> Another thing they got right was [...] None of these people really believe in anything, though sometimes they pretend to as part of some power play.

I think it's worth asking whether "nobody really believes anything" is itself the cynical manipulative play, one that occurs in the real world and affects how us as we sit here judging how "today" compares to past dystopias.

In particular I'm thinking of how certain regimes encourage a kind of "everybody is lying" nihilism, because it mentally exhausts their victims and deters organizing among those who believe things quite strongly.

In other words, a dystopia may show a moral-fog as something that simply exists among the hive of scum and villainy... but in the real world, perhaps we should be checking for some beekeepers with smoke-pots.