If utopia literally means "no place," where is DYStopia?

The Hunger Games by Susanne Collins is a young adult dystopian novel, a story that takes place in a dark future marked by harsh government control. Each year, the 12 districts of the new North America must send one male and one female between twelve and eighteen years old to participate in a televised battle to the death. The story's protagonist, Katniss, is from the poorest of the 12 districts, and volunteers for the Hunger Games to take the place of her younger sister, despite having to battle against young people from much wealthier districts who have been training for most of their lives. Upon arriving in the capital to prepare for the Games, Katniss experiences something akin to today's reality shows, creating looks and entire personalities suited for better mass consumption. Katniss develops a relationship with Peeta, the other competitor chosen from her district, but has to play the game to stay alive. The game itself is built up very well, very high-stakes and tense. The characters are well-developed, and as far as dystopian novels go, this story raises a lot of societal and critical criticisms that students would benefit from critically reflecting on.
Still, I've never personally been a fan of sci-fi/fantasty, because I feel like they get to bend the rules in a way I don't appreciate as much. Many of these stories get to create a reality where they critique current society in a way that avoids offending their readers. They get sort of a free pass by creating their own rules for criticizing society, and I've never been able to really find myself sold by any author's set of rules.
Still, in trying to think about this story critically, I started thinking about the types of dystopian stories that are told, and some of the source material from which The Hunger Games was drawn. These stories warning us against the dangers of government control and our own overindulgence in entertainment have been told in a lot of different ways, and with a lot of different predicted outcomes. So, as something of a thesis to this blog post:
When the Ancient Greeks told the story of Theseus of Athens being selected by Crete to battle the Minotaur;
when Battle Royale ups the stakes of a state-sponsored reality game to the death;
when the movie Gamer tells of a world where prisoners are used as live characters in a video game;
when TV’s “Jimmy Neutron” features aliens who will destroy planets based on the outcome of a game:
Does dystopian literature still serve a purpose, when none of these situations have come true for centuries?
Do dystopian novels really try to predict the future? Or are we fooling ourselves into thinking that “dystopia” is somewhere beyond the here-and-now?
If "utopia" literally translates to "no place," and "dystopia" is its opposite, where is dystopia?
This is the type of question I think students should be grappling with when reading dystopian novels, rather than just summarizing plot assuming that this means they're analyzing the author's intent.

Suggested grade level: 10-11 grade
Appropriateness: some violence, dark themes