This is the first set of questions we would like to propose to all of you reading George Orwell’s 1984. I hope we can exchange ideas and opinions about it. There is no thoughtcrime here!! J
1. What’s George Orwell’s perception of society in 1984? What real facts might have influenced him?
2. The Party slogans are
WAR IS PEACE/ FREEDOM IS SLAVERY / IGNORANCE IS STRENGTH
What are the beliefs behind these statements? Do you know any popular saying which expresses at least slightly similar ideas? Do you associate these slogans with discourses of any world leaders in our world?
3. What do people do in the Ministry of Truth? Do you think it would be possible to do such a thing in our society?
George Orwell had the idea at that period of time the people weren´t free to decided or say whatever they want to express something without someone were controling all their actions. For that reason I deduce it was a submited society by the power of their rulers. One of the things that may have influenced him fo write this book was the arrival of the nazis to the power of Germany, or the governments of Russia and China, whose people suffered a lot and made their lifes miserable and deplorable.
The real message these phrases want to transmit was change the thougths of the people so the only thing they have to remember that matter they only could think is what the government says is the rigth thing. I am not familiar with politics so I don´t know any phrase that look like one of that ideas. I could associate this statements with some others leaders which governments were awful for thier people.
In the Ministry of the Truth what people did was to take charge of the divulge of the news and enterteinment to all the habitants of the society. I hardly believe this could happened in our present society because now a days there are plenty of organizations whose mission is to watch over the information must be diffuse liberaly to all who want to know it.
Aswer 1-Just as the II World War over, George Orwell predicted that information and the way facts were told would be the way they would be accepted by the most part of population. As the famous sentence – A lie told a thousand times becomes truth – that supported nazi´s ideals, he could see that in the future, the same would be repeated, but in other forms.
Aswer 2 – This beliefs are that you must believe in a power (can be a government, a boss, a fear, a frustration, money, work, social status) to set your actions. Based in those, you can rule your life. All great leaders do that, like Bush, North´s Korea leader (i dont remember his name now…), Mao, Stalin, Hitler…in a certain way, they have to afraid their cattle…
Aswer 3- Ministry of Truth is kind of a caricatural symbol to mean that in a certain form, if we do not pay attention we´re “swallowing” truths that are just lies that were told a thousand times… and we forgot that they are lies!
1984 was first published in 1949 and I think all political facts of that age had influenced him on his writings. All that caos of the II World War had made several changes in society ways of thinking and acting. And as he, George Orwell, mentioned “if there is no freedom, reality belongs to the people with the power”. For me, it means that it was a time that is not permited to question a thing, they must have to obey and follow the rules. There were no space to think and even you could think there would be someone “taking care of your thoughts”. Nowadays we are living under all these kinds of pressures that all these statements represents, we live under an endless war for petrol, water, money,… People in Ministry of Truth works in writing newspapers, films, books, doing entertainments. It calls my attention to what we read is something real or something that we are supposed to believe?
Answer 1 – His perception of society in 1984 was that of total control of people by the government. He show a kind of tecno-dictatorship controlling everyone. This view was certainly influenced by nazism, fascism, soviet govern and other forms of totalitarism associated with the rising of new technologies that facilitates people control.
Answer 2 – These statements are paradoxical and the believe behind them is that is better leave the decisions for the government or others persons that take yours owns.
Answer 3 – People in the Ministry of Truth controls the information, the history and the beliefs of the society in order to the interests of the government. I think that in our society there are a lot of attempts to manage information and knowledge for dominate the meanings from happens and things, nor just by government but by companies and other institutions. If they achieve or not depends, so people must try to find your own truth.
1.- Orwell’s perception of the society of 1984 is of a government which manipulates people in all aspects and reduces the intellectual capacity of people, in such a way that they do not even know if what is happening is real. What affected Orwell’s was to see see the changes of the governments after the Second World War and to live in one of those countries which passed through it change, in his case was Oceania were the state only cared about power.
