A Comparison of Bradbury's vision of the future with contemporary times; furthermore a meditation on what he got right and/or what did he get wrong?

I was asked to read Fahrenheit 451 by Ray Bradbury. Moreover, while reading I was asked to think of some issues and themes the book addressed. Funny enough the book addressed some things that I have been complaining about in my class about modern society’s urge to appease everyone with political correctness, and its dependency on television. Moreover, how the contemporary society we live in and participate in has depreciation for literature and books.

In the text, Beatty the fire chief (character) explains how books became banned. He states that interest groups and “minorities” object to books because they were offended by them. Subsequently, books (literature) became the same. In addition, authors made an effort to avoid offending the “special groups” But it still was not enough, therefore “society” decided to simply burn books.

Guy Montag is the protagonist, he is a fireman. Firemen were the people in charge of burning the books. But he realizes the emptiness of his life. He begins to search for meaning through the books he is supposed to destroy. He learns that he needs the freedom to act upon the ideas of the books. The issue I found most similar to contemporary society other than the need for more literature and time to read/dissect it was exercising the freedom to act upon the ideas from literature. Guy Montag’s wife is described as fragile and sickly. She is “obsessed” with watching television and refuses to engage in conversation. She is described as Small-minded and childish. His wife Mildred does not understand much and has no desire to begin a process of understanding.

I think that our society has become “obsessed” with television because it is our closed mindedness that does not allow us to understand. Rather we want to be entertained and force feed ideas and images. Our society is not interested to invest time to read. It has no interest in conflicting ideas that have to be sought after and examined through another person’s word. Our society wants visual stimulation and conflict to be razzled dazzled liked self explanatory fireworks.

In addition, Bradbury had seen or at least knew about the Nazi book burning. He was aware of what human being were capable of in order to propel controlled chaos and peace. The Nazi’s high authority burned books to demonstrate the evil of the content or ideas. They destroyed ideas that did not agree; it was a form of control and propaganda. Another thing Bradbury got right was how people don’t appreciate the value of understanding and reading. Here is a video of some young people who exhibit this kind of ignorance and burn school books. For these two young men “it was a pleasure to burn” the books. They received satisfaction “a special pleasure to see things eaten, to see things blackened…”