Essay Sample on Animal Farm and Soviet Russia

“ALL ANIMALS ARE EQUAL BUT SOME ARE MORE EQUAL THAN OTHERS” appears scrawled across the wall at the end of George Orwell’s novella, Animal Farm, replacing the animals’ commandments. An allegory to the actions of the USSR and communist leader, Joseph Stalin, Orwell describes a farm where a revolution against their dictator farmer leads to the start of a communist society within the farm, where promises of equality turn into a totalitarian regime under a power-hungry Pig, Napoleon. This quote plays out in Animal Farm and under the Reign of the Soviet Union, but it also shows in the U.S Justice system regarding the recent case of seventeen-year-old Kyle Rittenhouse. Orwell uses this final message to satirize political systems, especially a government that prides itself on equality, but grants privilege to only some.

This quote is important in the events of Animal Farm because all actions relate back to the way this plays out in the novella. The animals rise up against their oppressive leader, Farmer Jones. As the book progresses, Napoleon begins to take more and more liberties that set himself apart from the other animals on the power spectrum. Leaving a power-hungry Napoleon with a farm that is recovering from a revolution, the dictatorship is practically handed to him. Setting himself apart from the working class, Napoleon begins to stretch and manipulate the rights all the animals came together to create. The rights are extended for the pigs to manipulate such as when the commandments are altered to, “‘No animal shall kill any other animal without cause’ Somehow or other the last two words has slipped out of the animals’ memory.” (88). Any animal that opposes Napoleon is picked off. The leader is assured in doing this because he is changing the commandments to fit his narrative, which goes unnoticed by the overworked animals.

Life under the USSR was anything but equal. Following the overthrow of the Russian Monarchy by the Bolsheviks, a communist system was implemented that promised everyone to benefit equally from the work the people put in, a breath of fresh air from their former capitalistic society. Following the revolution, Joseph Stalin and Vladimir Lenin begin redistributing land, under the authority of the dictatorship of the Proletariat. Any communist revolution begins with a violent revolt and moves onto the Dictatorship of the Proletariat overseeing the beginnings of a communist society until the country is stable again. Russia never advanced to the dissolution of the DOTP, which is why there was such a power gap between communist party leaders and working citizens. Stalin and his affiliates never advanced far enough to truly achieve equality for everyone, just like Napoleon and the rest of the pigs, so they could take liberties that the working class could not due to their power status never being dissolved.

Regarding society today, the case of Kyle Rittenhouse, a seventeen-year-old boy who was found not guilty to all charges, specifically a first-degree homicide charge and four others, shows the impact of a nation that prides itself on equality, but as the quote states, some are able to take more liberties as an equal citizen than others. Kyle Rittenhouse walks free today, the beneficiary of a system that allows a man with the gun to claim self-defense against unarmed protestors, just as Napoleon in Animal Farm was able to exploit the animals and break the commandments and face no consequences. Napoleon is able to stretch his given rights so he can profit more off of an equal society than all the other animals. Much like how Kyle Rittenhouse can pose in a shirt that reads, ‘Free as F*ck’ after a mere 3 months in jail, while teen Chrystul Kizer served 2 years before her bond was paid for murdering a man who tried to sex traffick her. Still awaiting trial today, Chrystul’s freedom remains an unanswered question like the animals’ freedom from Napoleon’s oppressive rule, as the novella ends with him still in power.

George Orwell showed through writing his allegory, Animal Farm, at the peak of the Soviet Union’s power that political systems that are egalitarian rarely are able to follow through on their promise of equal treatment, rights, and opportunities. Napoleon, Stalin, and Rittenhouse are able to benefit because equality has never been truly achieved. Therefore the ideals created by the pigs, the Bolshevik party of Russia, and The United States Constitution are nothing more than a facade, pacifying the people so that they don’t challenge authority in the name of equality. Society as a whole is moving towards the goal of complete equality, but only time will tell if a human desire for equality overrides their thirst for power.