The book I read was Anthem, by Ayn Rand. It is about a society where everyone is “equal” and you are thus punished for being different, or more intelligent, than other people. Also in the book they refer to themselves as “we”, and think of themselves in third person. This differs from society because in America we use the pronoun “I” a lot. This, however is not the only difference. America is a very diverse place where most people celebrate difference, and try new things. America was founded due to patriot rebellion. We embrace new technology, perhaps over obsessively. If something new comes out, people rush to see what it is.

            Something else I noticed in Anthem was that the people in power referred to present day (1939) as the dark ages, when we of the second millennium refer to those days as the beginning of the modern technological era. It was the during the middle of the second (and hopefully last) world war. With most of the men off fighting, women started entering the workplace. The  “girls belong in the house” school of thought was coming to a close. Of course, all of this was ignored in the book. The leaders of the society convinced everyone, including themselves, that advances in society were bad. One man, who renamed himself Prometheus, and one woman, renamed Gaea, left society to form a new place  where differences don’t matter.