#it says 'big brother is watching you / war = peace / freedom = slavery / ignorance = power' | Explore Tumblr posts and blogs

rollychan · 3 years ago

Text

Okay, turns out I have more to say about the first Loki series episode already.

But first a preface/disclaimer: 1) I welcome all opinions if they’re stated respectfully / without any insulting of or jibing at others or other groups of fans (I mean it, any “some fans *rollyeyes*” will get you a swift block and Idgaf which side you’re on, I have no time for that bullshit) 2) I am a mere unintelligent trashcan of a person and also my native language isn’t English so excuse me if my thoughts here aren’t deep or intelligent enough or thought through. They are my own, though. 3) These thoughts will NOT be very organized. I apologize in advance.

Thoughts under the cut.

The TVA and Dystopian Themes

The first point I’d like to make is that the first episode gives me major classic dystopian vibes just set in a very bureaucratic world. I will explain why:

1) The fact that Loki is arrested for time crimes he wasn’t even aware he is committing and that are decided on by some mysterious few authorities nobody ever seems to see.

Let me expand on this. It feels very much like it’s another powerful dictator-like power, like Big Brother from 1984, like the ten world leaders from Brave New World. They dictate how things should be. They decide on exactly the one timeline that they allow to exist and any variance from that is punishable by death. In 1984, you had the Thought Police and an arbitrarily chosen enemy you had to hate that changed from time to time and everyone had to follow those changes, in Brave New World, it’s a bit trickier, but basically, people were genetically modified (was it before birth? I can’t quite remember that well the details of it) and pre-determined to be in one of three (or four? it’s been years if not a decade+ since I last read the book) classes by deciding on their intelligence and other factors. Pre-determination, rigid behavioral rules, no straying from the decided upon social norms. That’s what they all have in common. Not to mention the brainwashing. “War is Peace / Freedom is Slavery / Ignorance is Strength” anyone? The TVA might as well get such a slogan for themselves. The people working for the TVA all seem very brainwashed. The guy at the desk that stowed away the Tesseract grew up behind the desk, for godssake, he doesn’t even know what a fish is. Just like people in Brave New World are brainwashed from their birth.

“A really efficient totalitarian state would be one in which the all-powerful executive of political bosses and their army of managers control a population of slaves who do not have to be coerced, because they love their servitude.” (Brave New World)

The TVA, like the people in the Brave New World, want there to be no conflict (forced happiness is the thing in BNW). They believe in what they do, and Mobius is actually very much a product of that. He believes he is doing the right thing. He believes that getting a Loki variant on his side will solve the problem the TVA are facing with the other Loki variant they are chasing. He will do anything for this goal, but he does have a different idea from the other characters we have met so far. They don’t think a Loki variant will help, but they are still all working towards the same goal.

And, I mean:

“You will be lifted clean out from the stream of history. We shall turn you into gas and pour you into the stratosphere. Nothing will remain of you; not a name in a register, not a memory in a living brain. You will be annihilated in the past as well as in the future. You will never have existed.” (1984)

I get major 1984 vibes here.

(I do think that Mobius might change his stance towards the TVA throughout the course of the series and I think he’s an interesting character to follow. But in the beginning, he’s still wholly entrenched. Him having a different opinion from the rest of the TVA does look like some foreshadowing though.

I have seen some people say the TVA is framed positively, which I respect as their opinion, but I don’t agree. I have seen nothing that cements in stone they’re the good guys here (there are some scenes I view as neutral and Mobius’ introduction I view as framing him as not totally evil, not the whole TVA as good). If anything, I get the feeling they are very powerful dictators and Loki caved because he realized how powerless he truly is there. But I guess that could be just me.)

2) Nothing is explained to Loki. There is no instance that acts in Loki’s defense. In fact, from what we have seen, there is usually no way anyone accused of time crimes can influence the court verdict. It is entirely one-sided and pre-determined unless someone from the TVA wants them alive.

Like, that is a major indicator of something being very very fishy here. No one who has a shred of morality will think that is just. Everyone accused of a crime has the right to a fair process, to a defense, to an appeal. Nothing about this process is fair. Everything about this process screams dystopia to me.

Loki isn’t even treated with dignity like every fucking criminal still has a right to in democratic countries. Getting the clothes lasered off without a warning? Would be a major human rights violation. Getting dragged left and right and dropped through floors? Major human rights violation.

This is, partly, played for laughs, but also not entirely. Loki does realize how little power he holds in that place and that moment is played seriously. It’s dictatorian, it’s unjust, it’s rigid.

3) People are arbitrarily erased / killed (”reset” is the term they use, I believe? When they use those glowsticks?)

For things like refusing to take a ticket and then having no ticket. When nothing is explained to them before.

The court process is a joke. It’s a farce, they go through some (not even all) standard motions of court preceedings but there is 0 chance for the accused to win. It’s all an illusion, as Loki so correctly points out. Nobody questions it but him, but it very much is all an illusion, a mask for the dictatorship underneath.

I’m, like, 80% sure the ticket bs is there so they don’t have to deal with everyone and can get rid of the annoying variants before they ever reach the “court”.

