1984 by George Orwell

[Stephane Budge]

I recently finished reading the book 1984 by George Orwell for the
first time. Orwell's insight into a future of totalitarianism, a
future of communism, and even socialism (though as I understand it, he
considered himself a socialist) is profound, and though drastic, maybe
even prophetic.

The setting of the story reminded me greatly of Nazi Germany before
and during WWII. The government, over time, had eroded natural
thought and natural emotion and molded it into a national collective
thought group and one giant country of unified emotion. The
government had engineered the citizens to think and feel a certain
way, their way, and if you didn't agree, then you were captured and
tortured. Orwell astounded me with the depth of his intent and degree
of intellect he injected into his novel. I will discuss my views of
how he created his civilization later.

As the story progresses, I followed Winston Smith in his search for
truth. I wondered, as he did, and discovered as he did, how a small
group of people could turn the evolutionary direction of all of
humanity backwards and keep it going that way, just to stay in power.
I was intrigued by the doctrine that "the Party" supported and
enforced and was confused about how a "normal" human being could let
such blatant and tyrannical theft of their freedoms and liberties be
allowed. The methods of "the Party" seemed to me to be almost
unnecessary to me and most in-human. From surveillance to starvation
to torturing the person with their worst fear, "the Party" used the
most extreme measures to keep people in line, all the while under the
guise of protectionism.

I don't wish to ruin the end of the story for those who haven't read
it, but I was saddened but not surprised by how Winston's life turned
up and how he reacted to his "life" after his brush with the
"miniluv". I was hoping beyond hope that what I think to be a natural
human instinct to fight for freedom and liberty of mind and body would
have been unleashed in him and he would have died a martyr. I was
also not going to let myself be surprised if "the fire inside" him
would have been extinguished. I was not disappointed at all by how
Orwell ended his tale.

In my review, Orwell gets two big thumbs up for the actual story. I
thought it was top notch. It had my attention from the very first
page all the way to the end. And I loved the underlying principles in
it. (They were underlying to me at least. I had to really think and
dig deep to get his intentions out of the book. Others might not have
to work and think as much as I did.) The overlaying plot was enough
to keep my attention, but after I thought about the book and what had
occurred, I marveled at Orwell's ability to put a double meaning in
the whole story.

What I couldn't figure out was how humanity had become so trusting and
so misguided. They went from being innovative and work driven to
being dependent and lazy. And throughout the book, I looked for
explanations as to how this occurred.

Our thoughts and our will, our desire to do as we wish and when we
wish, our desire to own and protect what is ours, is what keeps us
alive. Our will is the only thing that cannot be taken from us.
Therefore, in order for any one person or group of people to gain
complete control over another human being is to change their will and
their thoughts to match their own. "The Party" had taken every pain
and every measure to ensure that they were the end all. Every answer
to every question was changed to match the Party's desire and end.
Even history itself had been rewritten so that the Party could "prove"
that it was in the right. The Party had abolished all outside
information and destroyed anyone or anything that was contrary to it.
The citizens had no where else to go. And when that had been
accomplished, the Party began the slow and gradual processes of
stupification. They just wanted their people to be "fat, dumb, and
happy" with how things were going. And they began the Hate campaign
ingraining in the people the hate and dislike of anything
"unorthodox". The Party was "taming" humanity to do at its whim
whatever it desired. An entire slave species.

And now the real shocker (for me at least). In reality, Orwell's 1984
isn't far off point. Governments are taking a little longer to bring
their citizens into submission and their methods may be much different
than "the Party's", but the take over of our liberties and freedoms is
happening just the same.

For example; with the use of the FCC, the government is trying to take
complete ownership of our communications with rules and regulations,
thus limiting what can and cannot be communicated. Only what the
government says can be broadcast, can be broadcast. In and effort to
remove the filth and garbage from communication, and under the guise
of doing this for the "common good", they are stealing our freedom of
communication. We would only be allowed to say what they approved,
just as in Orwell's book.

Under the disguise of national defense, the Patriot act enables the
government to tape into our lives much in the same way that everyone
in Orwell's masterpiece was required to have that telescreen of "Big
Brother" in their homes, which had a microphone and video camera to
records all movements, facial expressions, and words. Things might
not be that drastic currently in real life, but the principle is the
same.

If we are not careful and vigilant, we too will soon lose all power to
do as we wish and when we wish. We CANNOT allow government
interference any longer, or we will end up like those in Orwell's
1984. There is much more I could say, and would love to say, but
another time.