In Fahrenheit 451 by Ray Bradbury, Bradbury uses the life of Guy Montag, a firefighter in a near-future dystopia, to argue against mindless conformity and blissful ignorance. In Bradbury's world, the firefighters of which Montag is a member create fires to burn books instead of putting out fires. By burning books, firefighters eliminate anything that might be controversial and thought-provoking, thus creating a compliant population that never lives a full life. Montag is part of this population for almost 30 years of his life, until he meets a young girl, Clarisse, who makes him think. And the more he thinks, the more he realizes that no one thinks. After making this realization, Montag does the opposite of what he should; start reading. The more he reads and the more he thinks, the more he sees how the utopia he thought he was living in is anything but. Montag then flees from this society that banished him because he tried to gain true happiness through knowledge. This is the main point that Bradbury tries to make through the book; the only solution to conformity and ignorance is knowledge because it provides things that society cannot offer: perspective on life, the difference between good and evil, and how the world works. The society Montag lives in is afraid of knowledge because it does not know that it can offer them more than what they have. Society then uses their power to be the majority to suppress the truth and knowledge they fear. After Montag's lecture on Beatty's dream, Faber speaks to him through the special clamshell two-way radio and explains the majority's hold: "But remember that the Captain belongs to the most dangerous enemy of truth and freedom, the sun... ... middle of paper ... is in blind conformity. If he can show the rest of society what they have just begun to see, then society might be able to break out of their conformity and ignorance. Fahrenheit 451, Bradbury uses his world to show what books provide that society cannot; knowledge. Knowledge then guides people out of the ignorance and conformity that Fahrenheit 451 society encourages and even demands as a majority. The fear of the discomfort that knowledge might bring is the cause of society's actions in attempting to eliminate it; however, because they never take the time to look beyond the discomfort and see the happiness that knowledge provides, they remain in their ignorance and experience their false happiness. Therefore, knowledge is what brings people out of ignorance and into the light where they may be able to find true happiness for themselves.