Basically, I think the TVA are supposed to be dystopian. It fits right in. (There is so much more in my brain but currently I lack the words to express it)

Loki and Continuity

The first half of the episode feels very over-the-top. There is so much over-acting going on with Tom Hiddleston that I don’t understand. He feels incredibly OOC in that first half (save for a couple moments, perhaps). The panicky fumbling for the ticket after he saw another variant being “erased”? That’s so much NOT Loki it’s not funny. I can overlook the thing about signing the papers that are supposed to be “everything he ever said” but some things are so OOC they are not even in the same universe as Loki’s original characterisation (of the T1 & Avengers 1 Loki) is anymore. That ticket fumbling moment, for example.

They did go over basically all his life in that scene with Mobius (though Mobius was absent for a bunch of it). Those emotional moments were raw and IC, in my opinion (the way he reacts to his own death - btw, anyone reading this before watching the episode: they show the IW death scene and while the moment he dies happens while the camera shows Loki’s reaction to it, you can still hear the audio of it, so beware!) I think that moment he breaks down is well-done. And it’s in that vulnerable state that Mobius finds him and gives him the final manipulative push to tell Mobius what Mobius wants to hear.

If they pick up on these themes - the dystopian dictatorship that the TVA are in reality and Loki having to come to terms with never being able to turn back and freedom vs. determinism (chaos vs. rigid order?), it can turn out to be a decent show.

I have way more thoughts but I’ve already spent way too much time on this so here you go.

#random #loki series #loki series spoilers #loki series review #sort of?#not tagging this one with the negativity tag since it's not really negative

38 notes · View notes

rip-apush · 3 years ago

Text

Won't You Love Me?

A fanfiction

Link to AO3

(I don’t usually post my fanfics here, but this one fits the ~academic vibe~ (kinda, if only in the sense that it is related to ~classic literature~) so here we are)

Summary:

Winston wants O'Brien to pay attention to him, even if that means O'Brien is just torturing him. Featuring: Simp Winston, Calculating O'Brien, and Uncomfortable Torture Scenes

Notes:

So my friends decided that we were going to write Winbrien fanfiction one day, so we all got onto a group call and wrote some. This is what I wrote. I'd like to apologize to my English teacher. This is probably not what you had in mind when we read 1984.

Word Count: 2558

Trigger Warnings: Unhealthy relationships, Gaslighting (nothing not in the book, it's 1984 after all), Torture (again, nothing not in the book)

Winston gazed into the moody depths of O’Brien’s eyes. This was the man who had broken him. The man who had torn down his humanity, sucked all individuality out of him, and in its place put love for Big Brother. The theft of his identity would usually be something Winston resented a person for, yet in this case, he did not. For he loved Big Brother. He loved this new person he had become. O’Brien could never — would never — love him, were it not for the passionate love for Big Brother that now filled him. Indeed, O’Brien was the closest thing he would have to Big Brother, and he loved Big Brother, so in a way he did not love O’Brien, but rather the greater cause he represented.

The Party had outlawed passion, except that for Big Brother. But the Party was Big Brother, and Big Brother was the Party, and they were all the Party, so really, Winston did not love O’Brien, but rather Big Brother in O’Brien’s shell.

That was what he told himself, anyway.

As Winston looked into O’Brien’s eyes, he thought about how he had come to this place, how he had come to love O’Brien and Big Brother so completely.

It had started when he was being tortured in Room 101. As he renounced Julia, wishing the rats upon her in his stead, he no longer loved her. He had betrayed her, well and fully. Doing such a thing stopped up what had been the torrent of love. Everything that made him Winston had gone. He had been reborn. And the first face Winston saw in this new life was O’Brien’s. O’Brien’s cruel yet kind face.

How could he not fall in love with a face such as that? The man who had given him this new identity, who had transformed him into a true member of the Party. Yes, a member of the beloved Party! This new Winston loved the Party, loved Big Brother, loved his new identity, thus loved O’Brien. It was then he realized his love for O’Brien.

At the time, he could not reveal it, of course. Even though his love for O’Brien stemmed from a love for all good in Oceania, the Party would not accept such an excuse. After all, it was certain that O’Brien didn’t have the same love for Winston as Winston did for him. O’Brien- he was a good person. He had only broken Winston because that was his job. That is what O’Brien did to all Thought criminals. He reformed all of them. Winston was not special in that sense. Although he was glad he had been reformed (how else could he have learned the true meaning of love?), he wished that O’Brien didn’t reform others. He wished O’Brien only had reformed him, for then Winston would be special. Then his redemption would show that O’Brien loved him.

But then, Winston supposed, O’Brien would not be O’Brien. He loved O’Brien for his kindness nested inside of his cruelty, for his determination to make the world right.

Once Winston realized his love for O’Brien, he knew he had to find a way to be with O’Brien for as much time as possible. O’Brien would call on him, and instead of lying to disguise his thoughtcrime he began lying to disguise his conformity.

“How many fingers am I holding up?” O’Brien asked.

“Four,” Winston replied.

“False, I am holding up five,” O’Brien corrected.

