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George Orwell 1984 Vs Today

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1984 is a book by George Orwell about a dystopian world where citizens of that world seem to have lost all of their humanity to essentially become robots worshipping their master, Big Brother. While the book is a fictional book published in the late 1940s, some of the points in the book have already seem to be a part of modern society and no one is worried about it. Some of the aspects of the book that are closely similar to today’s society include the prevalence of unjustified mob hatred, designation of one person or group to have full control over everything, and invasion of privacy that no one seems to notice. While many of these aspects seem to normal in the lives of those living in the present day, if more of the troubling parts of the …show more content…

One thing the book mentions is the citizens’ unwarranted hatred toward people that they don’t know, but they are willing to hate simply because the higher ups told them to. One of the groups of people the citizens look down on are the proles. The proles are often look at as impure animals because they are different from what the citizens of Oceania consider to be normal. Unlike the party members, they are allowed to have sex, marriage, and entertainment such as beer and lottery tickets. Their lower status in the social structure is shown by their poor living conditions and their daily lives of work. Because of this, even if the the Party does not know anything about the proles besides what Big Brother tells them, they are expected to scorn the proles. Another person the Party often needlessly hates on is Goldstein, the head of a group trying to bring down Big Brother. In the book, they have a daily event where they shout out insults and curses at Goldstein. They are told that Goldstein plans to get rid of Big Brother, but whether that is true or not they do not care …show more content…

In the book, every action and thought of every citizen of Oceania is being monitored by the telescreens and the thought police. Even in the their homes, they are being monitored by telescreens, and if anyone suspects someone of having thoughts that might provoke the Big Brother’s power, the suspects are mysteriously taken away and leave no tracks behind of their existence in history. Similar to the modern age, much of the privacy of people have been taken away due to improvements to technology and its uses to keep people safe. Unfortunately many of the inventions that were meant to keep safe have upset many people about their invasion of privacy. For example, drones were originally used for military purposes to keep the country safe but recently, there have been complaints of drones spying on people. Another example of invasion of privacy is the use of phones and phone apps. Using location service apps such as a GPS or Find My iPhone can be easy ways to track where somebody is at any given moment. Social media also makes it difficult to keep an individual’s information private because of its allowance of people’s information to be seen by the public. Social media sites such as Twitter or Facebook can be seen by almost anyone on the web when searched, and so, the information on someone’s private life is also able to be seen by anyone on the web.

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