9 Similarities Between 1984 and Today

118  2014-11-27 by Iliad_Keys

I recently read 1984, and had some thoughts to share. Spoilers.

Mass Surveillance
Because of course. This is what the story is most well known for, although we'll see there's a lot more to it than that. The protagonist, a gov't party man named Winston, lives in a world covered in cameras, and under 24/7 surveillance.
This is eerily similar to the recent leaks by Snowden, PRISM, and everything we're learning about the NSA surveillance in our world. Privacy is a relic.

Endless War on Ever-Changing Enemies
The book takes place in a totalitarian England, under the rule of English Socialism, or INGSOC. This land, now called Oceania, is allied with Eastasia and at constant war with Eurasia. Or was it the other way around? The tides of war constantly shift and once the Government says The Enemy is now renamed, It Must Be So. Everything changes to reflect this fact, and mentioning the shift is a crime. This is similar to the constant New Face of Terror we've seen with Taliban/Al Qaeda/ISIS, or how war changes from Iran/Iraq/Afghanistan/Syria constantly, as if these nations were interchangeable.

Self Inflicted Attacks to Control the Populace
Eventually Winston learns that the war itself may be an elaborate fabrication, and that Oceania may be staging attacks on its own country in order to keep the citizens in line, and control them through fear. This also causes the regular citizenry to support the war effort, unaware of the truth. The other enemies may not even exist! Operation North Woods, anyone? I don't even need to mention that Other Date. You all know what I'm talking about.

Mass Mind Control through Press and Propaganda
I haven't told you about Winston's job yet. He works as a media journalist whose job it is to edit and rewrite historical records to support the INGSOC causes. This means altering facts, fabricating entirely false information and then printing it as war propaganda, and destroying the evidence of his tampering. He's done this for years without question, to him it's just a job.
Again, we are familiar with the way the Press controls and contains the flow of information in our society, and as Winston realizes in the book, If It Isn't Recorded in History It Never Happened. He writes a fact out of existence, and it ceases having ever been true at all.

Subversive Mind Control through Education and Language
Another branch of government is in control of education and begins to rewrite language into Newspeak. Words like "bad" are replaced with the less offensive "ungood". The idea being that by contorting language you can control the direction of peoples' very thoughts, and make certain lines of logic impossible to consider and literally unspeakable.
If this is occurring in our current society, I'm not sure yet, although certain things I've discovered about Common Core are certainly alarming.

The Criminalization of Free Thought
Thought Crime in Winston's world is the act of having any subversive, original, or unsanctioned thought, and results in the individual suspected to be made to Disappear. Literally every trace and record of your existence is wiped from the public memory. Enemies who don't exist are the easiest to control. Of course Big Brother doesn't have to prove you had a criminal thought, just arrest you under the suspicion that you might have.
We haven't seen anything like that on Reddit recently, have we? It's not like shadowbanning people for free thinking speech and erasing their posts... Nah that's too easy.

Psychological Mind Control through Paranoia and Ritual
Every day, the citizenry are forced to partake in The 2 Minute Hate, a brainwashing exercise where citizens spew curses and rage against Goldstein, the leader of an underground resistance party and terrorist cell group.
Again, I find the similarities almost too obvious to mention, but the way we are expected to hate all members of a certain race or country, spewing hateful pap against people we don't even know in order to promote the needs of Uncle Sam... It seems to fit.

Controlled Resistance through Fabricated Shills
In another major plot twist, we eventually discover that the Resistance which Winston runs away to join, does not even exist. In order to trap would-be rebels, INGSOC fabricated their own dummy-resistance army. Anyone who seeks to fight them gets swept into it and eliminated. Even Goldstein, the man everyone is conditioned to hate, is illusory. What matters is they are being conditioned to Obey, and hate the idea of what he represents: Free Thought, and Resistance.
Limited Hangouts, media shills, pinning the blame for shootings and attacks on individuals who could not possibly be responsible for them... It's all there to control us.