Indeed, Winston began to see five fingers. He was wrong the last time. But if he answered correctly, O’Brien would give him less attention. Winston wanted to occupy as much of O’Brien’s time as possible. He wanted as much attention from O’Brien as possible, even if it was negative. Because at least O’Brien would be watching him. He had to reform his expression, twist it so O’Brien would see hatred and anger instead of reverence and love. It pained him to do so, but it was not so painful as being ignored.

Of course, O’Brien was quite observant. He saw right through Winston’s ruse.

Roughly a week after the incident in Room 101 (time was hard to measure in the Ministry of Love, but that was his estimation), O’Brien was torturing Winston, as usual. What had been torture to Winston before had actually become rather enjoyable, for when O’Brien was slapping him, shoving him, kicking him, all of O’Brien’s attention was focused on Winston. Winston could see in O’Brien’s eyes that O’Brien’s mind was thinking of nothing but him.

As O’Brien’s Party-issued steel-tipped boot made contact with Winston’s chest, Winston’s carefully orchestrated mask of hatred slipped, and he instead smiled. O’Brien, ever attentive to Winston in their torture sessions, noticed this.

“Is that a smile I see?” O’Brien asked.

Winston realized his grave error, and affixed the furious expression back on his face, shaking his head fiercely.

O’Brien arched a dark eyebrow. “Are you lying to me?”

Once again, Winston shook his head. “No, I would never lie to you. I could never lie, I promise I’m not lying-” “Then are you saying I am wrong in my observation? Are you implying that I am incorrect?”

Winston’s thoughts raced. What could he say? He obviously could not say O’Brien’s observation was wrong, not when O’Brien knew it was right. But he didn’t want to admit the odd satisfaction O’Brien’s abuse gave him. Although perhaps if Winston said O’Brien was wrong, he’d be kicked even more… No, it was time to come clean.

“I’m sorry. I did lie to you, I’m so sorry, I did smile.” Winston was sobbing, his face in a real expression of anguish. O’Brien would now know that the torture wasn’t torture at all, he would realize that Winston wanted his attention, he would realize that Winston loved him, he would realize that the best way to hurt Winston would be to ignore him.

“I see.” O’Brien’s expression grew calculating. “Do you enjoy it when I torture you?”

Winston nodded, unable to form words because of the thick lump in his throat.

O’Brien drew his hand to his face in a thoughtful gesture, nodding to himself. “Yes, that seems right. I thought something had been a bit off this past week. I couldn’t pinpoint it, but yeah… That sounds about right. I’m going to ask you several questions, and I want you to answer honestly. If you lie, I will know.”

Winston’s head bobbed up and down. He had been stripped of all dignity that was left.

O’Brien held up three fingers. “I am holding up two fingers.” Suddenly, the third finger faded, being replaced by two. “How many fingers am I holding up?”

Winston coughed, trying to clear his throat. He managed to croak out a “Two.”

“How many was I holding up originally?”

“Two.”

“Were you lying this past week to seem like a thoughtcriminal?”

“Yes.”

“Do you love the Party?”

“Yes.”

“Do you love Big Brother?” “Yes.”

“Do you love me?” “Yes.” Winston’s voice broke.

“I see. So you are not a thoughtcriminal at all, except in that you love me… This presents an interesting dilemma, for love toward any individual that is not Big Brother is forbidden. Might I ask why you love me?”

Winston was willing to explain his love, but how could he do so? He took a minute to gather his thoughts, for this was a topic he had long thought about in his hours alone. “Well, when you had emptied me of myself, when I had betrayed Julia, I transformed into a new person. I was reborn, and it was you who had formed me. How could I not revere you? How could I not love you? I loved Big Brother and the Party, and not only had you given me my love for them, but you also were them. How could I not love you?”

“Ah. Well, this leaves us with two options. You would either receive another torturer and they would reform you instead, or I could set you free.” “You would set me free?” There was hope- but then, freedom would only be freedom if O’Brien was there with him. Freedom was slavery to O’Brien. O’Brien’s war made for Winston’s peace. The world’s ignorance of his love made for strength.

“You do love Big Brother and the Party,” O’Brien said, “You are obviously loyal to the Party. I see no reason for why you would rebel, particularly if your love for me stems from your love for them.”

“But would I be separated from you, then?”

“Probably.”

“Then let me stay here. Let me have some other torturer, but let me stay here and possibly see you in the hallways. I would rather face abuse at another’s hands than let you fade from my life. I’ll take any contact. Anything. Just let me be in your life. Let you be in my life. Please, I beg of you. I’ll do anything.”

O’Brien gave Winston a wry smile, looking quite amused. “Well I suppose I should reward such devotion… Perhaps… hm, one of my assistants recently was arrested for thoughtcrime. It was quite a shame, but perhaps…”

Winston’s eyes brightened, his entire face hopeful.

“Yes, I’m in need of a new assistant. I wish there was someone I could hire… Someone who was dedicated to me and willing to indulge my whims. I’ve held off from hiring a new one due to my busy schedule, after all the Inner Party is quite a bit of work…”

“Could I be your assistant?”

