everything that Orwell foresaw to create that world. Everything and more. The nation of “Oceania” where Winston lives is a one-party state like Nazi Germany or the U.S.S.R. We’ve topped that. We’ve got two parties in our one-party state. Both the “progressive” Democrats and the “conservative” Republicans are intent on making 1984 come true. The “Leftright” Party is the party that really rules America. Members of the Leftright Party practice the “doublethink” that Big Brother demands in 1984. As Orwell explains it, doublethink is “to hold simultaneously two opinions which canceled out, knowing them to be contradictory and believing in both of them.” (Ask Attorney General Jeff Sessions about the dueling Republican/Democratic House Intelligence Committee memos on the Mueller Russia probe.) Orwell captures totalitarianism’s interference in every aspect of existence in the first sentence of his book: “...the clocks were striking thirteen.” Whenever “the authorities” start meddling with ancient and customary traditions, something is wrong. So it was when President Jimmy Carter tried to put America on the metric system. And so it is today with an ancient and customary tradition we used to have... that the President of the United States was someone you would welcome into your home. 1984 has a “Two Minutes Hate” where everyone has to stop what they’re doing and despise Emmanuel Goldstein, “Enemy of the
People.” We voluntarily stop what we’re doing and spend much more than two minutes despising Donald Trump on MSNBC. Or, if that doesn’t suit us, we despise Nancy Pelosi for hours on Fox News. Winston Smith “set his features into the expression of quiet optimism which it was advisable to wear when facing the telescreen.” This is nothing compared to the expression of smug and idiotic blow-hard certainty which it is advisable to wear when facing the cameras on MSNBC and Fox. Winston works in the Ministry of Truth where his job is to rewrite history. He obeys the Party slogan, “Who controls the past controls the future: who controls the present controls the past.” Some Leftright Party members tear down monuments to Civil War soldiers who died bravely having no idea they were wrong, while other Leftright Party members dress in red baseball caps that declare they’ll make America what it always has been. In 1984 a language has been invented to replace English, “Newspeak.” The purpose of Newspeak is “to limit the range of thought” by removing all previous mental associations and nuances of meaning from the vocabulary. The people of Oceania will be forced to use game consoles. And we, of our own free will, refuse to turn them off. Our situation is much worse... We have dozens of the things – desktops, laptops, iPads, iPhones,
40 March 2018
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