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The Party's Slogans in 1984 Essay

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Agony of Irony

In George Orwells 1984 the governing body known as The Party, has a three line slogan from which it bases its ideology. These lines are Ignorance is Strength, War is Peace, and Freedom is Slavery. These three ironic lines may not seem to make sense but the party uses them in a way that gives them total control over the people. They restrict the people to the point that there is no way that they could ever lose the power that they hold over them. The three principals will be explained more in depth in the following paragraphs.

The first line of The Partys slogan is Ignorance is Strength. What this basically means is that the people of Oceania are kept ignorant to what the party is really doing and how poor the conditions they live in truly are. This level of ignorance is achieved through three main tactics. The first of these is the restriction of language. The Party created a new language known as Newspeak which essentially destroys the peoples ability to express what theyre thinking. It does this through the restriction of vocabulary. Without the words to really describe what one is feeling then basically the feelings cant be felt. The party controls how the people feel by not letting them feel. The second method of keeping the people ignorant is through the falsification of news and events that took place in history. The book explains it as And when memory failed and written records were falsifiedwhen that happened, the claim of the Party to have improved the conditions of human life had got to be accepted, because there did not exist, and never again could exist, any standard against which it could be tested. The party has total control over the news and what goes in history books so they can make history whatever they want it to be. They changed the way the past is portrayed as a place even worse that the already horrific time of 1984. This lie forces the people to believe that they are better off now under the control of the party then they were before it came into power. The restriction of news is also a huge factor. The party will only publish new that shows it in a good light and often this news, never even happened. The people are only given good news of the Partys wonderful deeds so they think that the party does nothing but good. The third tactic for keeping the people of Oceania ignorant is by restricting science and technology. The only technological and scientific advances that are allowed to be made are ones that benefit The Party. This keeps the people in the dark ages so to speak while the party advances ahead making them far superior to the normal people. All of this ignorance inhibits the peoples ability to rebel therefore strengthening The Party.

The slogans second line is War is Peace. This is the concept of keeping Oceania in a constant state of war keeps the peace among The Party. The never ending war affects the peoples mentality towards The Party greatly in three simple ways. War instills a sense of patriotism and intense loyalty toward The Party thus obligating the people not to rebel. The war also puts the people in a state of constant fear. The Party uses this fear to their advantage because if the people believe that they are being protected then they arent going to go against the ones they believe are keeping them safe. Finally the party uses war as an excuse for poor living conditions. They say that the reason the people are poor and the reason there are shortages of almost everything is because of the war. Due to these war conditions that The Party has fabricated no one will rebel. The war they create gives them peace among the people.

The third and final line of the slogan is Freedom is Slavery. This means that The Party enslaves the people to their will so that the party leaders keep their power and have the ability to do whatever they want. They do this through never ending psychological and physical torture. The government controls every aspect of every minute of the peoples day. They control their minds and bodies and because of this the people have no time to think about how bad they have it. The second way that the people are enslaved is through brainwashing. The people are brainwashed to believe only what The Party wants them to believe. Its shown in this quote from the novel. In the end the Party would announce that two and two made five and you would have to believe it. It was inevitable that they should make that claim sooner or later: the logic of their position demanded it. Not merely the validity of experience, but the very existence of external reality was tacitly denied by their philosophy. The third way freedom is slavery is the impossibility of individuality among the people. This makes is so all people are the same. So they all think the same way. If no one is different and they all support The Party then theyll never pose a threat.

The three lines of The Partys slogan are a recipe for complete control over a non-thinking, ignorant race of people. It ironically uses the contradiction of the ideals that we abide by and protect today to completely control the people of Oceania.

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