It is! But it’s not dystopian in the same way. The society in Brave New Word took many, many generations of mental and physical conditioning, in combination with extreme bioengineering to make happen, and those who were left out were those who never submitted.
1984, which I feel is much more appropriate to that list, is about the imposition of a government who has a stranglehold on the very thoughts of its populace through beating, torturing, camps, and death. People who live there are forced to believe things that make no sense because it’s an entire society built upon layer after layer of gaslighting, which is more along the lines of what is what is being felt now, in a time where no one really trusts anyone. You’re with a news source or against it, but if you’re with it it’s gospel and if you aren’t it’s easily dismissed. It was as subtle as a train wreck.
Brave New World, for the most part, has none of that, IMO, and I have to admit my bias here because I have a pretty strong biology background. The idea behind their society was "okay, war and shit sucks, how can we stop this from happening and keep the people fed and happy and alive without that human nature thing fucking it all up for everybody. They knew trying to change things all at once would mean terrible things and also defeat the purpose, so it was rolled out in careful increments.
There was no beating, no torture, no horrific violence to enforce the society they had. There was definitely a lot of thought conditioning, and if you couldn’t get along you were removed to another location and your disappearance left behind just enough questions that no one really wanted the answers.
I’ve always liked Brave New World better, but I also think that it’s a very unlikely outcome in this situation and therefore not entirely relevant. It’s certainly a dystopian vision of the future, but I don’t think it’s the dystopian vision we fear in our current situation (or at least, most of us don’t). Where Brave New World infantilizes its citizens, 1984 criminalizes them, forcing them to spend their every waking moment proving that they aren’t enemies of the state.
The resistance in 1984 also bears more resemblance to the supposed outcomes of today’s issues. 2+2=5 sums up the book pretty well; how much longer will the majority of people today be able to hold out against a barrage of “official” sources bombarding us with 2+2=5?
