Technological Success, Emotional Failure: Civilization and Unhappiness in THERE WILL BE BLOOD
Happy is the man free of business cares, who, like the men of olden days, ploughs the family fields with his own oxen and neither lends nor borrows. — Horace, Beatus Ille[1] In his essay, Civilization and Its Discontents, Sigmund Freud seeks to connect the unhappiness of man as an individual to civilization and society, exploring concepts such as the sexual and death instincts, the relationship between technological development and happiness, and, to some extent, the god-complex. Freud defines civilization as “the achievements and the regulations which distinguish our lives from those of our animal ancestors,” “protect men against nature,” and “adjust their mutual relations.”[2] He remarks especially upon the “exploitation of the earth by man,”[3] or the domination of nature in order to then wield it as a tool to aid human progress. Freud also claims that civilization requires the renunciation or limitation of the sexual and death instincts.[4] Thus, civilization becomes “largely responsible for [mankind’s] misery,” and man would be more satisfied in his primitive state.[5] Each of these key concepts from Freud’s …
Bushra Varachia is a Cinema Studies filmmaking major with a minor in Spanish. After graduation, she hopes to edit videos to help her pay her way through Europe. If she's not at Kresge Library, you can probably find her in her car, driving 2,000 miles to walk around some rocks and sleep on some dirt.