Wednesday, March 7th, 2012
1984: Orwell’s Strikingly Prophetic Take on War and Propaganda
Back in 1949, long before the days of CCTV and home security ADT, there was Big Brother.
In Orwell’s shocking vision of the future, he saw a world of perpetual violence and strife where people were subjugated and all thoughts of individuality considered criminal. People were forced to act the same, look the same and live the same, and any feelings of self-expression that deviated from this were punishable with torture and death. In this world, propaganda was what kept the machine going and the only thing that kept the people from directing their hatred at their deified leaders was hatred toward alleged “terrorists” and “criminals.” It didn’t matter if these so-called criminals were innocent or not; it was enough that their leaders had labeled them as objects of ridicule and hate.
You might be asking, how is this prophetic in any way?
Look at the world around you.
Look at the trends and look at how we ostracize and ridicule those who choose to deviate from our established views on what’s socially and fashionably acceptable. Look at how television tells us to do this! And, seriously, really take a look at how our public blindly follows the news in printed word and on the television. No one asks any questions and no one is encouraged to learn for themselves. Instead, the news is simply fed to us and we have no choice but to hope it’s the absolute truth.
The US is far from the totalitarian regime envisioned by Orwell, but for how long?