Orwell's 1984 and Today's World Essay Example

George Orwell's book, 1984, was written in 1949 as a warning against totalitarian governments. Orwell’s book is about a dark and twisted dystopian future where everything you do is monitored and controlled by the government, ultimately dehumanizing their own people. His book was heavily influenced by Nazi Germany at the time. Nazi Germany brainwashed their people with propaganda and lies, changing their beliefs. To warn other civilisations and future generations, he wrote this book.  This may seem to have been ruled out of today's world however the similarities between 1984 and the governments and tactics of some current countries are frighteningly alike. China has one of the world’s harshest media restrictions, censoring foreign sites, news and apps to control the thoughts and beliefs that the public has access to restraining what the public sees. North Korea brutally replicates the physiological and physical force applied to their citizens to have near full control over their country, like in the book. Finally, the National Security Agency( NSA) was caught in a spying scandal after they monitored 98.9 million wireless phones, similar to severe monitoring in 1984. Most of the methods and tactics in 1984 have been or are currently replicated in the real world today. The book 1984 was not a far-fetched prediction. As time went on, Orwell’s 1984 could not be further from the harsh reality. 

In the book 1984, the government controls what media the public consumes, much like the methods that China has been using. China has one of the world’s harshest media restrictions. Most of the sites and resources we can access can not be accessed in China. The government has blocked multiple websites and social media sites such as Facebook, Instagram and other platforms. The government manipulates Chinese journalists and media organisations into self-censorship through the use of lawsuits, arrests, and other tactics to control what the public can see in the media. In China in 2017, 38 journalists were held captive. (Media Control in 1984 by George Orwell’s 1984 | Ipl.org, n.d.)  In the book, the government uses similar tactics, using propaganda and Newspeak to manipulate the thoughts and beliefs of their audience.  Syme and Winston, two of the characters in the book, discuss the aim of Newspeak and how it would constrict the thoughts and beliefs of Oceanic citizens.  “Don’t you see that the whole aim of Newspeak is to narrow the range of thought? In the end, we shall make thoughtcrime literally impossible because there will be no words in which to express it”. This is identical to the methods that China has been using and how they constrain the media consumption of their citizens. 

Furthermore.  in 2001, the National Security Agency obtained access to over 98.9 million phone records. The order for the phone line access enabled the National Security Agency to listen to any calls without suspicion of a crime. They gained the meta-data of the calls, giving them information on the duration and location of the calls. The aim was to prevent terrorist attacks, however, this tactic was far more aggressive and invasive than previous methods. The customers of the service providers that granted NSA access, were not informed that they may have been spied on meaning the security service was breaching the privacy of the users. In the book, similar techniques were applied to monitor the public, such as telescreens, and listening devices. The devices were installed in private homes to restrict illegal activities. The purpose of these devices was to prevent illegal activity, much like what the NSA was trying to achieve with spying through phone calls. “He thought of the telescreen with its never-sleeping ear. They could spy upon you night and day, but if you kept your head, you could still outwit them. With all their cleverness, they had never mastered the secret of finding out what another human being was thinking.” Although 100% of calls weren’t monitored and critically analyzed, this is easily comparable to the techniques the government had used to prevent prohibited actions using their technology.

Finally, North Korea brutally manipulates their citizens by psychologically and physically tormenting them, again almost identically to the book. The government in 1984 used these evil tactics to keep people from re-offending and to forcefully feed them propaganda and lies in order to make them follow laws and believe. “A hideous ecstasy of fear and vindictiveness, a desire to kill, to torture, to smash faces in with a sledgehammer, seemed to flow through the whole group of people ... turning one even against one's will like an electric current, turning one even against one's will into a grimacing, screaming lunatic.” This dark scene in the book where Winston, the main character, was getting tortured for rebelling against the government's idealogy is not far from what has happened in North Korea. There are prison camps in North Korea where savage torturing and sexual assaults are being conducted. “Beatings, rape, starvation and sick public executions are a daily reality for thousands of North Koreans, according to years of witness testimony.”(Black, 2017)This is exactly like the book where they assault lawbreakers to 

Throughout this book, there were unethical ways of controlling and manipulating the population. These techniques to gain control may seem fictional, however, our current world brings the dark truth to this book. Countries such as Russia, North Korea and the United States of America all have small parts that closely represent dark totalitarian governments. It may only be a matter of time before the severity of content constraints, monitoring and physiological and physical abuse to gain control increases. This book should be taken as a warning and precaution for totalitarian governments.

Reflective Commentary 

Throughout this research paper, it was quite easy to find similarities between the real world and the fictional novel 1984. When I first read the book I thought it was completely fictional until I did research about countries like Russia, China, the USA, North Korea and a few others. I was shocked to see that the actions displayed in 1984 could not have been more accurate to what some countries have been doing in order to obtain full control over their citizens. To formulate the research essay I paired themes from the book with examples in the real world. The three themes I included in the book were psychological and physical manipulation, control of information, and invasion of privacy. I paired each theme with a country that exhibited these traits. To find resources for the paper I looked at multiple articles and news reports of each of the countries to create links and find similarities. 

Bibliography 

Black, I. (2017, September 20). NSA spying scandal: what we have learned. The Guardian; The Guardian. https://www.theguardian.com/world/2013/jun/10/nsa-spying-scandal-what-we-have-learned

Media Control In 1984 By George Orwell’s 1984 | ipl.org. (n.d.). Www.ipl.org. Retrieved August 5, 2022, from https://www.ipl.org/essay/Media-Control-In-1984-By-George-Orwells-P3NKDP74SCP6#:~:text=Telescreens%20In%20George%20Orwell

North Korea’s human rights: What’s not being talked about. (2019, February 18). BBC News. https://www.bbc.com/news/world-asia-44234505

Xu, B., & Albert, E. (2017, February 17). Media Censorship in China. Council on Foreign Relations. https://www.cfr.org/backgrounder/media-censorship-china.