Examples Of Totalitarianism In George Orwell's '1984'

Towards the end of Orwell’s novel that presents a dystopian society, the antagonist, O’Brien, a close member of the inner party, warns Winston, the protagonist and one of only two reasonable people left, that “We do not merely destroy our enemies; we change them” (319). Winston, who has been taken prisoner for his political dissent, receives this grave warning tied down to a chair with O’Brien’s face staring at him from above. This alarming solution to the infamous mystery frightens Winston a significant amount, who after sacrificing so much, has just learned his fate. Orwell has brought about this fate to emphasize the perpetual triumph of the party over its enemies. In George Orwell's 1984, the author creates the totalitarian state of Oceania to warn the reader of the potential corruption and oppression of such a government.

“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

Orwells’ book is set in a totalitarian state where all who live there must accept and comply with every one of the Party’s rules, ideas and orders. The main character in this novel is Winston Smith. Winston decides to rebel against the Party and soon after this results in his capture and torture from the Party. By the end of the book Winston

Granted the Party can warp laws and control knowledge, its greatest tool for taking away freedoms and controlling the public is its ability to revise history. This idea is displayed throughout the novel, and is fundamental to our understanding of how perfect the Party is. A prime example occurs when Winston is at his job at the Ministry of Truth, the manipulators of history and truth. He contemplates how he simply substitutes one lie for another in his daily work rewriting history, and explains, “And so it was with every class of recorded fact, great or small. Everything faded away into a shadow-world in which, finally, even the date of the year had become uncertain" (Orwell 36). This highlights the genius of the Party’s control; there is no history. As mentioned earlier, the Party controls all publications, and destroys all facts that are not helpful. Much of it is simply fake information that bolsters the Party. Thus, when Winston changes

Your world is not real. Kennedy was never assassinated, Michael jackson has actually always been white, and subway is certainly NOT always fresh. Stop thinking you are free, you’re not. Okay, I’m just kidding. But am I really? Because sometimes subway really just sucks. Questioning. With this, through his work ‘Nineteen Eighty Four’, George Orwell has brought to my attention that I should be occasionally thinking for myself rather than constantly abiding by what I’m told is right. More specifically, ‘Nineteen Eighty Four’ suggests the plentiful ways that people can be oppressed in a totalitarian society will result in the loss of humanity and failure to rebound from the government’s control. These forces inhibit and encourage individuals’ actions and is described in the novel by the abundant use of technology combined with psychological manipulation. Orwell also uses symbols and metaphor to explain consequences of totalitarianism on a deeper level.

Furthermore, in “1984” the main character Winston realizes that their government dictates the history keeping the citizens uninformed to a life with freedom. The ignorance of the people relinquishes the citizen’s freedom and power to the party. Winston points out that this countenances them to manipulate the people, “who controls the past controls the future. Who controls the present controls the past” (Orwell 360). When The Party is able to control the history they are able to manipulate their citizens to believing that the government that is being practiced is appropriate

In the final section of the book, he admits ruefully that they got him a long time ago, and goes on to assert that “the choice for mankind lay between freedom and happiness, and for the great bulk of mankind, happiness was better.” The discourses of O’Brien in this last section strip bare not just the methods but the motives and the intentions of the totalitarian regime that seks power for its own sake. Winston is not just defeated and destroyed but completely metamorphosed in the ministry of Love. As O’Brien promises him, “ ‘Never again will you be capable of ordinary human feeling. Everything will be dead inside you. Never again will you be capable of love, or friendship, or joy of living, or laughter, or curiosity, or courage or integrity. You will be hollow. We shall squeeze you empty and then we shall fill you with ourselves.’ ”(p.206)

George Orwell’s 1984 is a prime example of a deep dystopia with a totalitarian government. Totalitarian governments have full and total control. The Inner Party, which is the main form of government in Oceania, has total control over its people’s thoughts and actions. They use many forms of abuse in order to control them. The Inner Party controls the government and is the upper class. The middle class is called the Outer Party. These people are given jobs from the government and are more educated than the Proles, which make up the lower class. The Outer Party is in charge of executing the Inner Party’s policies, but they have no say in them. The government uses many forms of manipulation to control their people. The members of Oceania’s society do not misbehave out of fear of punishment. People who betray the government vanish. They disappear and there is no evidence that they even existed. The government also uses the threat of abuse to keep its people in line. People of Oceania know they can be tortured or killed for even the slightest misdemeanor. The middle class is led to believe that they are living a high quality life through a method of false prosperity. The government fools people by changing history so the only form of truth the people think they have is their own memory. Many people discard their own memories and believe whatever the Party tells them is truth. Winston Smith is the character in which the book is centered around. He has doubts