O’Brien quirked his eyebrows in mock shock. Winston really did love those eyebrows. He loved all of O’Brien, of course, but those eyebrows in particular. “Wow, Winston. What a brilliant idea. Then, I will also be able to keep an eye on you in case you develop any… unorthodox thoughts or behaviors. Not that the Thought Police wouldn’t catch you anyway, but an extra pair of eyes could never hurt. Also, I’ll easily be able to punish you if necessary.”

“Thank you, oh thank you!” Winston gasped. He grasped at O’Brien's ankles.

O’Brien promptly shook him off. “I must send you back to your cell, I’m afraid. I’ll go through the process to release you, but in a few days or weeks, you will hopefully be serving me.”

“Oh thank you, thank you, thank you!”

Guards were called in, and they dragged Winston back to his cell. Usually that caused him a good deal of pain as his bruises were deepened by the bumping along the hard tile, but he was far too happy with the outcome of the last session. Of course, he fastened his face into a numb expression again, so the guards didn’t suspect anything, but inside he was soaring, flying.

His time in the small prison used to make him miserable. Now, though, he had hope. He could be with O’Brien. He would be with O’Brien at all hours- or well, not all hours, but enough. It would be enough. And hopefully O’Brien would give him even more attention now. Maybe. Then again, O’Brien was a busy man… But now his life would be devoted to the three things he loved more than anything: Big Brother, the Party, and O’Brien.

A few days later, O’Brien was good on his word. Winston was released from the Ministry of Love. The Party member who released him explained that his apartment had been taken away and given to someone else, so he would have to go to O’Brien to find housing. This filled Winston with hope, for it probably meant he would be able to live near O’Brien.

The ride to O’Brien’s was filled with excitement. Neutralizing his expression had become second nature by then, but it was getting harder to do as his dream slowly was becoming reality. He had taken to clenching the cold metal of the subway’s pole tightly, siphoning all energy into his fist. When the subway finally halted at O’Brien’s stop, Winston just barely refrained from running to O’Brien’s apartment. Still, he managed to arrive at the apartment in only ten minutes.

He knocked on the door rapidly. O’Brien opened the door, welcoming him inside. It had been a long time since he went to O’Brien’s apartment, so he was surprised by how spacious it was.

“Hello again, Winston,” O’Brien said.

“Hi,” Winston replied.

“Alright, so as my assistant, you will have many responsibilities. You’ll need to clean, serve me, cook, and generally take care of any tasks I see fit to assign to you.”

“Okay!” Winston said eagerly, “I’ll do anything you want me to.”

“Anything? Alright, I look forward to seeing how this goes,” O’Brien replied, “Oh and please refer to me as ‘Sir.’”

“Yes sir,” Winston said, “What would you like me to do first?”

“My house needs a good cleaning. But first, let me show you your quarters before I go to the Ministry of Truth. I do have a job, you know.” O’Brien guided him to a room at the far back of the apartment.

The room was quite small, just barely enough space for a bed and dresser. But Winston had never loved another room more than this one. It was mere steps away from O’Brien’s.

“I need to go now, so I expect the entire apartment to be perfectly clean. The broom is in that closet over there, as are the rags.”

“Yes sir. When will you be back?” Winston asked.

“About seven hours from now.”

“Okay. Goodbye, sir, have a nice day at the Ministry.”

O’Brien smirked and walked out the door without a response.

Winston looked around the room. O’Brien was a very clean person, as Winston didn’t see a lot to clean. Still, O’Brien wanted the house perfect, and Winston was willing to oblige. Big Brother, the Party, and O’Brien deserve no less. He took the broom out of the closet, and started his sweeping in O’Brien’s room.

Cleaning was a tedious task. Winston had never been a fan of cleaning. His apartment- or rather, his previous apartment- was always quite dusty. However, if sweeping was the price Winston had to be with O’Brien, then so be it. Cleaning the apartment took a few hours, due to Winston’s intense determination for everything to be perfect. He cleaned it once, twice, three times, until at last O’Brien came back.

As O’Brien opened the door with a click, he raised his eyebrows in pleasant surprise for an instant. It was only half a second before his face went back into the blankly austere look of the Inner Party, but Winston saw. O’Brien was pleased with his work. He had impressed O’Brien, even if just for a second.

It allowed Winston, just for a second, to imagine that O’Brien might love him back. Or at least, come to love him in time. Someday, perhaps, O’Brien would love Winston just as Winston loved him. Someday.

And just as this hopeful thought came into Winston’s mind, he saw O’Brien pull out a gun. O’Brien shot Winston at point-blank range. The bullet lodged in Winston’s heart. Winston fell, bleeding on the floor. O’Brien walked over to his desk, ignoring the dying body in his apartment. As Winston’s life bled out from him, his lips formed one final sentence.

“O’Brien, please, look at me.”

But O’Brien did not look.

#winbrien #george orwell #1984 #orwellian #orwell 1984 #orwell #fanfic #fanfiction #ao3fic #ao3 fanfic #also on ao3 #Winston is a simp #literature #english literature #english #books #british literature

7 notes · View notes

movieshdblogs · 3 years ago

Text

1984 Audiobook | Free Audiobook | Understands Easy

The clocks are ticking 13 and I want you all to repeat after me War is peace Freedom is slavery and ignorance is strength Did you hate this book in high school?