The Hope Lies with the People
Winston, a member of government, realizes that the only way change will ever occur is if the regular members of the population, the proletariats, or "Proles" as he calls them, openly choose to revolt. The problem is these people live relatively comfortable lives, are ignorant of the truth, and seem resistant to the idea of the government conspiracies he tries to express to them. He knows that they are so numerous and influential that the course of the future will be determined by their action or failure to act. He also knows that the herd mentality of the masses means that change will probably never happen.
That reminds me of today because...
...

44 comments

28  Spaceneedle420 2014-11-27

1984 reboot film would be nice. With cellphones as telescreens. I'm talking about a real horror film. Where people leave thinking a new way.

13  DoctorWhoBong 2014-11-27

This may certainly stir the shit pot. People love movies.

7  121995420 2014-11-27

Obviously the government controls everything we see, Do you really think they'd let everyone watch that movie? Not that it's not a great idea, don't get me wrong. But they won't let us see that for the same reason the media is not talking about the revolts in Mexico, they don't want us to get any ideas.

3  Iliad_Keys 2014-11-27

And unfortunately the industry has a choke-hold on what Indie films are allowed to hit the mainstream. I've hear horror stories about Indie films that were basically black listed and blockaded from ever seeing daylight simply because thugs in the movie industry didn't want the competition.

2  SleazySnake 2014-11-27

they can do this in the internet age?

1  Iliad_Keys 2014-11-27

Apparently they can. If I ever find those sources I'll post 'em, though it was years ago.

3  the_swagger_man 2014-11-27

This is the best idea I've ever seen on /r/conspiracy. It seems like common sense given the current cultural climate.

12  watersign 2014-11-27

Subversive Mind Control through Education and Language

It's called political correctness.

2  __DocHopper__ 2014-11-27

It's getting NBA stars to put together a commercial telling kids not to say the word "faggot."

1  AppleSlut 2014-11-27

trying to reduce bigotry. literally Subversive Mind Control through Education and Language.

0  OnSpeakerCrab 2014-11-27

It's both.

12  santino314 2014-11-27

I love how in Newspeak some words are negative when used to describe an enemy but positive or neutral to describe the Party. Thus, rendering citizens quite literally wordless to criticize the Party. Not too far from:

Militaristic: when spoke of foreign country it means aggressive, violent and violator of human rights. When spoke of the Homecountry it means patriotic, valiant and champion of freedom and democracy.

9  Tortoise_Mafia 2014-11-27

Orwell was quite prescient with his novel, and OP has hit on the major points, especially the obvious mass surveillance. Some thoughts:

On Subversive Mind Control through Education and Language:

OP notes "If this is occurring in our current society, I'm not sure yet, although certain things I've discovered about Common Core are certainly alarming."

What Orwell notes in his explanations of "newspeak" have always been true. If you control the terms, you control the dialogue. One man's "terrorist" is another man's "freedom fighter". It just depends on which side you support. Or, look at the abortion debate. If you are "pro choice" than anyone who disagrees is by definition anti choice. If you are "pro life" than your opponents are ipso facto anti life. The powers that be know this and this leads to the points made by OP in "Mass Mind Control through Press and Propaganda", and "Psychological Mind Control through Paranoia and Ritual"

Which dovetails in to my thoughts on "The Hope Lies with the People". If this is true, we may be screwed. It seems to me that so much of the population has bought in to the lies, that any "resistance", no matter how logically based, is shunned by the herd. As long as general life is relatively comfortable and there is "bread and circus" to distract us after our 10 hour minimum wage shift, there will be no revolution. We will grumble about the TSA bullshit at the aiport, but we will eventually submit to the process not because it makes us safer from terrorists, but because not fighting gets us on the plane and on to our destination faster. And if there is someone ahead of us in line fighting the system, our logical brain might agree with their philosophy, but our herd brain is pissed at that individual for delaying our flight to Vegas.

What Orwell didn't anticipate is how powerful the systematic mass brainwashing could be. In 1984, the citizens are subjected to mass surveillance via their telescreens whether they liked it or not, but today, people actively volunteer their privacy violation. Imagine if in 2000 the government had passed a law requiring all citizens to carry an electronic device that contained a GPS tracker, two cameras (one front-facing), and the ability for the authorities to monitor not only all phone and text communications, but also our daily schedule, contacts, etc. There would probably be backlash. Today, citizens are paying top dollar for the "privilege" of owning one of these devices. See also Facebook, "The Cloud", "smart" tv's, etc.

