Why dystopian?

[robertbevan]

You forgot arguably the most important luxury of civilization that would sorely be missed... no toilet paper. Dry leaves just won't cut it for me.

very next post...

It wipes the slate clean for a fresh beginning -

come on guys, i was eating when i read this.



anyway... i was thinking about the resources you guys are talking about, be it toilet paper, medicine, food, whatever, and i had the exact opposite thought. i was thinking it would be more like "the stand" where there are so few people left, but empty shops are still full of everything the survivors could ever need until they get back on their feet and figure out how to make all that stuff again.

in fact, i liked the beginning of the stand a lot better than i liked where it went. i was hoping it was going to be more of a survival and rebuilding of civilization story, told from a few characters' points of view. and it was, but i could have done without all of the mystical good vs evil stuff.

 

[Penpilot]

come on guys, i was eating when i read this.

Sorry... I hope it wasn't oatmeal. Sorry again....seriously. But sometimes it's hard to pass up on the fart and kaka cracks.

anyway... i was thinking about the resources you guys are talking about, be it toilet paper, medicine, food, whatever, and i had the exact opposite thought. i was thinking it would be more like "the stand" where there are so few people left, but empty shops are still full of everything the survivors could ever need until they get back on their feet and figure out how to make all that stuff again.

I don't know how long resources would really last and be viable. Lots of the stuff would spoil. Antibiotics expire. Batteries go bad. Even stuff like rubber tires will dry rot over time. Gas degrades over time too. Dried food may last but only if they're protected from critters.

 

[Kit]

The canned food would be edible for generations, but the survivors would need to procure fresh veggies at the very least to stay healthy.

 

[morfiction]

I think dystopian societies or apocalyptic situations make such entertaining stories--or writing them even--is because you have an endless panel of choices ahead of you.

I'd rather write straight up fantasy. The rules can be written from scratch. You create the universe and everything. I feel too constricted writing in the real, modern world or in the future. I don't know how Dean Koontz or Stephen King or any other writer can stand it??

And, well, the questions I am forced to ask the other guys in the team I'm currently in right now (glances at own signature), I don't want to sound as if I'm bugging them but the rules are being redone and I feel inquisitive. I won't divulge which questions I am asking because of the NDA....

 

[Saigonnus]

I think the basic knowledge of how to make basic things (like toilet paper) would be something they'd pretty much HAVE to have to survive in a post-apocalyptic society. Canned goods may last awhile, but depends on the climate on how long. Excessive heat can force the bacteria in the cans to grow exponentially and cause explosive decompression (the top or bottom ruptures). That usually takes a long while (2-5 years). There was a documentary called "Life after People" that goes into what would happen if people just disappeared; not quite the same as a dystopic or post-apocalyptic setting, but gives some idea on how things would play out when unattended.

I would think a post-apocalyptic society would pretty much have to become self-sufficient for food and basic resource in a relatively short period of time. Something that affects humans that drastically would likely affect the natural world as well, making hunting and gathering much more difficult. The knowledge would be there, but likely the technology level would take a drastic plummet to something close to the pre-industrial times if not worse; with only a basic understanding of basic machines (hand operated most likely) for easing man's burdens.

 

[morfiction]

Thanks for the replies. The reason I'm asking is because I'm working on a dystopian scifi game with a team. I wrote about it in Self Promotion. No zombies, yet... I promise.

 

[Anders Ämting]

Robert Brockway offers a theory on this subject in this article.

Personally, though, I have a slightly different theory. I think it's about our latent hunter-gatherer mentality.

See, humans have been around for 200,000 years, and we spent the first 190,000 of those years as hunter-gatherers. (Some of us still do.) In that context, this whole "agriculture" thing is still sort of this bold new experiment, and having a desk job in an office is the equivalent of a sudden random impulse that may not turn out to have been such a good idea in hindsight.

What I mean is, most of us maintain lifestyles that we as a species were never really built for, anthropologically speaking, and our evolution hasn't quite had time to catch up.

And that's why we all have this little voice inside that sometimes goes: Why do I have to go to work? Why do I have to buy food and clothes with money when I could go out there and scavange it? I wish I could just walk into a store and grab whatever I need. Ooh, or hunt deer from a jeep with an assault rifle. That would be rad! So what if I had to dodge the occasional lion? Totally worth it. Screw it, maybe I'll run away to an island somewhere? Nobody to tell me what to do, just living off the land, not a care in the world.

Of course, most of us don't actually do that because we're not stupid. We know objectively that the benefits of modern life, like internet and medicin, more then outweigh the downsides and that "living off the land" is the direct opposite of "not a care in the world."

But that little voice is still there, because it doesn't appeal to an easier life, but rather a life our primal instincts are still telling us we were meant to live - I shouldn't have to go to work. I shouldn't have to pay for things. I should be able to spend all my time however I want.

Which is not to say we all want to be criminals deep down. We can still agree that walking into a store, grabbing a whole bunch of stuff and walking out without paying for it is morally wrong, that someone had to manufacture all that stuff and that those people are entitled to compensation. No, it goes a bit deeper than that: We feel that doing it shouldn't be morally wrong - that in some kind of perfect utopia, that is exactly how life should work. Like having to pay for things is an unfortunate flaw we just haven't found a way to correct yet.

Notice how the very moment conventional laws stop being enforced, typically during a crisis, we get a whole bunch of people looting stuff? I dare say most of those people normally wouldn't even think about stealing things. But the moment we feel that "the legal concept of ownership no longer applies in this situation" the impulse to hunt and gather just becomes overpowering. There's nothing right or wrong about it, I have to grab this awesome loot or someone else will.

But of course, for the most part we are law-abiding citizens who go to our dayjobs and earn our pay and buy our property, suppressing that little inner anarchistic bushman of ours. And I think that apocalyptic scenarios gives us an outlet for that. Watching a zombie movie or playing Fallout lets us safely imagine a lawless world were everything is free, money is useless and we get to do whatever we want, all the time. So what if I had to dodge the occasional radioactive mutant? Totally worth it.

 

[Christopher Wright]

Well, dystopian and apocalyptic aren't exactly the same. 1984 isn't apocalyptic--society still exists. It exists a LOT. Society is basically thriving. It's just a nasty, vicious, evil society that cannot be defied.

 

[Helen]

what do you think makes the apocalypse so entertaining?

Well, you need to world build.

And it's just a ready-made world with a backstory and a problem.

Like, a nuke war blew it up and now how do we return to Eden.

And we (human nature) have blown up and how do we return to some form of morality.

 

[ahhhitswells]

Because the world we live in is not natural for humans. Concrete walls and paved roads are not the way to grow.

An apocalyptic world resets this environment and brings out our animalistic nature.