Well, me too, do I like it as an adult who finally understands one percent of world politics, yeah well today we’ll dive into

Free Audiobook

This book and I will tell you guys how this book looks like in 2020 and all the years since the publication of this book, which in 1948 is now many

You may have already read this book in high school or maybe in college or university but maybe you didn’t like it because of the writing style because of you

I know Heavy terms are used in the book but today I am going to tell you guys why you should read this book after high school and if you didn’t like it in high school you should give it a try because of the things I am going to tell you in these blogs

Well, what is 1984 really about totalitarianism If you’re a fan of dark or dystopian books, you might actually know a few things About this book now let’s half

What is a dystopian world is basically a world where everything and everyone who feels dissatisfied with people is stripped of their humanity and there is no longer individuality

Among the people and basically, everyone is brainwashed, the people in this book live in complete denial of everyone in every area of the profession

Everything is a monument Everything is manipulated by the government and George Orwell wrote this book to describe how such oppression 1984 Audiobook | Free Audiobook

Really violent government can affect people and how power itself can be so destructive, there are so many things that are constantly being suppressed.

The government manipulates its people One of them is gender and the other is the history of the language which is constantly manipulated to make it sound better, the main slogan of the party is already written in

The first page of the book says Big Brother is watching you Big Brother is the arrogant leader of Oceania and is also the leader of this.

A totalitarian government believes that everything he does, including historical negotiations, including the mother of manipulating people, is all for their own good.

This is very confusing to the reader because everyone in this novel is very compelled to do everything they do and they really have There is no way to go further or further than they want, and through language, they are also suppressed

Why because in this book Orwell created a language called press talk that limits people’s feelings and limits people’s exchange of language

Free Audiobook

Which is a way of telling you that, because we don’t have enough words you can’t describe how you really feel or you can’t describe

what you really want of our government and this language really leaves no room for better thinking to overthink or express your disgust at this Government

So the government uses this language to oppress people and tries to make people as small as possible by putting pressure and pressure on

Thoughts and feelings that are not the only device used to manipulate people, there is a reason for people to accept everything that this government implies and that’s because

The government is manipulating their memory, brainwashing them, and indoctrinating them, and people are constantly confused by what is in the present.

The past is because everything is tied together and the government has changed the past to make itself

It seems more like you know it’s desirable and I think Orwell had some inspiration to write the memory part of this novel because knowing that this novel was

📷 📷

Published in 1948 World War II ended in 1945 Many people have already denied the Holocaust despite all the evidence of the Holocaust found at Auschwitz found in all concentration camps, current people still deny it,

so Orwell really wrote this to tell people that history can be negotiated if the people They really listen and people are brainwashed as much as they are in this novel

So if something like the Holocaust happened in this novel, the evidence would be completely erased and the government wouldn’t even think about

Proof that they will just say no and vaporize anyone who knows anything about this evidence and fumigation just means making sure no one knows you exist

Even though the magazines Illustrated anything talking about the magazines the main character in this book is Winston Smith and he keeps the magazines and this is an act of total rebellion

1984 Audiobook | Free Audiobook | Understands Easy (movieshdblogs.com)

0 notes

a-skirmish-of-wit-and-lit · 4 years ago

Text

Book Review: 1984 by George Orwell

"A nightmarish vision of the future" is a beyond apt description of this novel where concepts like freedom of speech and thought, democratic ideology, and individualism have not only come to die but have been scourged from people's lives and minds completely.

Orwell turns up the dial on totalitarianism to an alarming and appalling degree in this book. He makes WW2 ideology under leaders like Hitler or Stalin seem tame in comparison, extremist though it was. He makes it so those in control can rewrite the past as well as the present so that the Party is always right and never wrong, effectively obliterating historical accuracy altogether. That means people aren't even certain what year it is because the "truth" is constantly changing and is wholly dependent on manipulation and brainwashing. The "truth" becomes the propaganda the Party feeds and forces them all to believe. Worse, they have no choice BUT to believe it because no one person is permitted to question the Party in anything. To imagine a government like this - any government - with this amount of unchecked dominance was absolutely bone-chilling for me. To think, too, that it'd be impossible to separate fabrication from reality whenever the media's main goal is to spin lies with unmistakable veracity is the kind of thing that could keep a gal like me up at night--head thumping, fingernails bitten, and petrified.

