Conformity and Ignorance in George Orwell's Animal Farm Essay Example

“A closed conforming society is a sick society waiting to die from stagnation and inner illness. Only openness is the treatment” George Orwell's Animal Farm is a perfect illustration of how this conformity and ignorance can cause the slow and painful death of society along with its people. And throughout the novel's later parts we can see much clearer that because of the dictatorship style of leadership adopted, the farm began to shape back into the remorseless life that they once tried to escape. But throughout the novel, even in the beginning. It is shown that the lesser animals and more intelligent ones are slowly manipulated and pressured by the pigs to conform to the rules. And because of their ignorance of the clear hierarchy, they are given the shortest stick in most fashions and are stuck with the bare minimum. So, by the end of the novel, they are almost fully dependent on the pigs for survival. And while it is depicted as the pigs causing the fall of the farm. Did the lesser animals' ignorance and conformity have a big role to play in how the farm turned out? 

As time progresses, we see how the lesser animals are slowly pressured and thereby manipulated to become mindless yes bots. To begin, one of the major causes of the lesser animals' ignorance and conformity is the pigs' abuse of power during the events of the novel. Language is their most prominent tool of manipulation, though many forms such as “Four legs good, two legs bad” or the 7 commandments. But the pigs also use more effective “fear-mongering” techniques to manipulate the animals into agreeing and doing whatever is stated or asked of them out of fear ”surely none of you wishes to see Jones back? The animals reassured him on this point immediately (Orwell 70). The threat of Jones’s return is the most effective and in turn most used threat of the pigs, the reason it is so effective is that Jones is a mass trauma for the farm due to his neglect and abuse. So whenever the lesser animals question something, once Jones is “threatened” the animal's train of thought is almost completely shut down because they associate him with harm and therefore avoid him at all costs. And because of this, if the pigs wish to change something or get something for themselves all they have to do is threaten Jones’s return and the animals automatically agree without question, as seen in the novel. In addition, it is also shown how people in high-status positions (socially, politically, etc.) can cause a bandwagon effect on whatever they think because of their large influence and praise by other people. ”they absorbed everything they were told, and passed it onto the other animals by simple arguments' ' (Orwell 27). In the book, this quote is describing the two horses Boxer and Clover, they are admired and loved animals on the farm due to their motherly nature and hard-working attitude. But due to their high social status, many other animals admire them, and due to this, when they believe in something many other animals are “peer-pressured” in a sense to believe the same. The best example of this is Boxer, he has adopted 2 maxims in life “I will work harder” and “Napoleon is always right”. He is very verbal about them, and though it is not right said, like many things in the novel, his high status along with the knowledge of his Maxims has influenced other animals on the farm to for example work harder in the construction of the windmill. This all shows us how the animals have now become ignorant of the malicious actions of the pig and will conform easily to the use of certain strategic words, phrases, and vehicles of influence.