Evan Thomas
Period 1 Kas-Margoi
English 9A
Monday, July 16, 2017
Ignorance
In a society where an elite class has access to tools that the masses do not, this elite group of people often use these tools to dominate and oppress society. In George Orwell’s story, Animal Farm, Orwell demonstrates that education is a powerful weapon and is a tool that can be used to one’s advantage. Living in a world where power is easy to gain, the pigs quickly use education (or lack thereof) to manipulate the rest of the animals on the farm to serve themselves. This story ultimately reveals the underlying message that first, education is important to all levels of society, next, for when it is not, society is stratified, resulting in the masses suffering.
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Orwell is able to show how when education is not given to all, it is very easy for those with it to abuse it for more power. Now that the pigs have the initial advantage over the other animals, the future holds plans of using it as a personal tool to oppression.
After the pigs have fully educated themselves, they continue to deny the others education and change certain rules to assert their elite dominance. After Napoleon has gotten rid of Snowball to have all power to himself, he takes away all power from the other animals as well. Napoleon announces to all the animals:
From now on the Sundaymorning Meetings would come to an end... [also] all questions relating to the working of the farm would be settled by a special committee of pigs, presided over by himself. These would meet in private and afterwards communicate their decisions to the others...[additionally] there would be no more debates.” (21)
Through having Napoleon declare that “there would be no more debates,”Orwell is able to portray that the pigs are silencing their subjects in order to maintain power for themselves. Napoleon’s education makes it possible for him to assume all power through manipulation. Napoleon’s complete control and silencing of the animals foreshadows that he may resort to more oppression and take
When the pigs come into power, they soon discover how effective the barbaric way of ruling is. Animals who confesses to defying and betraying the authorities are publicly executed through the gory means. Napoleon trains the dogs on the farm, from youth, to become callous and vicious, killing machines. Napoleon deprives the dogs from their youth to create instruments of fear. The pigs demonstrate the consequences for those who dare resist the government and impose fear on those who dare try to oppose the pigs.
‘All animals are equal but some animals are more equal than others’. George Orwell writes this toward the end of his highly acclaimed allegory, Animal Farm. From this single statement we can tell quite a bit about Orwell’s views on education which he puts across strongly throughout the novel. A message I see that this statement portrays is that everyone has the right to an education but some people were getting a better education than others at the time. During this essay I will be arguing that George Orwell was critical of the education system in 1945 (the year the book was written) and that he aired his views, hidden as they were, in many places through the book.
Orwell shows the difference in those with absolute control and those without the ability to express themselves by describing how “the pigs did not actually work, but directed and supervised the others. With their superior knowledge, it was natural that they should assume the leadership”(35). By including this quote within the making of the new farm, Orwell expresses how the pigs took advantage of their authorial positions so they could force the others to work, while they dominated Animal Farm with their own rules. The pigs’ power allowed them to have freedom to do anything they wanted, but caused the other animals to be restricted further in their lives, work, and individual rights. This resulted in the exploitation of the other animals, forcing them to have lose any hopes of having an equal society. Still, the other animals did not protest, and instead believed the pigs should be in power because of their intelligence. Their actions lead to the oppressive, dictatorial society shown as Animal Farm progresses. Soon, the inequity between the pigs and other animals develops to a point where “all rations were reduced, except those of the pigs and the dogs. A too rigid equality in rations, Squealer explained, would have been contrary to the principles of Animalism”
This book shows you a story on the surface, but makes you dig deeper to see a completely new story as well. This book deals heavily with the issue of class and through Orwell’s creative and metaphorical writing you learn to look at it a different way. Animal Farm by George Orwell takes you through the metaphorical animal’s amazing and conflicting journey. The reader, although the book is now written in an animal’s perspective, gets to feel all the feelings of the animals at the same time and see how everyone handles things. The ending of the book is just as astounding as the beginning, and the middle. I won’t spoil it for you, I will let you make your own
Orwell clearly demonstrates that those in power who aren’t held accountable for their actions will unescapably become fraudulent. Also by accepting praise that is not theirs to receive it will force them to see themselves as superior and God-like. The chickens are a shining example for those who applaud the pigs for something that has nothing to do with them: “Under the guidance of our leader Napoleon, I have laid six eggs in five days”. In one of the final scenes, the pigs are witnessed to be walking around in human clothing, which again, is a violation of one of the 7 Commandments. This further creates a divide between government and working class. This act by the pigs, further proves Orwell’s warning of political corruption. Not only are the pigs and other animals divided by class, they are also divided by their morals. The working class are only trying to better their lives and please the leaders, whereas the pigs are only interested in having luxury and