Talk about dismaying! I'm not ashamed to admit that a part of my soul recoiled when I learned the philosophy behind Newspeak, either. As a writer, as a lover of books and poetry and words in all their forms, I hated that its purpose and its reason for existence was to limit language so there's little to no variety. Imagine a language that's created with the intent to decrease its existing vocabulary instead of increasing it. *trembles with outrage and horror* To destroy or eliminate words is the worst kind of blasphemy, in my opinion, archaic though many of them become over time. So the premise behind Newspeak was extremely difficult (impossible, really) for me to accept passively. Doing so felt like choking on all the creative liberties I spend my days living and loving. (Not to mention take for granted like everybody else.) Reading this was sharp and cynical in the worst way. Like a cold water slap across the face. I say that because not only was it poignant and powerful, but everything about it felt possible. That was the worst part. It was so awfully, artfully possible to close my eyes and see myself living with Thought Police and telescreens, with Big Brother who was always watching, and no longer having control over what I wanted to write or read or do. I think that's largely Orwell's point here, though-- To unsettle. To disturb. To drown all readers in an Extreme™ of extremes. Herein lies a sociopolitical commentary as well as a warning. All of the content he presents here is a stark, severe, and scary examination of what could be in this world if we let it. And while many years have lapsed since its original publication, the fact that 1984's themes still resonate now more than ever shows why it's revered as a literary classic and always will be. I'll forever be grateful for books like this that shock me into deep, evaluative thinking. P.S. May we strive to never live in a society where WAR IS PEACE, FREEDOM IS SLAVERY, and IGNORANCE IS STRENGTH.

4/5 stars

*You also can follow me on Goodreads (HERE)

#ashlee bree's book reviews #1984 #george orwell #classics #dystopia #science fiction #recs: ashlee approved!#read june 2019 #bookblr #book reviews

0 notes

imnothinginparticular · 4 years ago

Text

#finishedbooks 1984 by George Orwell. Got this from the library to read in tandem with "Animal Farm". Immediately, this reminded me of reading Ayn Rand's "Anthem" to "The Fountainhead", obviously not politically, but in their scope. "Anthem" like "Animal Farm" you get it in the first five pages and the rest is a rather sterile illustration of the allegory, both "The Fountainhead" and "1984" allow for much more complexity and with that the chance for misinterpretation. As 1984 could be either anti-communist or anti-facist with a lot in between, or could be anti-Churchill or anti-Chinese now...or anti-corperate capitalist. For the former, I would have been curious to see where Rand would have been now in actually seeing how Friedman's economics (that she was essentially in tune with) only achieved similar exploitation that she rallied against in communism. But more than the idealist libertarian economic policies she championed, I liked her idea of just ruthlessly giving your life to just being the best at what you do through hard work, although a lot of privileged "second handers" (to use her term) take claim of her...interesting parallels. The story itself is about a average 39 year old man living in this future world in what his closest guess would be 1984 since the state, that is big brother, controls all information and its flow, while watching and hearing everything you say and do. He can't help but question it all and incidentally has a love affair with another party member which is also forbidden and they are eventually caught and re-educated with the following mantra: War is Peace. Freedom is slavery. Ignorance is strength. I am a bit bias towars dystopian stories. The fear of losing individuality, not being able to have control of your own body, not having any tools to learn and subsequently express any humanity in the hopelessness of the future is a bit fantastical to me because in a not so distant past, this actually just was life for a very long time. Our past is still more terrifying precisely because it is real and its repercussions still linger. With that the book in a way actually reminded me of "The Gulag Archipelago" (which again is more terrifying because it is real) but interesting because there was no way Orwell could have known the illusions he made here... to what Solzhenitsyn revealed decades later. A lot of the crazier parts of this book were detailed almost exactly as Solzhenitsyn was experiencing it. The enduring quality of Orwell does come from the accuracy of the details and subsequent fore sight.

#finishedbooks

0 notes

lewepstein · 7 years ago

Text

Close Encounters With the Truth

I was recently listening to a recording of Anthony de Mello, an inspirational Jesuit priest and psychotherapist when something he said stopped me in my tracks. The story that he told seemed to go to the heart of what it means to be honest with ourselves. It also spoke to what has gone terribly wrong in our society regarding what we call The Truth, a problem that seems to have reached some kind of critical mass in the era of Trump.

De Mello describes a lecture that he was giving to a group of fellow Jesuits regarding certain tribal cultures. The central idea had to do with how innocent and good these people were before ever having read the gospel or known anything of Christianity. Following the presentation, he was approached by an elderly Catholic missionary who had devoted the last forty years of his life to working with the very tribes de Mello had been speaking about. The question that this clergyman posed struck me as remarkable for its courage and its candor. He said the following:

“ I’ve been reflecting on what you spoke about today and wonder if I haven’t spoiled these people by introducing Christianity into lives that already possess innocence and goodness.”

One thing that I take away from this story has to do with the willingness of an individual to consider a view of the world contrary to what he had always believed to be true - to allow doubt to cast a shadow on something he once thought of as God’s work. Regardless of what we may personally believe or feel about the work of missionaries, we can still marvel at the strength and faith that this priest displayed. When confronted with evidence challenging the value of what had been his life’s work, he was willing to question whether his efforts had been of any value at all.

I can’t say whether or not the truth will always set us free or even that we’ll feel better having faced a truth. What I can say from my experience as a family member and from what I’ve learned from my work with families is that our life-long relationship with the truth is possibly the most important connection that we will ever have.

Sometimes I find myself asking clients faced with an important life decision, “In your heart of hearts what do you believe to be true?” Often, the underlying questions I am asking are: “How well do you really know yourself?” and, ”Do you honestly feel that you can live with this situation or relationship in your life without it eroding your sense of self?”

