In Winner’s “Are Humans Obsolete?” he talks about how science and the creation of new technology “benefited some groups more than others and left working people in the dust” (pg 26). He also comments that if the “wider populace knew what the intellectuals and entrepreneurs had in store for them” they would prefer to be given a closer look at the predicted outcomes and ways to be more involved in the said outcomes. If the wider populace in Oryx and Crake had known about the sterilization effect of BlyssPluss, how might that have changed the story as a whole? Do you think that people would still have used it, despite the sterilization and risk of human extinction, due to the other benefits?
ENGL 360 | Future Perfect Human
Prof. Myra Seaman | Fall 2016
This is a great question. The industry of human improvement in Oryx and Crake is massive because there is a substantial market for genetic and cosmetic enhancement, as evidenced by Jimmy and Crake’s journey to the “street of dreams” in the pleeblands. As Winner suggests, the global economy is determining the future of human biology; supply and demand are promoting a dramatic shift toward the post-human. The general population is preoccupied with improving themselves and extending their lives, so the question of whether or not negative side effects would deter them is tricky. If people continued to use BlyssPluss (adverse effects be damned), it would attest to Crake’s attitude toward the inferiority and imperfection of humans as a species, as well as the dystopian atmosphere of the novel as a whole. Whether they knew the consequences or not, the general population would have used BlyssPluss because 1) narratively, they had to, and 2) to quote Goethe “even were he not pawned to the devil, he’d go down to perdition still.” The apocalyptic aftermath in Oryx and Crake is possibly the logical conclusion of what Winner calls the “obtuse arrogance” of post-human proponents.
I agreed with Winner’s thoughts on post-humanist fantasies; the global market would drive the production of human enhancements, only creating an insurmountable divide between modified humans and the unmodified. That is one of the reasons why I believe we should engage everyone in a debate over issues dealing with the theme of unnatural human enhancement.
In Oryx and Crake, I don’t think the outcome would have been at all the same had the populous knew of the crippling side effects, unless BlyssPluss were addictive in nature. The distribution of BlyssPluss relied on the secrecy of the company developing it. In fact, that is the problem. It wasn’t the global market or the consumer’s desire for the BlyssPluss drug, it was the shrouded secrecy and corrupt corporate practices in tandem with the massive propaganda campaign led by Jimmy.
I think it is far too assuming that humanity would allow themselves to fall victim to the side effects of BlyssPluss in the absence of the secrecy and propaganda. There would be a counter-movement as well, which would outshine the propaganda.