Orwell examines this issue with the development of the character Boxer. He truly believes that Napoleon makes the right choices for everyone and yet he ends up being the one to kill Boxer. George asserts his claim of the horrible destiny the may come to society by providing evidence about the usage of intelligence and education as tools of oppression. When the pigs persuade the other animals into believing that they are crucial to the farm because they are the intelligent ones, Orwell addresses this issue by advising, the more uninformed a society is the more the top class can get away with. The pigs were able to control the farm who they wanted to because they knew how to mislead the animals into controlling their apprehensions of the
The novel ‘Animal Farm’ created by George Orwell heavily expresses the ideals of a prolonged cruel or unjust treatment and the exercise of authority. The exponential ignorance of the farm animals towards the actions and ideas of the pigs (Napoleon, Squealer and Snowball) prove the incentive that it is easier to conform to the ideals/ways of the ‘New England’, than to rebel, as well as through the exposure to propaganda and the distortion of reality. This therefore leaving them docile, numb, and oppressed.
In “Animal Farm”, Orwell satirises the desire for control and the relishing of luxury that come with power, showing that humans inevitably succumb to greed. When the pigs, first establish animalism at the
“Intelligence without ambition is a bird without wings”. Many people believe that intelligence is something you don't have to work hard for but just have it easy. As we read the book “Animal Farm” the author George Orwell has a purpose for us so we may understand what message he is giving us. The main message of George Orwell's book is mostly about our government. We citizens should question the government's decisions and what our government is doing. The people in the government are often full of greed and don't care about the wellbeing of the people. This characterizes the pigs in the the book “Animal Farm” because they are really greedy and don't care about other animals except themselves. The question we should ask ourselves when reading
Education, a gift that even today is widely taken for granted, a key part in any society that hopes to work for more than a few years, a necessary measure to prevent corruption, and the requirement for great power. In George Orwell’s novel Animal Farm this is made very apparent in the relationship between the governing pigs of Animal Farm and the rest of the animals that resided on the farm, the pigs assert power with their only claim to power being their intellect, and through this power they slowly change from a society that was built to benefit all of the animals on the farm into a society that has all of the animals enslaved by the pigs just as the animals had been enslaved by their previous master back when the farm was known as Manor
George Orwell’s Animal Farm is a perfect example of how ignorance and lack of education can be used for control. Control which can lead to political and social oppression. The experiences of the various characters present how the pigs use this idea to oppress the animals of Animal Farm.
(Orwell 35-36). This quote proves that the pigs are using their intelligence to trick the other animals in many ways. The first and most important way the pigs misuse their powers is by using math and science to confuse the other animals into doing whatever they say. This quote also proves the pigs are putting their wants before the farm’s needs to better their lives. The pigs realize how successful this is and use it throughout the novel to manipulate the other animals.
“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.” That was when the animals knew the pig’s use of propaganda was so effective. Before the animals discovered the corruptness of the pigs, the animals of Manor Farm in England, irritated with the ways of life and how they are being treated, decided to start a revolution. The smartest of the animals, the pigs, took control of the farm while the other animals worked. Through the deception of the pigs, they changed the rules of the farm to better accommodate themselves. George Orwell’s historical literature work, Animal Farm, is a political allegory to the Russian Revolution. Orwell tries to convey
George Orwell includes a strong message in his novel Animal Farm that is easily recognizable. Orwell’s Animal Farm focuses on two primary problems that were not only prominent in his WWII society, but also posed as reoccurring issues in all societies past and present. Orwell’s novel delivers a strong political message about class structure and oppression from the patriarchal society through an allegory of a farm that closely resembles the Soviet Union.
Animal Farm is a novel by George Orwell. It is an allegory in which animals play the roles of Russian revolutionists, and overthrow the human owners of the farm. Once the farm has been taken over by the animals, they are all equal at first, but class and status soon separates the different animal species. This story describes how a society’s ideologies can be manipulated by those in political power, to cause corruption by those in leadership.