Nelson Mandela once said, “To deny people their human rights is to challenge their very humanity”. In this short but powerful quote, Mandela advocates for human rights by saying that without them, one would fail to be human. Maintaining humanity is crucial because it is what makes everyone unique. Human rights give people the opportunity to voice their opinions, think freely, and be who they want to be. To take that away from a person is to deny them of being human and restrict them from their freedom. People who have freedom tend to take it for granted as they do not realize the fragility of it. When in fact, there are people around the world every day fighting for those rights. There is no humanity in a society where people are confined and imprisoned by a lack of independence. Similar conditions of confinement and limitations occur in 1984, where author George Orwell satirizes the totalitarian government and what would happen if a government is in total control of its people. And its protagonist, Winston Smith, lives under the oppressive regime led by the Party and in hatred and paranoia of it as well. In the dystopian novel 1984, Orwell uses Winston Smith to present a timeless warning of the injustices that a totalitarian government can impose on a person’s fundamental rights and freedoms.
One of the main ways the government inflicts their control on the citizens is through the invasion of privacy. In this society, every home is installed with telescreens and microphones that watch the residents every move. The government does this to watch for any signs of abnormality in citizens. The cameras are installed in streets as well to prevent conspiring among the citizens. Citizens are watched everywhere and there is no escape from being scrutinized. The caption “Big Brother is Watching You” (Orwell 3), is posted all over the city as a constant reminder to people that they are never away from Big Brother’s watch and that Big Brother knows everything. Winston feels that the picture is “so contrived that the eyes follow you about when you move” (Orwell 3). Obviously, pictures can not move, yet Winston feels like it watches him constantly.
Through Winston, the readers are able to understand the amount of fear
The Party uses surveillance in various intrusive ways to police the thoughts and actions of the people. In the opening scene, Winston uses an alcove in his flat to write in his diary out of sight of the telescreen, an instrument similar to a television that cannot be turned off. Winston knows that it is watching his every move. Later, when O’Brien simply turns off his telescreen, Winston is amazed at this inconceivable privilege. The screens cover public areas as well as each house in Oceania. Also covering the streets are posters of a man with a black moustache and following eyes, which everyone knows as Big Brother. This idyllic, anonymous figure
The government’s use of cameras allows for total domination over citizens privacy. First, in the book, 1984, Winston tries to hide his
As the electronic eyes shrink in size, Big Brother grows even bigger. (Hancock 1995, 1) Cameras can turn into instruments of abuse, even to effectiveness of telescreens that did in Winston and many of his kind. The wired society is a creeping phenomenon because there are no regulations or laws to protect against video surveillance. (Hancock 1995, 2) Our poor character Winston was subject to a harsher type of surveillance than what has been seen, but with no regulation the possibilities are very real that a system that did the work on the people of Big Brother can exist in our society today. George Orwell amazingly portrayed a anti-utopian world in witch everyone was caught up by the strong possibility that there being watched, and if/when they foul up, there next in line to be reconditioned. Even Winston knew the great power of
George Orwell was the pseudonym for Eric Arthur Blair, and he was famous for his personnel vendetta against totalitarian regimes and in particular the Stalinist brand of communism. In his novel, 1984, Orwell has produced a brilliant social critique on totalitarianism and a future dystopia, that has made the world pause and think about our past, present and future, as the situation of 1984 always remains menacingly possible. The story is set in a futuristic 1984 London, where a common man Winston Smith has turned against the totalitarian government. Orwell has portrayed the concepts of power, marginalization, and resistance through physical, psychological, sexual and political control. The way that Winston Smith, the central
George Orwell’s 1984 published in 1949 is one of the important novels in the twentieth century, since author’s vision is satirist and prophetic that it is one of the most powerful warnings ever issued against the dangers of a totalitarian society. During the WWII, George Orwell witnessed the rise to power of dictators such as Adolf Hitler and Joseph Stalin of the nightmarish atrocities committed by fascist political regimes, and inspired his mounting hatred of totalitarianism and political authority; therefore, in novel 1984, Orwell uses the characterization of the main character, Winston Smith, to show that an extreme totalitarian government can destroy one’s morals, beliefs, and self-worth. Like Aldous Huxley’s
George Orwell’s 1984 is more than just a novel, it is a warning to a potential dystopian society of the future. Written in 1949, Orwell envisioned a totalitarian government under the figurehead Big Brother. In this totalitarian society, every thought and action is carefully examined for any sign of rebellion against the ruling party. Emotion has been abolished and love is nonexistent; an entire new language is being drafted to reduce human thought to the bare minimum. In a society such as the one portrayed in 1984, one is hardly human. In George Orwell’s 1984, the party uses fear, oppression, and propaganda to strip the people of their humanity.
