abolishment of traditional roles of men and women and the evidence to support. The difference of roles of men and women in the World state will be extensively discussed to argue that there is still gender inequality in the Brave New World.

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The Dominance of Men in the World State

The dominant and civilized characters in the setting are only men (Chasemills, n.p). Lenina is the only female character that has a higher role while Mustafa Mond, John the savage, Bernard Marx and Helmholtz Watson have more senior positions. This novel set primarily presents inequality. A good example is at Bernard's party where the bankers and regional controllers are men while the caretakers, erotic personages and nurses are the only jobs left for ladies. Therefore, it shows civilization has been highly allowed on men while women are not given or rather exposed to these opportunities.

Psychological Domination and Control over Women

Psychological dominance is played over the women while they are expected to be submissive despite. In an attempt by the government to control reproduction, sterilization of the only foetus in females shows that women are degraded in this society. A man being part of life reproduction also stood a chance of being sterilized (Chasemillis, n.p). Why were they not cleaned? It only shows that the government felt leaving the future of the offspring's under men safer than in women. Seemingly, this is psychological dominance over women. Also, in the first chapter of the novel, Huxley introduces the director leading a crowd of only young men through the test tube since women are not allowed to be part of this. Women are expected to be submissive on the rules made over them while the two women; Lenina and Fanny decides to obey, Linda goes against it and cannot be tamed. As a result, she ends up dying due to overuse of the drug used for comfort.

Women as Objects of Sexual Desire and Irrational Beings

In this setting, women play the role of creatures with sexual desires and beings of irrationality. A good example is where Bernard decides to sleep with all types of women, even up to six women in a week (Huxley 64). On the other hand, Lenina struggles with her love with John, who can't fulfil her sexual desires. When Lenina requests John to have sex, but John declines. The view of marriage in this context, especially by women is not good. When John asks Linda to marry her, she replies, "what a horrible idea!" Bernard also makes fun of Linda, who is a single mother with a son called John. According to Linda, being a single mother isn't a problem; in fact, she enjoys sleeping around with men. Others, especially her fellow women, hate Linda because of this behaviour, they hate her more because of her appearance. They describe her as fat, lost her youth, blotched skin texture, bad teeth and figure ...." (Huxley 153). Through Linda, Huxley has clearly shown that motherly figure was hated.

Conclusion

Huxley, through his novel "Brave New World", predicted the world that we are living today. The acts of test tube babies have been embraced, and sexual immorality has become dominant. Huxley prediction on change of roles of both men and women through technology came true. However, the big picture of inequality has been seen throughout the setting of the novel. Women have been used as objects of sexual desires; their roles and capabilities are underrated by the society they are living. While men are given opportunities to learn, grow and get civilized, women are denied these opportunities. While the community trusts women, women are not. Gender inequality is exhibited in the setting of this novel. The happiness that the society in the book wants to attain is no happiness. In search of this happiness, women like Linda ends up losing her life due to the shame brought about by being a mother.

Work Cited

Chase, Millis.Brave New World: Men's Domination Over Women. Hobby Lark 2016 Retrieved From https://hobbylark.com/fandoms/Brave-New-World-Men-vs-Women

Huxley, Aldous. Brave New World, HarperCollins, 1932 Retrieved From http://www.idph.com.br/conteudos/ebooks/BraveNewWorld.pdf

Duckworth, Angela, and Angela Duckworth. Grit: The power of passion and perseverance. Vol. 234. New York, NY: Scribner, 2016.

Lee, Suk, and Bob Song, eds. Never Give Up: Jack Ma In His Own Words. Agate Publishing, 2016.

Read, James H. "Leadership and Power in Nelson Mandela's Long Walk to Freedom." Journal of Power 3.3 (2010): 317-339.