The Veldt By Ray Bradbury: The Effects Of Technology On People
Try going without modern technology for a day. People will find out that they are dependent on technology, and that leads to recession, which can there lead to unknowing. In the short story “The Veldt,” author Ray Bradbury discusses the effects of technology it has on people and shows the negative impacts it can have on people, especially adolescents. As the process of time goes on, humanity heads towards the idea of how people need machines and artificial intelligence, causing people too mad, leading to the demise of human civilization.
In the story, George and Lydia Hadley purchase a Happy Life home, which supposedly makes their lives a lot easier. They soon purchase a “nursery,” a room for their children, Wendy and Peter, where their imagination comes to life by using their thoughts and feelings to show what occurs in the room. As time goes on, the children begin to have negative thoughts. The room then gives the feeling of the African Veldt, where Lydia, their mother, starts to notice such changes in their children and how the house is replacing them. Concerned, Lydia alerts her husband, George. He denies her allegations; yet, Lydia sees her husband’s behavior change over time on how they feel that the home is replacing them. As time goes on, the parents debate whether or not to power off all the machines in the house and invite family friend David, the psychologist, over for dinner. When George shows David the scene of what occurs in the nursery, David confronts George and lets him know that he can not be the bad cop and expect their children to be content with his decision. Time passes, and when the family is about to leave the house for vacation, the children are unresponsive to their parent’s calls for them to get downstairs for the trip. George and Lydia soon head up to the nursery where inside is the African veldt. Peter and Wendy expeditiously exit the room and lock it from the outside, where lions gormandize their parents. The house in the story does not feel a certain way towards the parents on accident. The nursery feels like this because it is being told on how to feel and respond by the children. Thus, if the children like their parents, they would not imagine them being eaten alive by lions in the African veldt. The nursery is just reacting or being told how to act by the kids. The nursery is not doing anything wrong concerning its function; however, the children are the issue.
When the advancement of technology forwards on, it causes people to be lackadaisical towards doing entertaining or necessary human needs. However, the parents fear their children’s technology addiction and discuss the idea of whether or not to pull the plug on the house. Soon, the children overhear this, and Peter to let their parents know that “it sounds dreadful” to do things on their own. He argues why would he “tie [his] own shoes instead of letting the shoe tier do it?”. The children rely too much on technology to do everyday tasks. They complain about how they have to do these tasks by hand even though they are rather basic. In the 2000s, the technology boom with touch screens and robots have made basic tasks that can be done by hand dreadful to do, making some people despise the idea of doing it. When David and George discuss whether or not to go on vacation to forget about their issues at home, George does not imagine that “the room will like being turned off”. Due to the parents’ fear of being replaced by machines, they are starting to give it “human feelings such as likes and dislikes”. The family, in total, treats the house as a living thing. Understanding whom the house can influence, the parents function as cowards and are afraid to take control for fear that their children will rebel against them. Machines do not have the ability to have emotions like people, but they are given characteristics and emotions by people.
Due to humans being social animals, when governments take privileges away from other people, then people will do anything they can to get their privilege back, causing some to feel melancholy based on the people’s status. After the parents have turned off the house’s fuse box, the “children were in hysterics.” Upset by witnessing her children going through withdrawal, Lydia asks George to turn the power back on in the house because he “can’t be so cruel”. George here is finally stepping up to the house to take back control on what is his finally; however, his wife thinks the opposite. Lydia sees her children screaming and panicking, just craving for the house to turn back on. Lydia feels sorry for the children and does not want them to suffer because she fears the future consequences of what the house can do. She turns to George and begs for him to turn everything back on. The house in the story does not feel a certain way towards the parents on accident. The nursery feels in such a way because being told on how to feel and respond by the children — eventually, George caves in and allow their children to use all of the functions of the house. George allows the nursery to be on for a single minute, “then off forever”. His children prance around him and chant his name. The children and Lydia head towards the nursery while George is “vacuumed upstairs through the air flue” to his room. George caves into his children, and shows that he himself can not avoid technology. Instead of taking the stairs, he uses an air flue to enter another room quickly. George reveals that he also prefers convenience, just like the children.
Finally, regret is a driving force on never to do something in the future because it was a bad choice. George and Lydia both regret purchasing the Happy Life home, and George feels that he was a bad parent for not intervening in their children earlier. When Lydia asks George how his wallet ended up in the nursery, he does not “know anything” on how it got there or why their children act like this. George is regretting purchasing “[the nursery] for the children.” George thinks to himself that the room is supposed to help “them work off their neuroses in a healthful way” (Bradbury 8). Like parents today, George and Lydia have an issue later on regarding the purchase of a room like that for their children. Parents today feel the same way regarding violent videogames. Violent videogames usually help lower acts of violence and even murder rates on when a new game drops; however, the opposite is true in this situation. The children are more and more building up hatred and their violent tendencies even though the room is supposed to destress and help the kids relax in a healthy way. When questioned on if the room felt any different a year ago, David “Can’t say [if he] did;” yet, David does admit on how this behavior is normal because “they feel their parents are always doing things to make them suffer in one way or another”. Children feel in a way that their parents are forcing them to do stuff because it is bad or to punish them. In reality, it is for their own good, so they do not end up a bad person.
It is best when the people have a higher understanding of new technology than it does of it. However, when technology outpaces people’s understanding of it, the machines will soon turn people mad, as well as slaves, into their own creation. The writer Ray Bradbury has had an impact on American Literature. He wrote about augmented reality, as well as machines that take on household tasks. He predicted the importance of machines and on how people will turn into cult followers of it. He grew and popularized common ideas of what people share today. Ray Bradbury foresaw the outcome of what happens when people get dependent on technology without even physically having it on hand. He showed the American public the effects it can have on people when they start using it too much, building a bond with it, causing a life that can not be unrepeatable with technology.
