The Uglies #7

" 'A bug got loose, but it didn't infect people. It infected petroleum.' ... 'Oil infected by this bacterium was just as unstable as phosphorus. It exploded on contact with oxygen. And as it burned, the spores were released in the smoke, and spread on the wind. Until the spores got to the next car, or airplane, or oil well, and started growing again.' ...

'I wonder why they don't tell us that in history class. They usually love any story that make the Rusties sound pathetic..'

David lowered his voice. 'Maybe they didn't want you to realize that every civilization has its weakness. There's always one thing we depend on. And if someone takes it away, all that's left is some story in a history class.'

'Not us,' She said. 'Renewable energy, sustainable resources, a fixed population.' ...

'It doesn't have to be about economics,' he said bringing the food over. 'The weakness could be an idea.' "

Pg 547-550

Reaction: The fact that Tally says that in school they love any stories that make the 'Rusties' sound pathetic shows just one of the parts of the massive conditioning that every single person go through. By making the past society seem terrible and self-destructive it helps make them believe that their current society is even more perfect than they already make it out to be. What I thought was a really powerful quote was when David says how every civilization has that one thing that it completely depends on that once taken away leaves the society falling apart. In our case clearly it happened to be oil that without with we could not keep living the way we do. I feel like oil and technology is the keystone to the arch structure that is our current society.

Analysis: With this the author establishes that the people who run this society are very aware that every civilization has its weakness and that's why they work so hard to protect and manage the way this society is run. If they were to take the operation away or start letting people go against the operation then society would  most likely collapse the same way the the oil virus caused the collapse of the 'Rusties'. The author is also making a statement about our society today and one of the huge problems with it. It really makes you stop and think about what would become of us if anything we're to happen to our oil or when we eventually run out of it which is inevitable. The connects the 2 civilizations to show that even though they fixed the oil and resource dependency they just ended up adding another fatal dependency that their society would crumble without. He is also making a statement about the fact that we definitely need to find an alternative to oil.