Polonius’s final words of advice to Hamlet in Shakespeare’s most performed play is: “Above all else to thine own self be true.” The wisdom that he offers Hamlet beyond the virtue of being honest with himself has to do with being courageous in the face of difficult realities. I take this to mean that we place ourselves in jeopardy when we ignore or deny what we underlyingly know to be true. The reason that we avoid exploring things more deeply is usually because they frighten us or take us out of our zone of comfort.

Close encounters with the truth can also arise in our jobs and careers. One run-in that I had with the truth had to do with my work as a family therapist. With the benefit of hindsight I can say that in the 1990s I had “fallen in love” with an approach to treatment called family systems therapy and the theories of Murray Bowen. This approach had been very helpful to me in my work on my own family issues and some clients of mine reported growth in other parts of their lives after having examined and established more mature relationships with extended family members.

The danger I fell prey to was believing that the theory should work in all cases even when some of my experiences with clients didn’t support that conclusion. I was finding that there were clients of mine with more severe symptoms - usually eating disorders and post- trauma problems - who seemed to derive little benefit from this type of treatment. It was emotionally difficult for me to let go of my belief in the universality of this approach. But I would have eventually faced my own crisis of honesty and integrity had I continued to apply a method that was contradicted by the evidence that I was witnessing in my daily work.

“The Fog of War,” a 2003 documentary memoir of Secretary of Defense Robert S. McNamara was a film that left me with a deep respect for truth telling as confessional - a public figure’s way of making amends for policies that wreaked death and destruction on entire populations. McNamara was a figure reviled by the American Left in the 1960’s, one of the architects of the Vietnam War and a Pentagon number cruncher who always came across to me as devoid of feelings and humanity. But watching this frail eighty-five year old bare his soul and humbly admit to the miscalculations and moral failures of himself and others during that era was a lesson in humility. I felt like I was witnessing a different kind of power in his willingness to tell the truth. And this in turn left me with a begrudging respect for a man whom I had once held in contempt.

It is important that we bring truth to bear in our careers and in examining the regrets we may carry around past decisions that we have made, but it is our intimate relationships that challenge us to face the most difficult truths about ourselves and others. As a couples’ counselor I have found that almost all marital problems are crises of honesty in one form or another. Resentments build when people ignore or deny the sincere criticisms and requests their partners offer them. Our narcissism becomes the enemy of the truth when we are unwilling to take a closer look at the negative and sometimes even destructive aspects of ourselves.

Another reason that we are susceptible to lying to ourselves and distorting the truth is because of our early need to be cared for and to trust our caregivers. This leaves us forever vulnerable to the self-deception of being seduced. Life partners, friends and relatives can become surrogate and symbolic caregivers who can abuse their positions of power and exploit the powers that we hand over to them. This kind of adulation can extend to gurus and politicians who we deeply want to believe in.

I have sat in my office with emotionally and even physically battered women who have defended the husbands who abused them daily. They would insist that, “ Underneath his hurtful behaviors I know that he really loves me.” When I have inquired further about any evidence they might have to support that belief they generally have had little to offer. When we create mythologies around other human beings and brainwash ourselves into believing that they are OK when they are not, we do so at our own risk. We also harm the other person whose distorted ideas and behaviors remain unchallenged.

The denial of reality that I have witnessed in women who defend their abusive partners is part of what we are witnessing in the election of and continued support by large segments of our population for Donald Trump. The idea that underneath his crass bombast he is really a good guy who is looking out for us, the common people, is almost identical to the myths that women create about their abusive partners. The fact that Trump is himself a chronic liar is compelling in itself, but the daily reports of his breaking major campaign promises is something that few can deny. And yet that denial of reality is exactly what is happening with his political base. The cruel irony of the Trump phenomenon is that the people who saw him as the authentic, straight-talking, non-politician who would “drain the Washington swamp” and fight for the little guy now have significant evidence to prove that they were betrayed once again.

Trump’s assault on the truth is part of an epic, global battle that will probably determine the direction of the entire world. The Russia connection and Putin’s placing his thumb on the American electoral process by hacking into computers and planting fake news on the internet is designed to create confusion and undermine our democratic institutions, raising the question, “is there anything that we can believe in or trust? On-going investigations will soon determine whether there was collusion between Putin and Trump’s election campaign that could have tilted the election in Trump's favor. Many people are left with the question: Who do we believe? - the press and investigative agencies or a leader and his own media entourage who daily attack mainstream journalists and declare that what they are exposing is “fake news?”

The Trump regime certainly seems to have an Orwellian character built on distortion and lies. In the dystopian novel 1984, Big Brother’s credo for the masses is, “War is Peace, Freedom is Slavery and Ignorance is Strength.” In this absolutist, totalitarian state the “Department of Justice” is the agency of torture and mind control. But is this “new-think” much different from the Environmental Protection Agency in the era of Trump which is headed by the very man who sued it multiple times in the past, is rapidly dismantling regulations on the chemical and oil industries, and is being “advised” by the lawyers of the corporations that it is charged with regulating? Is this all part of what activist Naomi Klein has called the “Shock Doctrine?” - a flipping of reality on its head and sowing confusion about what is real? - a further softening us up as a prelude to our acceptance of the authority, protection and wisdom of the Great Leader?

