Essay on Big Brother is Watching: Get Over It!

When George Orwell’s epic novel 1984 was published in 1949 it opened the public’s imagination to a future world where privacy and freedom had no meaning. The year 1984 has come and gone and we generally believe ourselves to still live in “The Land of the Free;” however, as we now move into the 21st Century changes brought about by recent advances in

Everyone has always wondered if people were ever watching them. Our technology today is capable to eavesdrop in on anyone’s conversations even if their phones are turned off. In the novel, “1984”, the party INGSOC uses telescreens to watch over the people and always know what they are up to. This denies the people’s rights and privileges to go about their business as they please. The technology we have today is almost exact to what big brother uses in George Orwell’s novel by taking over the public and private parts of our lives.

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

“BIG BROTHER IS WATCHING YOU”(Orwell 2), is a saying that surrounds society in the classic novel 1984. The author, George Orwell provides his audience with an abundant amount of themes throughout his writing. One very prominent one is Orwell’s psychological manipulation of his characters. As characters within this society are constantly surrounded by sayings such as, “WAR IS PEACE”, “FREEDOM IS SLAVERY”, and “IGNORANCE IS STRENGTH”(Orwell 4), Orwell shows the ultimate type of control within his characters. Orwell is able to achieve such psychological manipulation in his characters through physical control and the abundance of technology. Without Orwell’s use of telescreens, his characters would be able to have their

1984, a novel by George Orwell, represents a dystopian society in which the people of Oceania are surveilled by the government almost all the time and have no freedoms. Today, citizens of the United States and other countries are watched in a similar way. Though different technological and personal ways of keeping watch on society than 1984, today’s government is also able to monitor most aspects of the people’s life. 1984 might be a dystopian society, but today’s condition seems to be moving towards that controlling state, where the citizens are surveilled by the government at all times.

Everyday technology is advancing and has become part of people’s everyday life, from phones, cars, computers, and even the light switches in a room. With all this technology, it would be easy to use it for other things then what they were intended for. For example what if someone wanted to control what another person could do such as sleeping or going places. It would not not be that hard to try and control another human being, or even worse being watched every single moment of everyday for the rest of their life. That idea is not as farfetched as it may seem now with even more phones, computers, televisions and cameras in general. Technology is taking humanity nearer and nearer to world of Big Brother and the worse part is that if they are not careful, Big Brother could raise without any citizen ever knowing.

George Orwell’s novel 1984 reflects on the society of dystopian city Airstrip 1 where main character Winston Smith lives. Along with the many other citizens, Winston is controlled by the Inner Party by constantly being monitored via telescreens that keep sight of everybody and their actions. Besides using telescreens the government also easily arrests people in any case of “thoughtcrime” which consists of any thoughts that regard disobedience towards the government. Thoughtcrime and telescreens are two of the several factors that reflect the extreme surveillance in 1984. Orwell uses surveillance as the central theme of the novel to spread his idea that the usage of more extreme surveillance could eventually lead to a totalitarian society. On a less extreme scale, today’s society also has a significant amount of surveillance but many question whether or not more surveillance is necessary. With the many current text sources, it is certain that we need less surveillance in order to keep a stable society that does not take away the individualism of people.

Similar to how telescreens work in 1984, our society has personal information analyzed and recorded by the government. Data collection is a turning more to privacy taken away from citizens. If people are constantly being under surveillance, people start to lose their individuality because people transform into automatons. On (1.5.65) Winston says, "It was terribly dangerous to let your thoughts wander when you were in any public place or within range of a telescreen. The smallest thing could give you away." This quote explains the significance of privacy, as even the smallest things in society matter. Orwell is foreshadowing the increasingly tighter surveillance on citizens and that affects society today because our society today is becoming more similar to the one portrayed in

The prophetic nightmare of George Orwell gives us many warnings that are becoming increasingly true in our modern society; however, among all of the auguries and prediction none rival his warning about the severity of our reliance on technology. He shows us the dangers of technology through the protagonist Winston’s eyes. The prophecies in this novel are ones that we need to head in today’s society. With apparent advancements in technology we have begun to fall down the same awful Orwellian spiral, loosing to technology our privacy and thought.

“Government exists to protect us from each other. Where government has gone beyond its limits is in deciding to protect us from ourselves”(Reagan). In the book, 1984, Winston recognizes the power the government has over the citizens of Oceania. The citizens lack privacy from the government. George Orwell warns society about a government with total control in 1984. Based on Dana Hawkin’s article, “Cheap Video Cameras Are Monitoring Our Every Move”, as well as Beech Etal’s, “The Other Side of the Great Firewall”, society may truly have something to fear in the form of surveillance and information manipulation.

The modern day equivalent, the National Security Agency (NSA), carries out similar operations for the American government by tapping connections of massive data portals online to collect personal information and build digital profiles on people, which is then stored in a database. In the beginning of the novel, we are introduced to the telescreen in Winston’s apartment and functionalities:

    One of the many ways Big Brother controls his people is by using manipulation,to alter the past to fit the present. In the story Winston's job is to rewrite articles and papers to match what is s aid to be true. “The messages he received referred to articles or news items which for one reason or

In the beginning of the novel 1984, the reader is introduced to how the government under the dictatorship of Big Brother is administrated as well as how it runs its citizens. Not only are the people of Oceania suppressed, but they are also audited through whatever means deemed necessary by the government. They are even watched through their televisions. Because of this the main character, Winston Smith, placed his television on a wall in his house so “Winston was able to remain outside the range of the telescreen, so far as sight went.” This is where Winston writes his qualms with the government down in a diary. Furthermore, the CIA, has been said to have “the capacity to break into our everyday consumer electronics….” The USA Today article goes into further detail by stating that, “CIA hackers could break into iPhones, Android phones, PCs running Microsoft Windows and Samsung smart TVs, and exploit the microphones inside such electronics,” (TVs are allegedly spying on you, Baig). It has been argued that this is a violation of privacy, but others state that it is merely for protection.

The book 1984 depicts a society unimaginable to most; however, a further look shows us that we actually do live in an Orwellian society. Orwell describes a country called Oceania made of multiple continents which is ruled by the dictatorial “Big Brother” who uses different systems like the “thought police” and “telescreens” in order to have full control over the country. Our democratic government, through organizations such as the NSA and NGI, can look through our most private conversations and moments using spyware. Due to the secrecy of the government, citizens in 1984, as well as those in our society, fear the government.

In Orwell’s novel he creates a fictional society in which the government rules all the people and holds complete power over everyone. The government is referred to as ‘The Party’ and they depict themselves and flawless, generous, and so very helpful to all of mankind. They feed the people lies and tell them that without them (The Party), the citizens would be hopeless and could not possibly survive. The government holds onto their widespread power by instilling fear upon all citizens. They openly let the people know that they have spies hidden everywhere, and they have various technological devices that will ensure that every person is acting exactly how the government wants them to. For example, the ‘telescreen’ was a device that was mandatory in every citizen’s house and was installed by the government. It was basically a video recorder that could watch a person’s every move, as well as read off important news from the government rulers. The main character in Orwell’s novel, Winston Smith, expresses his thoughts about the telescreen by realizing that “at any rate they could plug in your wire whenever they wanted to. You had to live -- did live, from habit that became instinct -- in the assumption that every sound you made was overheard, and,