
In Black Mirror San Junipero is a place where everyone goes to get away and have fun. It is a virtual reality where everyone can escape their real lives and party till midnight. In some people’s cases they have already passed over and live in San Junipero forever through technology. This concept goes completely against many religious concepts like going to heaven after you die. Also the sexuality in this episode between Yorkie and Kelly being lesbian goes against the Bible and the concepts of Christianity as well. This is all based through new futuristic technology that has been created to let someone live on forever.

This whole idea of San Junipero and passing over to live on forever goes directly against many religious beliefs from Christianity and the Muslims beliefs of the afterlife. They both believe in going to heaven once you die. This would create a huge debate within those communities about the ethical beliefs of this. “Just as people are destined to die once, and after that to face judgment,” (biblegateway.com, Hebrews 9:27) This shows the beliefs of the Christian religion and how the idea of San Junipero goes directly against it. I feel like it would be very hard for this kind of technology to exist in today’s society. There is already so much controversy over abortion and taking or giving life and I believe this kind of afterlife could create many problems in today’s world. 

The idea of living on forever and never truly dying is very weird as well. For example, what if you decided to pass over and then after a while you became bored or tired of San Junipero? Would you just be stuck for the rest of eternity? There could be much more controversy from the religious community about this side of it as well. And being brought up as a person of religion watching this really made me ponder this idea of a San Junipero. I thought it would be a cool idea to be able to visit through this virtual technology, but at the same time questioned the thought of being able to pass over there and live for forever. “Right now the revolution is devices you put on your eyes, your ears," Kurzweil says, noting that he has patents for tactile virtual reality. By the 2030s, he says, VR could plug straight into your nervous system — which will expand the potential experiences in your life, or so the futurist argument goes.” (buisnessinsider.com, tech news). He goes on to say that virtual reality would go hand in hand with living forever, and would be a necessary thing to avoid becoming a sorrowful immortal. It also brought me to thinking about if these people are even considered to be alive in a technical sense. Because they have already died or “passed over” into another life. 

The technology in this episode is very futuristic but could also have a lot of downside if anything bad ever happened to the place where everyone is technically stored. If there was ever something to happen to the servers in the large warehouse would everyone cease to exist? That could be interpreted as murder or some way of man slaughter legally speaking. I know that if I had a friend or family member visiting San Junipero for the night and something within the technology failed and was killed, I would want answers and someone to be held accountable for it.  Also in today’s world of terrorism this kind of facility where so many lives are stored would be a huge attraction for any type of terrorist looking to take live or destroy a meaningful place. 

The sexuality seen in San Junipero between Yorki and Kelly fits what the context of what San Junipero is. Its known as a place to have fun and do whatever you want. This is seen how in real life Yorki is a straight female that is about to get married. But in San Junipero she falls in love with Kelly the first night that she meets her. We also see that Kelly has relationships with guys as well at the beginning of the show. This all fits the context of San Junipero being a free, un-judgmental place to go do whatever you want.  The use of music is also strategically placed to give a mood to a scene and even a time period. For example, when Yorki was deciding on what to wear out every time she changed outfits the music changed to fit what she was wearing. 

All in all, I thought that the episode of San Junipero was very interesting to watch and see this futuristic way of living. Even though it is against the ethics of many religions I believe that you need to explore and see different views to life. I will be interested to see if anything like this comes along in the future and what questions and controversies that could come from it.