It has been more than seventy years since the release of George Orwell’s 1984, a novel that imparts a lesson on the consequences of government overreach. However, today that novel reads like an exposé of government surveillance. Privacy and national security are two ideas competing for value on a balance; if one is more highly valued, the other carries less weight. Government desire to bolster national security by spying on its own citizens-- even the law abiding ones-- is what leads to the inverse relationship between civil liberties and security. In times of a perceived threat to the nation, national security becomes highly prized and people lose privacy. One case is terrorist attacks. 9/11 caused an understandable kneejerk reaction in Americans to bolster protection. Some of the the measures taken were observable, like greater security at airports, but others attempted to increase national security in a more intrusive way. Privacy should be more highly valued than national security, and America has reached a point where that is no longer true.
George Orwell uses his novel 1984 to convey that human beings, as a species, are extremely susceptible to dehumanization and oppression in society. Orwell demonstrates how a government’s manipulation of technology, language, media, and history can oppress and degrade its citizens.
As human beings, there are distinct characteristics that separate us from feral animals; the ability to create, to appreciate art, to curiously question the world and most importantly to sympathize for our kind. However, when that exact nature is stripped from us, we tend to become mindless, restricted, cold, and degraded as an entire race. This is the setting of George Orwell’s last book, 1984. A world where human thought is limited, war and poverty lie on every street corner, and one cannot trust nobody or nothing. It is all due to the one reigning political entity, the Ingsoc Party, who imposes complete power over all aspects of life for all citizens. There is no creative or intellectual thought, no art, culture or history, and no
One of the most important concepts that many individuals in modern day society value the most is the idea that they have the freedom to do whatever they please. The term freedom means “being able to act, think, and speak in any way one wants to without any type of hindrance,”(Dictionary.com). In the book, 1984, by George Orwell, the totalitarian society ruled by Big Brother, in many ways, controls its citizens by hindering any types of freedom a member of the society might have. In a society that is decorated with telescreens, hidden microphones, and strict rules, Orwell illustrates the many ways Big Brother uses that to its advantage to stifle the freedom of its citizens. However, under all the scrutiny of Big Brother, there are
Have you ever been in a situation in which you have gone against what others have said? Perhaps you didn’t agree with what they said. What about breaking the rules for the greater good? Well in the novel, 1984 by George Orwell- Winston goes against the rules that the party has put up. He falls in love with a girl named Julia, and they are taken to trial at the Ministry of love. The theme to best fit the story would be- Freedom is Worth Fighting For.
The words under the picture read “BIG BROTHER IS WATCHING YOU” in all capitals. This phrase immediately establishes the power-distance relationship between the party and its members. All citizens are constantly being watched over and are powerless compared to the party. The word “watching” implies that all citizens are under scrutiny from big brother himself with the “mustachiod figure” playing the role of a “big brother”, watching over his citizens and controlling their actions and movements. Such a lack of freedom creates a stark contrast between normal people’s lives and the lives of Orwell’s characters, and therefore acts like a warning as to what might happen in the future if the rise of totalitarianism continued in Europe. Through this, Orwell is also criticizing this movement by highlighting its key disadvantages and drawbacks.
George Orwell’s work of fiction 1984 is a futuristic, dystopian novel about citizens living in a totalitarian London. In this society, the government maintains power by controlling as many aspects of its citizens’ lives as it possibly can. The protagonist, Winston Smith, attempts to fight against the government’s controlling ways. For some time, critics have argued that this book was intended as a warning of the scenarios that could emerge if citizens traded freedom for security and allowed governments to take away too many of their rights. 1984 is a powerful warning against the risk of allowing governments to control too many aspects of the lives of their citizens through propaganda and the acquisition of personal information. These methods
Hopelessness, deep and gaping ever lasting hopelessness. If the course of humanity fails to change, to this everyone will succumb. That is the message that George Orwell has left for the future, and it would be in humanity's best interest to heed. Winston Smith of 1984 lived in a world that had been consumed by the everlasting abyss of injustice. Eventually this world became too much for our hopeful protagonist and thus, like the future that is bound to a horrific fate, he succumbed. “It was like swimming against a current that swept you backwards however hard you struggled, and then suddenly deciding to turn round and go with the current instead of opposing it” (Orwell 248). No one in this world is any different than Winston, they will follow his path like all of those before them, following the five stages of Kübler-Ross. Denial, anger, bargaining, depression, and acceptance make up the cycle that every feeble life will follow and that Winston grew to know all too well.
Over seventy years after he lived and wrote, the works of English journalist and democratic socialist George Orwell, continue to fascinate, stimulate and enrage his readers concerning the structure of society and the organization of government. The controversial writer openly spoke out against the absolute power of any government, warning that a fascist government would deprive its people of their basic freedoms and liberties. Orwell’s novel, 1984, serves as a reminder of the danger of totalitarianism by depicting a future in which all citizens live under the constant surveillance of the “Big Brother.” Through the main character, Winston Smith, Orwell demonstrates the dangers of totalitarianism; writing of the consequences of absolute government in several essays and proposing socialism as an alternative. To Orwell, the role of government is to represent the common people rather than the old and the privileged.