Much is at stake in the willingness of people to be open enough to re-examine what they hold to be true. What is in jeopardy has to do with some people’s very survival - the coverage they receive in our American healthcare system and the environmental fate of our planet. The direction we move in as a nation may be based in large part on the willingness of a portion of our society to take an honest look at the political package they were sold and to consider fighting back against the beginnings of tyranny. Or, on the other hand, will people double down on what they'd rather believe to be the truth out of some misplaced loyalty and shame, without ever considering the facts or other possibilities?

If we connect the dots, we can begin to draw a line between the Jesuit priest who was listening to the DeMelo lecture, Defense Secretary McNamara’s early look backs at his role during the Vietnam War, the person in a relationship who knows that she is not being treated in the way that she deserves and the citizen in a democracy who is confronted with critical political choices that challenge his ingrained prejudices and group loyalties. What each is being called upon to struggle with is his relationship with the truth. This is the part of our humanity that may be even deeper than the influences of social class, gender, race and culture. It has to do with the qualities we all need to cultivate in order to get things right in our personal lives and in our society - curiosity, honesty, courage and the willingness to be open to new ideas. They are the parts of our humanity that may unsettle us, but may also bring on the necessary internal shake-ups that challenge our narrow, tribal beliefs. Hopefully, they will keep us on a never ending quest for what is true.

0 notes

liibros · 6 years ago

Quote

George Orwell

War is peace. Freedom is slavery. Ignorance is strength.

All animals are equal, but some animals are more equal than others.

Who controls the past controls the future.Who controls the present controls the past.

Big Brother is watching you.If you want a vision of the future, imagine a boot stamping on a human face - forever.

If liberty means anything at all, it means the right to tell people what they do not want to hear.

Four legs good, two legs bad.It was a bright cold day in April, and the clocks were striking thirteen.

Perhaps one did not want to be loved so much as to be understood.

The creatures outside looked from pig to man, and from man to pig, and from pig to man again; but already it was impossible to say which was which.

0 notes

teenageread · 6 years ago

Text

Review: 1984

Synopsis:

Winston Smith works for the Ministry of truth in London, chief city of Airstrip One. Big Brother stares out from every poster, the Thought Police uncover every act of betrayal. When Winston finds love with Julia, he discovers that life does not have to be dull and deadening, and awakens to new possibilities. Despite the police helicopters that hover and circle overhead, Winston and Julia begin to question the Party; they are drawn towards conspiracy. Yet Big Brother will not tolerate dissent - even in the mind. For those with original thoughts they invented Room 101 . . .

Plot:

It is in ruinous London, where Winston works for the Ministry of Truth. The four Ministries are where the acting government that rules the way people lived in which they are” the Ministry of Truth with dealing with news, entertainment, education and the arts, the Ministry of Peace which deals with war, the Mistry of Love which deals with law and order, and finally the Ministry of Plenty which deals with the economics of the land. The leader of the government, Big Brother, is always watching you, and it us up to you as a citizen of Big Brother to report anyone (that could be your wife, friend, neighbor even parent) acting suspicious. Their slogan popped up around town were to remind the people what the government stands for: “WAR IS PEACE / FREEDOM IS SLAVERY / IGNORANCE IS STRENGTH” (17). In a society where having friends is illegal, everyone is your comrade, it is illegal not only to do a crime, but to think of one as well. You are to marry based off of DNA and not emotions, and work until you die. Winston Smith at age thirty-nine, did not remember what happen before the party took over (and could not look it up in a history book as the party changed the past based off their current image) but knew this was not what life was supposed to be. Separated from a wife, he did not even want; Winston starts off the story by breaking the law. Purchasing a diary Winston began to jot down his thoughts and feelings about his life, a crime punishable by death. Winston then meets Julia, a young girl he instantly hated because of the lust he felt from her, knowing it was against the law to ever be with her. The Minister of Plenty installed a new saying: “Our new, happy life” (60), as Winston prepares to openly rebel against the party, willing to do anything for freedom.

Thoughts:

George Orwell wrote 1989 based off his life in the late 1940s with the rise of Nazi Germany and the Soviet Union. The party was based off of a totalitarian government, which represents an unfree type of society that controls everyone's life all hours of the day. Winston with his job in the records department, did not fit in his society as he, and wanted to rebel against it. Like other authors Aldous Huxley, Orwell focuses on emotions, specifically the pleasure of sexual intercourse, how in this society there is no pleasure. Orwell expresses that, as Winston wife, whom the government deemed him to marry, but not satisfy his emotion and sexual needs. Where Winston was the protagonist, hero was not the right word, as his emotions towards his ex-wife were full of homicidal urges, as she has been just like what the society breed her to be. Freedom for Winston was not just so that he could legally separate from his wife, enjoy his lust affair with Julia, but a passaged Orwell described in the story: “Freedom is the freedom to say that two plus two makes four. If that is granted, all else follows” (82). Yes, it is a classic, and like all classics there are boring bits, and when the words do not meet the standards of today’s language, forcing you to read slower to truly get the meaning. To the Ministry has a second side, Big Brother is watching over everyone, Winston goes through a plethora of pain, as his society tries to ‘save him’.