Propaganda was a big contributor to the chaos and destruction among citizens of 1984. “Two Minutes of Hate” is one of the methods used in the novel. It is a program that broadcasts on television screens where Goldstein, the main rebellious man against the Party, is seen as a despicable figure of the Brotherhood. The Brotherhood is a resistance group against Big Brother. The program claims that “all subsequent crimes against the Party, all treacheries, acts of sabotage, heresies, and deviations, sprang directly out of his teaching.” (Orwell). This translates to all of these acts are not in the standards of the dystopian society in Oceania. Some citizens believe that Big Brother is good and bad at the same time. Which bring us to another type of propaganda; Double-think.

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.

In 1984, O’Brien is leading a deception against Winston lasting for at least 7 years, as he states, and its main goal is to strip all forms of individuality and humanity from Winston. As Winston gains his ideas of revolution and breaking the chains of the party, O’Brien feeds into this and deceives him into thinking there are high ranking members of the party seeking to revolutionize. It is because of this that Winston is tricked into thinking it is possible to overthrow Big Brother. However in the last part of the book, O’Brien reveals himself as a member of the Thought Police, imprisoning

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

shows that children learn to think a certain way, as they are educated. For instance, Parsons, a man who strongly supports Big Brother, is turned into the Thought Police when his own daughter convicts him of saying “Down with Big Brother” in his sleep (Orwell 233). This demonstrates that the education children receive manipulates their minds into thinking the way the government wants. Parsons’ daughter learned to turn in people who did not support Big Brother even if it was a family member. The Party also uses the Ministry of Truth to manipulate its population with skewed history. Winston’s job is to change records of history so people only know the history that the government wants them to know. Through these lies, the government is able to control people’s thoughts and how they think. Orwell shows that people have lost their thoughts without even noticing since they have been taught to always think like so. He uses this to demonstrate that “if man [does] not become aware of the assaults on his personal freedom,” he will lose his right of thought (Bossche). Therefore, Orwell establishes that the government can be too powerful when they manipulate people without anyone noticing.

The fear of a totalitarianism government is not a mere thought, but an idea that can be put into action based upon the present status. With the warning of an all knowing, all seeing, and all hearing government, Orwell uses the idea of controlling history in order to directly deliver his mental message. As Winston reflects on his previous knowledge, “She believed...that the party had invented airplanes. (In his own schooldays, Winston remembered… it was only the helicopter that the Party claimed to have invented; a dozen years later...it was already claiming the airplane…) … After all, what did it matter who had invented airplanes?” (Orwell 127). By using the control over history, the Party (totalitarianism) over time continuously controls the truth and has no signs of stopping. Lying about the invention of the plane causes an unsafe feeling to someone in the 3rd person view. With the control of

In 1984, George Orwell criticize the many flaws of the totalitarian government. The main flaws of the government system demonstrated in the novel are the deprivation of freedom of the citizens of Oceania. In 1984, the life of Winston is always filled with dread until the end when he starts to believe in Big Brother. It is due to Big Brother keeping him alive during the torture process because of him believing in him made the torture ease for Winston. Winston rebels against the government because he realized that the laws in Oceania are prejudice and unfair to man. The happiness of Winston found at the end of the book is due to him falling into the trap of a totalitarian government. After Winston, had been tortured by the ministry of love, he was sitting at a café and was listening to the telescreen as he started to constantly say “2+2=5” and “I love big brother” after he had been tortured (Orwell 263). Winston found that the trap to be his form of happiness because it allowed him to survive the torture session, making the totalitarian government very dangerous because Winston would have tragically died if he had not fallen under Big Brother’s fist. The happiness of Winston found at the end of the novel relates to the fact a person’s worth