For me, the most fascinating aspect of the short story “Escape from Spiderhead” is the idea of being able to control another person’s emotion with an administered drug, along with the consequenses of doing so. An individual’s emotions and how he/she expresses them is a defining quality that makes us unique and human. Love, is a very deep and personal feeling that is extremely hard to simply create out of thin air. However, in the story, Abnesti is able to minipulate love in his subjects with the simple flick of a switch. He claims, if proven to work, this advancement could change world for the better (end national disputes, stop soldiers from fighting, etc). But, a moral dilema is raised as a result. At what point do we start to lose our individuality/uniqueness?

If we were able to control other individuals’ emotions, we would all essentially become “robots”. Everybody would lose their authenticity and nobody would ever know when another peroson is being genuine. This would create a “distant” feeling between each person, and everyone would eventually lose their feelings of happiness. In “Escape from Spiderhead”, Jeff thinks to himself, “Why sad? Was I not a dude?… Still, honestly, I felt sadder than sad. I guess I was sad that love was not real? Or not all that real anyway? I guess I was sad that love could feel so real and the next minute be gone, and all because of something Abnesti was doing”(26). Even though Jeff was able to experience true love, he was not content with himself because as quickly as he was able to gain (the mutual) feelings, he had them taken away. The feeling of Love is desireble because it has to be earned, and when it is, it should be hard to lose. The instantaneous gain and loss of feelings for/of Jeff, made such a personal connection feel like a business transaction. Especially since it was a result of Abnesti’s decisions. Controlling emotions and feelings has always been sought after by humans, but reading this story has made me realize that, in doing so, we would lose our humanity and individuality.