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In her novel Oryx and Crake Margaret Atwood portrays an alternate reality of genetic engineering gone wrong in a dystopian society. However, as of late, her novel is inching closer and closer to a brutal reality. Although the novel is fictional it displays many parallels to our society. It has aspects that some groups in our society face today such as having an us against them mentality and being the last of a kind. As science and engineering progresses, the value for human life declines.
In his article Pigoons, Rakunks and Crakers: Margaret Atwood’s Oryx and Crake and Genetically Engineered Animals in a (Latourian) Hybrid World Jay Sanderson explores the ideas of social ranking, scientific progress and its cost, as well as corporate power and commodification.
He uses all these theme to connect to a primary topic of social injustice. He finds that Atwood’s speculative fiction isn’t too far from being a reality.
The novel features many groups of people, the plebs, crakers, the words and science people.
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These groups are physically separated by the walls of a compound and socially by what's available to them in their environment. The crakers and Pleebs have to scavenge to survive while those inside the compound are living lavishly. In this society, people are designed to have max production and efficiency, even if it means sacrificing relationships with loved ones. Jimmy’s mother exclaims “Leave Daddy alone,” said his mother. “Daddy is thinking. That’s what they pay him for. He doesn’t have time for you.”(18).
As a child, Jimmy, had to live in a dysfunctional household with constant fighting, and lacked a meaningful relationship with his father as he constantly had to “think” for his job at Organinc.
As the world around Jimmy gets destroyed so does social equality, which forms a social pyramid. Under the new identity of Snowman, he is living with the bottom feeders of society, the crakers, a group of genetically engineered humans designed without the flaws of jealousy, love, and sexual frustration. However because of this, they are very ignorant not at their fault and jimmy lacks the ability to teach or build a meaningful relationship with them. This just further applies Sandersons idea of the state of human relationships and a social ladder.
Scientific progress can prove very beneficial in improving life for all, however it also comes with a cost. The world of Oryx and Crake is not just an opinion on costs of advanced biological science, it is a warning that scientific progress without humanistic ideas leads to poor moral and ethical decision making. We can see this in Crake, as his science gets more elaborate, his morals and regard for human life decline. And once it finally starts to click with him, his fate is already decided, death. Enthusiastically Jimmy’s father says “There's been a lot of fooling around in those days: create-an-animal was so much fun, said the guys doing it. It made you feel like God.”.(42).
With the scientific power available in this world comes great responsibility, however it is evident that is thrown out the window, especially with jimmy’s dad who feels like “god” when he’s at work. How could someone morally conscious be okay with playing god in their world, and creating people and animals alike in their image. Unaware of the consequences for others, these scientist can place new predator in the environment which can have adverse effects for those already there or simply create creature that can not think for themselves. While scientific progress could be advantageous, it could cause more problems than it solves if the power is given to the wrong people.
Just like our society, the World of Oryx and Crake is filled with capitalism and corporate greed. All the engineering companies in the novel have the same goals of max production and efficiency. All of it to improve a few lives which were already pretty good to start while the rest of society that they created are struggling to survive day to day, as well as any humans like jimmy who were left on the outside of the compound. Even before the destruction of the world in the novel, created creature were abused for labor purposes without regard for their life as another one could simply be manufactured if they died. Thinking to himself Jimmy says “Strange to think of the endless labor, the digging, the hammering, the carving, the lifting, the drilling, day by day, year by year, century by century; and now the endless crumbling that must be going on everywhere. Sandcastles in the wind.”(31).
All the man power, time, just meet a corporate agenda, and its never ending, and to top it off, human labor devalues as technology improves, causing many to live with the bare minimum. Corporate greed is the root of all this, and unless the higher ups start to care for all those that could be affected by their actions, the cycle will continue, whether it's in the novel or in real life. While corporations may have a ton of power, all that can be taken away by the power of nature or a higher being, as seen in this example in the novel. Just like the novel, in our society, we see plenty of commodification. This is most evident in factories in china, which have poor work conditions, living conditions, low wages and high hours for max production. This all for the need to mass produce technology as science and engineering improves. Commodification in the novel and real life is morally and ethically wrong, however corporations do not care and continue to devalue human life.
Lastly, whether its real life or in the novel, human life has seemed to devalue as technology has vastly improved. Atwood's novel Oryx and Crake based on speculative fiction, seems to be more real with our current technological advances and current political climate. Social justice is a universal theme as it has been seen in both this novel and Power, these authors both in the speculative fiction field are aware of the current social injustices in our world and display the issues minorities face in our society into a fictional novel that can be viewed as warning of what's to possibly come.
Line Between Speculative and Reality. (2021, Dec 04). Retrieved from https://studymoose.com/line-between-speculative-and-reality-essay
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