2023 is about Utopian Hope & not Orwellian Dystopia

Is it right to sound “orwellian” on a New Year? Well what’s Orwellian. In 1949 an English Novelist, George Orwell wrote a social science fiction novel – Nineteen eight four. His Novel was centered around Stalinist Russia & Nazi Germany and how destructive it could be the welfare of the society.

His Novel became widely famous and “orwellian” got added to the english dictionary as an adjective which means “describing a situation, idea, or societal condition that George Orwell identified as being destructive to the welfare of a free and open society”

Why do I talk about “orwellian” now? Year 1949 was just after the World War II, the world was getting ready to re-build after the disruption & destruction the world war had brought. Albeit 75 years later, the world did learn and has avoided large scale war since then.

What’s Word War II, 1949 & Orwellian connected with in today’s context? Technologies like AI were disrupting how things are done & we had the Pandemic that disrupted the whole world, Here we are in 2023, looking forward to reconstruct the world. 2022 was more of a settling year. So the question naturally comes should we sound “dystopian”, live in fear or should we look forward to the “utopia”. Practicality is always between dystopia and utopia.

So as we are in the post pandemic disruption, I would say we should look forward to the utopian, look forward to the multitude of opportunities that’s around us. Disruptions are for us capture the moment and build on, History has taught us that

When Jesus Christ was in this world, transforming the society, it was probably all well for His disciples. Suddenly, He was arrested, flogged & crucified. He died, was buried and He resurrected and ascended into heaven. All this within just 72 hours sans the ascension which was 40 days later. The lives of Jesus’s disciples were disrupted, but they were prepared for a bigger cause in the days ahead. Once they received God’s strength as the Holy Spirit, they transformed the whole world. Today, the good news of Jesus Christ is known globally, and millions are touched by the love of God.

Today with this “contact-less” culture because of the pandemic & the “connection-less” culture because of the technology, we have had a huge disruption. Work from Home, Swiggy & Zepto are here to stay, we will go more and more “contact-less” & “face-less”. Insta, twitter, Whatsapp are all here to stay & we will be more and more “digital zombies” without relationships and connections leading to heart-lessness.

How are we going to deal with this “face-less-ness” & “heart-less-ness”?

Oh my God !! I am sounding orwellian now. The hope I have is the fears of orwellian were overcome. We didn’t have a world war since 1945. It wasn’t dystopian as orwell sounded in his novel, neither we had a Utopia. Practically, we have treaded somewhere in the middle. We are going to be same post this pandemic & technology disruptions. It’s about how much lesser we are face-less & heart-less will define how we have handled this disruption.

I strongly believe 2023 is the starting point to handle this. Somewhere in 2100, someone will look back and comment on our generation on How we have handled this disruption, probably by then there was another disruption, and our way of handling today’s disruption will have an answer for them too.

கடந்து வந்த 2022 ஆண்டு
பொல்லாத பெருந்தொற்றின் தாக்கம்
சற்றே அகன்று தப்பி பிழைத்தோம்
தகர்ந்து உடைந்த உலகு, மெதுவாகவே நகர்ந்தது
ஆகப்பெரும் தாக்கத்திலிருந்து மீண்டு தப்பித்த நாம்
வரும் ஆண்டை புத்துணர்வுடன்
காக்கும் வல்ல மெய்யோனை வணங்கி
பூமியில் நம் செயல்கள் யாவும் வெற்றிக்கனி ஈட்டிட
நம்பிக்கையுடன் உழைப்போம்

உலகின் பிணி வென்று ஒளிரட்டும் புத்தாண்டு
சனவரி துவங்கி உலகளாவிய புத்தாண்டும்
தை துவங்கி தமிழர்நம் புத்தாண்டும்
நன்மை பயக்கட்டும், வளம் செழிக்கட்டும்
மெய்யோன் அவன் ஓளியின் மகிமை
அனைத்துயிருக்கும் புத்துணர்வு அளிக்கட்டும்

புத்தாண்டில்
நம் உழைப்பும் இறைஅருளும் ஒருசேர நம்
உள்ளம் அகமகிழ, ஒளிர்வோம் பிரகாசமாய்