Society's Use Of Control In Fahrenheit 451

In the four texts, Feed by M.T Anderson, Fahrenheit 451 by Ray Bradbury, Pedestrian by Rad Bradbury and Black Mirror Nosedive by Joe Wright, we can see how they connect to show resistance against control. Resistance is demonstrated through war, undermining, and power. In these texts, resistance sometimes benefits people but sometimes can end significantly worse.

Although society in Feed is being controlled, we see resistance from Violet. In Feed, Violet tries to resist the Feed. She does this by confusing it and showing interest in many completely different things. Although in the end, this doesn’t work well for her, she manages to lose the algorithm the feed created for her. “…what I’ve been doing over the Feed for the last two days, is trying

Fahrenheit 451 shows a dystopic world where book burning is the way of limiting imagination and depth of thought. Resistance is shown in Fahrenheit 451 when Montag hides books in his house. When Beatty finds out about the books and burns down Montag’s house, Montag goes on the run and him and Faber decide together what to do from this point onwards. “I feel alive for the first time in years… I feel I’m doing what I should have done a lifetime ago.” Over time, the urge to resist the control that the government has put on society by eliminating books, has taken over and they finally do it. They feel relieved and “alive” once they are on the run. From the quote we see how Montag and Faber are aware what they are doing is morally the right thing. Montag and Faber’s resistance to control works together with the resistance we see from Leonard Mead in the Pedestrian. “In ten years of walking by night or day, for thousands of miles, he had never met another person walking, not once in all that time.” Like in Fahrenheit 451, Leonard Mead is resisting the expectation of only finding happiness through consumed things such as parlours and televisions. Whilst everyone else in society is inside, glued to their screens, Leonard Mead is out walking and appreciating the natural environment. This is like Violet when she is slowly dying. She wants to resist the stereotype of only finding

Mead goes on walks every night whilst the rest of society is inside watching television. He appreciates these walks as its time for him to gather his thoughts and relax. As the rest of society is fitting in with each other, Leonard Mead is escaping this and enjoying little things by himself. He is resisting by refusing to sit in his house all evening and watch TV. He doesn’t even own a television. He lives in a society where books and writing are a thing that isn’t socially acceptable. Since Mead is a writer, he is resisting this concept. “In ten years of walking by night or day, for thousands of miles, he had never met another person walking, not once in all that time.” Mead has been walking and resisting the control and temptation of being addicted to the technology for at least 10 years. This quote shows resistance as we see Mead is the only person, he has never encountered someone else who also resists against the stereotype. The resistance shown in Pedestrian connects with Black Mirror Nosedive to show resistance in dystopic settings. “I started saying what I wanted, when I wanted. Just drop it out there…” When Cherry Jones, the truck driver in Nosedive, says this, we learn that she is resisting the control through not caring about her ratings. In Nosedive everyone needs to get a good rating to feel satisfied with life. At least that is how they have been