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Mans Quest for Utopia

Mans Quest for Utopia In 1516, Sir Thomas Moore published his Utopia. He wrote of a perfect world, one where optimal common wealth was acheived, and there was a common satisfaction with the system. Though Moore may have coined the owrd "utopia," this was by no means a new concept. Ever since the dawn of time, man has dreamed of a better world.There has always been a desire to make things better, to create a happier and more peaceful existence. Throughout history, various leaders, terrorists, and commoners have strived to create their own perfect world. However, one conflict has always arisen: everyone holds their own image of utopia. And when these images clash, problems arise that make utopia harder to grasp. By examining history as the documentation of man's quest for utopia, we see man striving for utopia in three ways: conquest, reform, and isolation. Hitler, Napoleon, Caesar, and Ghengis Khan all saw their own personal utopia as a world in which they were in control of a vast empire. For Hitler it was an arian society where the world was cleansed of the "impurities" that had "infected" society. For Napoleon is was simply a large France that followed his Napoleonic code. Caesar was more interested in the military side of things and wanted a large militaristic empire that would be more powerful than anything the world had ever seen. Ghengis Khan was interested in many of the same things as Caesar in that he was interested in militaristic matters. All of these great men used conquest as their vehicle to their personal utopia. Most of them succeeded, even if only for a small period of time. Hundreds of other leaders through history have used conquest as well. Conquest is a common tool for those who wish to obtain some sort of authority. Anyone with even a moderate knowledge of history can see a pattern of conquest to seek the perfect world. If one does not, however, wish to expand one's surroundings, but merely improve the existing ones, one turns to reform to seek their utopia. Mao Zedong, Peter the Great, Thomas Jefferson, and Rev. Martin Luther King Jr all used reform to try and attain their utopia.While Mao tried to do away with the "four olds" of ancient China and turn toward a Communist society, Peter the Great was more interested in gaining ideas from the west and modernizing to their standards. Both Jefferson and King had ideas of freedom and equality in mind when they presented their reforms. (However Jefferson and King probably had different ideas on equality.) Reform is a more modern tool than conquest. Reform is often geared towards a group utopia as opposed to a personal utopia. Conquest normally satisfys no one but the conqueror, whereas reform is ordinarily beneficial to the general public. Reform can happen on a small scale or a large scale. Mao certainly acheived reform on a large scale by reforming an entire country's governmental system. The theatre department at Newton North High School, however, acheived reform on a large scale when they made the Senior Cup award available to any student, not just athletes. Isolation is another technique that is rarely used, but used nonetheless to acheive utopia. The Native Americans, and Japanese emperor Tokugawa achieved isolation in order to accomplish utopia for their civilization. The Native Americans did not attempt to conquer any lands, nor did they feel it necesarry to reform their ways. The only major problem that they encountered was the invasion of their land by the Explorers. Ever since they have seeked isolation from the ever-growing civilization around them. Because they were inferior to their conquerors technologically, isolation was their only hope to survive. Emperor Tokugawa faced many of the same problems as the Native Americans.The Japanese culture was being threatened by conquerors much as the Native Americans were. Until Commodore Perry triggered the Meigi Restoration, Japan isolated itself from the rest of the world for 250 years. Japan saw what the west was doing to Chinese culture and feared that their culture would be completely destroyed by Western influence. To Tokugawa, utopia already existed, and it was his job to defend it. Isolation is not a very wise tool as communication is necesarry to achieve world peace, which is the ultimate utopia. Isolation is seen as very self-centered, however is is less so than conquest. However history has not ended. It continues every second of every day and utopia is still being sought after. In the future, I believe that the quest for utopia will turn back to conquest, but not the land conquests that we are familiar with. Now that we are in an age where loyalty to G-d or to one's nation has been replaced with loyalty to one's company, conquest will turn into buisness transactions. AOL- Time Warner, Mitsubishi, Sony, Viacom, General Motors, and all of the other Fortune 500 companies will attempt to "conquer" one another by buying eachother. This will lead to an untimate rivalry between two major conglomerates. Isolation may show itself if there comes a "green party" conglomerate (a GPC) of sorts into this rivalry which attempts to claim some communities of its own. These communitis will be isolated from the rest of the buisness world out of disgust for the rivalry. They will be loyal only to their GPC. Once our GPC faces competition by more GPCs, the major rivals will become less frequented. The era of buisness conquest will end and we will attempt to achieve our utopia by returning to simpler times. Reform will be on everyone's lips as we try to free ourselves from the grasps of technology. More people will try to live without their computers, blenders will be replaced with hand-strokes and running will replace treadmills. Some communities will reject GPCs for small, family-owned providers in an attempt to simplify. Conquest may return again once people realize that the entire world thrives on technology and living without it would put us into a modern dark ages. New conglomerates may arise, and we may face new rivalries, but not the extent that we saw in the era of buisness conquest. We will have learned from our mistakes before, and conglomerates will remain relatively small and prosperous. History is a curious thing. It seems to come in cycles, but whenever we return to the beginning of the circle, we seem to be in a different place than we were when we were there last. But despite the curiosities that plague historians about the meaning of history, there will always be the search for utopia. It will always be there, on an unreachable pedastle, and perhaps it will never be reached. " All historical experience confirms the truth that man would not have attained the possible unless time and again he had reached out for the impossible." Bibliography:

Word Count: 1147