2.- The purpose of these statements is to make people think that what they are living is not real, people in that society are not sure about dates, they do not know what happened and they do not trust each other because they are afraid of spies, they live under pression. I do not know other saying but I can associate it to some discourses of leaders, they do not say it directly but with their behavior they say it and with their acts too, that`s the reason of corruption between others.
3.- People in the Ministry of Truth are in charge of rewriting newspapers, modify books and dictionaries (as well as doing new ones) and composing poems and songs in order to change people`s mind. I think this is possible as there is more an more corruption every day, nowdays most world leaders are interested in power, and some of them will do the possible and impossible to reach it.
Lima-Perú
1. In the book 1984, George Orwell writes about a society controlled by some kind of
totalitarian government, in which everyone were submitted to a larger power and lost their
individualism. This is a darker, but plausive view of future, due to effects of the World
War II in many contries, such as the dictatorship in Soviet Union with Stalin and China with
Mao Tse Tung, and even in England – homeland of the author, which had lost some of its
importance and wealth during the war.
2. The belief behind the Party Slogan was to continuosly strenghten the government and
mantain the control over the people, by staying in a constant war abroad, creating
artificial freedon inside and people, ignorant, attached to it. It is possible to ennumerate
some popular saying like those: “Ignorance is Bliss” and “A lie told 1000 times becames
true”. These slogans can be easily associated with many discourses of oppressive
governments, countries in dictatorship and even in the way the United States is conducting
their war in Middle East.
3. The people in the Ministry of Truth work with the party propaganda, creating and
rectifying records, news and articles to conform with the Party actions. By doing this, the
Ministry of Truth changes history to give all credits to Big Brother accomplishments. In
today society it is much harder to do so, because Internet provides a way for everyone
broadcast their opinions to other people. But it still happens in some ways on countries
ruled by dictators and with censorship.
George Orwell think that in that time all the people couldn´t express all their feelings or ideas because of the society..they follow estricted rules that prohibed them to told what they think. And the things that could influenced him to write this was the arrival of nazis to the power of Germany, or the governments of china and russia.
The message is that what the government says something..thats right and all have to believe that…on the other hand many leaders say phrases like those always to lie to the people.
In the mimistry of the truth what people did was to take charge of the divulge of the news and enterteinment to all the habitants of the society. In addition i hardly believe that it can exist in our society because nowadays there are many organisations that are in cherge of difusing the information liberaly to all the people that want to know about it.
Well, he sees the society in a particular way. I mean, he knows that people can’t express their ideas, and they are not free to say what they want to. He doesn’t seem to be happy. He want a normal life, he feels like he doesn’t belong there and that makes him feel really uncomfortable.
He was influenced by the media, the people, the ideas, society. Even in his house he wasn’t secure, he couldn’t trust on anyone.
The messages that were hided in these statements were that everything what the government says was like a rule. Nobody could think differently. Well, I can not remember any phrase that is similar to that but I know that many governments especially in Europe or maybe in America used to have this kind of power, and make people do what they want to. People in Ministry of Truth works in writing newspapers, films, books, doing entertainments. Nowadays it may be possible if we are in a authoritarian government.
George Orwell think that the sociate in 1984 made people not express their opinions and manipulates people in all aspects, in that way they reduces the intellectual capacity of people making them not even realize what is really happening.
The purpose is to make the people think that what they are living is not real, people in that society do not know what is really happening and they are really insecure because they are afraid of spies.
People in the Ministry of Truth controls all the information and the history of the society because in taht way they give all that important information to th goberment. I think that in our society it’s dificult to happen similar statements as 1984, beacuase here pople created a lot of organization which have to make the information go around the world making people to know a little more.
His perception of society in 1984 is that people can´t express their opinions, because they were manipulated in all ways by a dictatorial government. Also, the intellectual capacity of people was reduced.