Hope that wasn't TLDR.

3  Iliad_Keys 2014-11-27

You made some terrific points, thanks for the input!

2  Irradiance 2014-11-27

Tangentially, it's funny that there's this prolife pro choice false dichotomy. I feel that I'm both — that you shouldn't have abortions but neither should you be hindered or punished for doing so. Having to live with that unfortunate decision is punishment enough.

7  fuckthebbc 2014-11-27

I read it decades ago, one thing that sticks in my mind is the rat in the bucket enhanced interrogation technique.

2  BeastPenguin 2014-11-27

Can you explain? Google isn't helping :(

3  generalmontgomery 2014-11-27

as far as i know, the rat in the bucket interrogation technique involves placing a rat, under a bucket, on the stomach of a subject of interrogation and applying heat the bucket. as the rat tries to escape the heat, he will try and dig through the stomach to get away. but i don't remember that being in 1984. i remember the rats in the room 101 but no buckets involved?

2  Iliad_Keys 2014-11-27

Yes, except in the book, it's a little worse. They put the rat in the cage, and place it up against the mans face, meaning the rat has to eat it's way through him to escape. It's not a very pleasant story.

-2  BeastPenguin 2014-11-27

My school library has, like, 5 copies. I've read the first 20 or so pages but I never find time to finish it and I prefer to read a book all the way through giving at most 3 different reading sessions.

2  frickinamazing 2014-11-27

It's also, like, online, in its entirety, in numerous places.

2  BeastPenguin 2014-11-27

Not sure why I was downvoted but yeah, I was curious about its availability online. I'll check.

1  OnSpeakerCrab 2014-11-27

You put a rat in a bucket, stick the opening of it against an individual's stomach, and heat up the bottom.

You can imagine what happens next.

1  TylerTheNomad 2014-11-27

Watch 2 fast 2 furious, that shows it.

6  dukemantee 2014-11-27

No doubt mass surveillance is happening but there's less need in our world for Big Brother because we volunteer so much personal information about ourselves on Facebook. Here's my house, my job, where I go to school. Here are my likes, dislikes - the movies I watch, the books I read. Here's the car I drive, this is who I'm voting for, the church I go to, the guns I own, this is my boyfriend, my parents, my kids.

Who do you think is reading this stuff, just the people who "friend" you? So fucking stupid.

5  boxcutter729 2014-11-27

It's worse. You're seeing the results of a frog that's been boiled slowly.

4  Iliad_Keys 2014-11-27

Since there is an interest, I will begin working on a sequel to this list. In the meantime, here are quotes from the book regarding these 9 issues, which I intended to include in the above, but left out due to length.

Mass Surveillance

"Big Brother is watching you."

Endless War against an Ever Changing Enemy

“It was curious to think that the sky was the same for everybody, in Eurasia or Eastasia as well as here. And the people under the sky were also very much the same--everywhere, all over the world, hundreds or thousands of millions of people just like this, people ignorant of one another's existence, held apart by walls of hatred and lies, and yet almost exactly the same--people who had never learned to think but were storing up in their hearts and bellies and muscles the power that would one day overturn the world.”

Self Inflicted Attacks

“She startled him by saying casually that in her opinion the war was not happening. The rocket bombs which fell daily on London were probably fired by the Government of Oceania itself, 'just to keep people frightened'. This was an idea that had literally never occurred to him."

Press and Propaganda

“He who controls the past controls the future. He who controls the present controls the past.”

Education and Language

“Don’t you see that the whole aim of Newspeak is to narrow the range of thought? In the end we shall make thoughtcrime literally impossible, because there will be no words in which to express it.”

Criminalization of Thought

“Power is in tearing human minds to pieces and putting them together again in new shapes of your own choosing.”

Paranoia and Ritual

"The horrible thing about the Two Minutes Hate was not that one was obliged to act a part, but, on the contrary, that it was impossible to avoid joining in."

