This is the second story in this short story collection where Ballard talks about intensely cramped "efficient" spaces and overpopulation. I am a little curious if these are spurned by his experiences of growing up in Japan, considering cities like Tokyo where the living situation is very "efficient" i.e. small.
What is really interesting about this story is this sort of evolution of thought and what certain things mean to certain people. So they have to live in 4 cubic meter cubicles, that's the government standard, but they find this room that 15 cubic feet and it's so huge to them! It's funny because that's only like 5 cubic metersish. But all this extra space for them is intoxicating.
There are actually a bunch of topics that manage to be covered by this including overpopulation and government incentives that are self exacerbating. So like to live in a larger cubicle you need to be married and have 3 kids. But the world is already vastly overpopulated. Encouraging more kids just exacerbates the problem of lack of space and overpopulation. We're dealing with overpopulation in the real world even now. The Chinese government for sure screwed up when they mandated everyone have lots of children, now it's gotten so bad you can only have one! I feel that American religion sometimes causes problems with this too. "No sex till marriage" and "birth control (condoms) are bad" both contribute significantly to unnecessary population growth. With birth control it's easy to see, without birth control your chances of getting pregnant are really good. "No sex till marriage," well it encourages kids to get married really young. Not only is this usually dumb (but not always, sometimes it works out fine but the chances are real slim), but often married couples have kids. And merely having generations closer together contributes to the problem of overpopulation. If you wait longer, you spread out the generation and voila, there are less people on earth at once. (Learned this from reading Richard Dawkins, pretty fascinating tid bit eh?).
Fast food is kind of like this. The cheapest food is that which is worse for you, quality food costs a little more, so economically you are encouraged to eat at MacDonald's. Obesity in America unfolds. Quite the simplification I know, but I think it's a relevant thought. The whole idea is I think the model fits many things that happen in the real world.
Excellently written story, with an interesting twist at the end which is very Ballard.
Tuesday, April 6, 2010
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