Aldous Huxley skewers civilization’s descent into fatuous pleasure-seeking. We’re a vapid lot, he observes, gorging on the masticated pap of moronic cinema, witless wireless arias, and the ersatz intellectual sustenance from that phonypapers ignobly titled the “Press.” Rather than exercising our flaccid gray matter, we prefer to absorb entertainment via that most indolent of actions—a passive, vicarious spectatorship. Yet our puerile ennui shall inevitably swell, demanding ever-more sordid and savage distraction to divert our cretinized minds. Why, the resurrection of gladiatorial bloodsport seems a merciful inevitability to placate us depraved, atavistic philistines! Huxley’s dagger of derision cuts to the cultural jugular with surgical precision.
Published in Vanity Fair.
