Elimination of Human Characteristics in "1984"

“Dehumanization in George Orwell’s 1984”

         George Orwell wrote 1984 while he was on his deathbed and founded it on the work of a Russian author Yergeny Zamyath. 1984 is a frightening illustration of how the government can come to control and dominate the individuals through cultural conditioning. (“1984” 233) 1984 is set in Oceania, a totalitarian territory dominated and controlled by the ominous dictator named Big Brother who completely manipulates and dehumanizes the citizen’s thoughts, expressions, and behaviors. (239) 1984 is the expression of George Orwell’s mood toward the behavior of mankind. The mood it expresses is depression and anxiousness about the future of the human race, and the warning is that unless the human race changes its actions and behaviors, everyone will loose most of their human characteristics, and will become soulless robots without even being aware of it. (Fromm 129) In 1984, George Orwell uses Winston and Julia, the main characters, in order to demonstrate the disastrous effects and hazards of dehumanization through the annihilation of various aspects of human life.  

        Winston hides his disdain for the actions of the totalitarian government like, the disgusting food and drink, deplorable accommodations, training of children into spies, the alteration of history, the mass hysteria that is deeply imbedded in the ritualistic tendencies of the two minutes hate, hidden, deep inside for he knows that if such feelings or thoughts were shared it was a crime punishable by death. (“1984” 234) Even when he hears the party’s three slogans, “War is peace. Freedom is slavery. Ignorance is strength”, (Orwell 6) he has to hide is disdain and repeat the slogans with enthusiasm and loyalty or he could be perused for facecrime. (“1984” 245) “The reader will find many features of our present Western society in Orwell’s description of 1984. It is even possible to commit thought crime by being overheard talking in your sleep, which Winston fears will happen to him.” (239) “By controlling all information and past information, Big Brother controls the reactions of individuals, directly through the large, two-way TV screens in every housing unit.” (241) The citizens of Oceania always have to guard their thoughts and emotions by a mask of undoubted loyalty and unwavering enthusiasm for the part since Big Brother can very easily expose thought crimes. (239) Any citizen that is guilty of thought crime, will be turned in by Big Brothers ever vigilant and loyal army of children spies. (239) If a citizen does not have the correct, loyal facial expression, they are considered guilty of a crime like thought crime, facecrime. So all emotions must but highly regulated (239)

        “The sexual act, successfully performed was rebellion. Desire was thought crime” Lust and desire is thought crime in Oceania because it raises the human, the individuality, higher than Big Brother and the power of the part to regulate the populous. (240) “The threat to the party of the thought crime that desire represents is sufficiently serious that the state shows very strict control over any instinctive characteristics of humans.” (“1984” 246) The party realizes that humans instinctively want to have intercourse, form romantic bonds, and show individuality in their lives instead of cooperating with everything the totalitarian government says. (239) There is no extra space in the lives of the outer parties loyal members, anything that isn’t directly related to the party or Big Brother. “Sexual energy is to be transferred into political violence and mass hysteria”. (246) The party prohibited love and romanticism that surrounds sex and reduced marriage to a business deal between a man and a woman that exists only to produce children. Sexual urges must be hidden away and diminished in fear that they will lead to love, romantic connections, and personal loyalty, all of which threaten the power of the party and the totalitarian government. (239) Readers only see Katherine, Winston’s wife who cannot bare children, through Winston’s memory of her. Katherine’s purpose in the novel is to show how Big Brother destroys love and loyalty in order to preserve the party. (238) Big Brother demands absolute control over the citizen’s individual infatuations. Big brother also demands that the citizens love him more than anyone else, even their families. (239)

        In 1984, orthodoxy removes the reason or need to think ever. (“1984” 241) The party is on control of all information and often alters and changes history, even yesterday’s events and history in order to correct history that may have changed. (239) One of the most important changes in the book was a new form of writing and communicating, which developed from the Renaissance. The first expression of which is Thomas More’s Utopia. (Bosmajiah 1) “He contends that our language becomes ugly and inaccurate because our thoughts are foolish but the slovenliness of our language makes it easier for us to have inaccurate thoughts. Dehumanizing metaphors are more than just figures of speech; they affect our thought and actions.” (1) The reason for Newspeak is to limit the span of ideas that can be thought of and expressed so, as the language progresses and develops, it contains fewer and fewer words and expressions. (“1984” 240) Torture is the way to communicate in Oceania, worse to be tortures is not the worst thing in the world, if only his torturer understands the victim, as Winston feels like O’Brian understands him, which makes the betrayal of O’Brian even more painful to Winston. (250) That human beings can only efficiently communicate through torture and pain, or that, that will be the state of things soon, is a dark, depressing thesis. (252)