The II World War influenced and affected him to write about nazism, fascism and other totalirarism forms of government.
The statements have the purpose to make people think that was better the goverment takes decissions insted of them.
Moreover, the popular saying: The power is done by a gun, was saying was mentioned by a dictator to justify the cuban revolution.
People in the Ministry of Truth controlled the information, rewrite books and modify the newspapers in order to change people opinions.
I think this situation would be possible if we had a dictatorial government, but (luckly) it is not our case.
• 1. George Orwell saw a society totally controlled by the government, and don’t exist individualism, because they were watched all the time, at work, home… I think he was influenced by the effects of the World War II in many contries and especially in Englant, his homeland and the dictatorship in Soviet Union with Stalin.
2. The Party use this slogan to control people and convince to do what they want. To make people do what you want they need be ignorant, slavery and for this reason they will make your war because they lost the sense of right and wrong, they just do what you say to they do. Who do this very well, in a certainly way is J.W. Bush because he obtain the “yes” to make a lot of stupid wars in his government.
3. The Ministry of Truth work creating news according the Party, they do everything to make truth what Party says, so they change the real information and they do this so frequently that even then forgot what was the real truth. Now a day is much more difficult to do this, because the information is opened to everyone by the internet, but same newspapers have same one point of view so they show only the true trough this point of view so we need to read different kind of information, to construct our true.
Orwell’s perception was of a society totally controlled by the government and manipulated by the media, where people couldn’t express ideas or even feelings. The facts that affected Orwell, I think, might be the politician transformation of the world after the World War II.
The Party slogans were made to wash the brain of people changing their point of view, telling wrong ideas, with the intention of controlling their future actions in benefit of the government.
Ministry of Truth was in charge of controlling the information given to the people; they modify the news and books in order to say good things about the government. Nowadays this situation is less common, but we can see it in countries with dictatorial government.
Lima- Peru
• For George Orwell the perception of society in 1984 is that people couldn´t express all their ideas, their feelings or manipulates people in all aspects, and those kind of actions make the intellectual capacity of people reduced.
• The purpose of these statements is to make people think that what they are living is not real and the goverment takes the “right” decissions insted of them.
• Ministry of Truth was in charge of rewriting newspapers, modify books, dictionaries, and composing poems and songs in order to change people`s mind, but the most important thing was that they modify the news and books in order to say good things about the government.
I think it’s dificult to happen similar statements as 1984 because there are plenty of organizations whose mission is to watch over the information must be diffuse to everybody.
Well, I think his perception is that people in 1984 can not express their real opinions as they are manipulated by a dictatorial government. They are also influenced by this government in theirs private life.
The World War II politics effects affected Orwell because he notice that his country is only caring about power and governors.
This statements want to confuse people making them think that it was better for them having decisions made by the government.
People in the Ministry of Truth is in charge of all the media: they control what it was published or shown in order to give a wrong idea of the government(with lies).
Nowadays this will not be possible because the freedom of the press is a right protected all over the world.
I believe George Orwell thinks society back in 1984 was a society full of lies and corruption, where people couldn´t express themselves and where they were influenced by the goverment and the media.
Maybe one facts that might have influenced him is the radical change in society after the Worl War II.
The slogans of the Party have only one purpose : Change people´s believes; make them think the same way, or not think at all.Making them agree with everything the goverment says, just like chess´s paws.
Actually I´ve never heard a popular saying that expresses similar ideas to these statements, but this situation might be similar to the one that is developing in the United States, where the liders of this country find war the best solution to all problems.
It´s ironic the way Orwell presents the Ministry of Truth like the one in charge of disguising the truth. They have the duty of creating ideas that people would and would have to believe, rewriting newspapers, diccionaries, poems, films, changing the language , etc. This is the way they use to create their own world, the one that later would have to be people´s world too.
It seems to me that this happens in our society too, but in disguised way. Media has the incredible power of changing people´s mind and perception.