Dystopias: societies or civilizations that endure the absolute worst living conditions imaginable.
Dystopias are known to be societies where people live in fear. The dystopian TV shows that Iāve watched, such as āThe 100ā or āBlack Mirrorā, were my first introductions to dystopian societies.Ā Ā In āThe 100ā, the people in this civilization lived in a world consumed by radiation. But thatās not what made their living situation terrible, it was the people. They formed their own personal societies, governments, and rules. This caused turmoil to occur between each other due to their own personal beliefs clashing. Instead of working together to rebuild a livable society, they made their living conditions worse by adding more threats to their own lives. The āBlack Mirrorā portrayed different scenarios that could potentially happen in our society based on concepts we are familiar with. The most popular episode that I remember was the one about reading the terms and agreements. This turned to a dystopia by showcasing that if we donāt start reading through things like that, we can unintendedly agree to things we have no clue about.Ā Ā
Ā An interesting fact that Iāve learned so far is that a postapocalyptic world isnāt considered a dystopia. Although a world with zombies and monsters would be the worst thing to live through, itās not realistic. This made me realize that the media twisted peopleās minds about the original meaning of a dystopia. I say this because before learning what a dystopia actually is, I would often imagine a world similar to āThe Walking Deadā as a prime example of one. I believed that situations like that were the worst outcomes a society could have, but I forgot the main factor of it being fake. An example of a realistic dystopian society would be the pandemic. This was a dystopian time due to the world shutting down due to an illness. COVID-19 managed to cause death, unemployment, and other changes to occur in a short amount of time and lasted for years.Ā