Orwellian

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Orwellian is an adjective meaning "authoritarian," "tyrannical," or "dystopian," to such an extreme degree as to wish to control reality itself.

The term comes from George Orwell's dystopian novel Nineteen Eighty-Four, which depicts an intensely authoritarian government.

[edit] Aspects

One of the most important and chilling concepts in 1984 is Orwell's description of how the ruling Party places no boundaries on its efforts to subjugate its people. In 1984, the Party:

  • encourages doublethink, to obfuscate reality and prevent questioning of the Party
  • punished thoughtcrime, to prevent anyone from overcoming doublethink
  • manipulates language through Newspeak, to require doublethink in all language
  • spreads propaganda and alters history through negationism and pseudohistory, to make doublethink unnecessary and the Party appear inherently good
  • encourages worship of the Party, or "Big Brother", to reinforce doublethink
  • creates a constant foreign threat of war to use to unite the populace in support of the Party
  • monitoring all citizens through sophisticated surveillance equipment, to ensure compliance
  • tortures and murders noncompliant citizens

[edit] Misuse of the term

Many arguments for greater government involvement have been argued against as being "Orwellian", while, ironically, Orwell himself was a leftist and a democratic socialist. Even more ironically, Orwell spoke against the obfuscation of language and was particularly opposed to people using precise terms in the wrong context, yet "Orwellian" has been applied to even the most benevolent of world leaders.

[edit] See also

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