Fabricated Shills

"We control life, Winston, at all its levels. You are imagining that there is something called human nature which will be outraged by what we do and will turn against us. But we create human nature. Men are infinitely malleable."

Hope in the People

“Until they become conscious they will never rebel, and until after they have rebelled they cannot become conscious.”

“The choice for mankind lies between freedom and happiness and for the great bulk of mankind, happiness is better.”

"They could be made to accept the most flagrant violations of reality, because they never fully grasped the enormity of what was demanded of them, and were not sufficiently interested in public events to notice what was happening. By lack of understanding they remained sane. They simply swallowed everything"

3  pervyjeffo 2014-11-27

I have this concept in my head constantly. It's fucking crazy.

3  average_shill 2014-11-27

If there's any hope, it lies in the proles

2  JamesColesPardon 2014-11-27

It's the only way.

2  Terrorstorm133 2014-11-27

Solidshow nice

2  shadowofashadow 2014-11-27

Great post. I haven't read the book and I've seen this comparison given on the surface level. This goes a little bit deeper and was interesting to read. I had no idea shills were a part of the book.

4  Iliad_Keys 2014-11-27

I'm glad to have helped. The book had more depth to it than I had anticipated, and more than I've covered here. But oh my yes, it turns out several key characters in the story turn out to be shills, posing as resistance members to infiltrate their ranks, ruin their plans, and betray them to Big Brother.

2  peterson2004 2014-11-27

Only 9?

4  Iliad_Keys 2014-11-27

I could have kept going, but I thought, "No one's going to read a list 20 items long" ;)

6  ideapathy 2014-11-27

Keep going.

5  nothing_but_the_rain 2014-11-27

Keep going! You can always break it up and do multiple parts. I will read it if you write it.

2  PythonEnergy 2014-11-27

What disimilarities did you find? In other words, what features of 1984 society did not hold true of the US today?

4  Iliad_Keys 2014-11-27

Terrific question!
I would say one major way that things differ is that in 1984, the domination and oppression is is in-your-face and obvious. Orwell based a lot of the book off of practices in Communist Russia, where such was the case. I think today, while a lot of the same tactics are used, the powers that be are much more subtle about it.

Another difference is that The Party was very interested in suppressing and condemning sexuality, with the goal of the Temperance Movement being that of controlling people through reigning in their baser passions and instincts - which could lead to genuine affection or further powerful emotions. I don't think the government today has any interest in enforcing abstinence, although it'd be interesting to explore what stance they take on sex, because it's a powerful force.

2  PythonEnergy 2014-11-27

I agree, but in the end resort, the final answer of the state and other powers that be is always violence. If you do not pay your rent, they will physically throw you out.

I think that they push marriage and babies more than sex because they want labour excess to keep wages low and cannon-fodder for their wars.

The other question is what do we see in society that is not in the book. I am thinking of the economic controls like student debt being a permenent weight on people or the way they bailed out the bankers to enslave the people. I don't recall this in the book, but it has been a while since I read it.

1  MK0Q1 2014-11-27

They haven't promoted abstinence because Homosexuality is the key to population control. I'm not against Homosexuals, don't get me wrong. Freedom of Sexuality is inherent in our nature, animals do it, we do it. They can't revoke that from us yet because it would have to much of a backlash, so promoting sexuality and sexual freedom alongside acceptance for homosexuality works towards population maintenance as more Men enjoy Homosexual or Transexuals they no longer reproduce.

I can see why condemning sexuality has finally been realized as not working in their favor and so the opposite approach is taken where sexual "morals" and "rights and wrongs" from the past are viewed as archaic, non-progressive ways of thinking. When homosexuality/transexuality is no longer viewed as taboo by overwhelming majority, more men will be inclined to just take part because.. why not when its integrated into society at such a level. I can't really say whether or not that's a bad thing, just different. But it would explain the rationale behind not condemning sexuality, and rather promoting it instead.

1  xxCRM114xx 2014-11-27

Take a look at this doublethink: https://www.congress.gov/bill/113th-congress/senate-bill/2265

-2  [deleted] 2014-11-27

[deleted]

1  heroineasinladyhero 2014-11-27

whoosh

0  PythonEnergy 2014-11-27

whoosh whoosh