Here are a few questions over the section we read (pgs 37-69). You can choose which question or how many questions you want to answer.
1. How do you think Party supporters working in the Ministry of Truth view the work they do? How does this relate to doublethink?
2. How has working in the Ministry of Truth affected Winston's perception of reality?
3. What is the purpose behind producing lower forms of entertainment for the proletarians in society?
4. Why do you think Winston believes that intelligence, no matter how orthodox, will ultimately lead to vaporization?
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9 comments:
Not sure if everyone else forgot or not, but I guess I'm first to respond. Great job on the activities Friday.
I definetly think that because of the Ministry of Truth Winston's views on reality have been altered. Everything in their society has been doublethought so that even plain and obvious ideas have their truth questioned. As with F451, in this Utopia no one searches for these flaws. But when someone like winston comes along and questions all of society, their entire perception of reality changes and alters and sees how society is gilded.
I think the Winston believes intelligence will lead to vaporition because he knows that intelligence can and will lead to revolt. At some point even the most orthoxy intelligent people will realize that there is room for revolt!
I think I’ll choose question four to answer (Why do you think Winston believes that intelligence, no matter how orthodox, will ultimately lead to vaporization?)
Seeing as this is an opinionated response, I believe that Winston has adopted this philosophy because he is able to visualize the corruption within the present administration. He utilizes his perception as a model to predict the fates of others. Although the Big Brother regime promotes the alteration of previous historical archives (in the ministry of truth) thus conceiving a society based on complete false information, Winston understands how fiction the lies the government procures are. For this reason, he must have driven him to consider the possibility of a person being aware of the government’s lies and the consequences associated with it. He must have also assumed that the thought police persecute for opinion, concern, resentment, or disbelief in government statements or the regime itself. But why would the government hold opinion, concern, or disbelief as negative entities? In my opinion, this question must first be analyzed in terms of incentive behind persecution on the government’s part. The government feeds its citizens lies (non intelligence) so that the society may never become subject to challenge. Assuming this statement is correct, using indirect logic, it may be assumed that intelligence (in the form of concern, disbelief, or opinion) results in challenge, or in other terms, rebellion. Of course, the government is attempting to prevent this from happening and will deploy the thought police once a suspect “guilty” of thought, opinion, concern, or disbelief is encountered. For this reason, all rebellion will be stopped before it even starts, and Winston realizes this through his occupation at the ministry of truth. Will he be the next thought crime victim, for he fits the qualifications above?
By the way- great game guys!
I think the parties supporters view their work in the Ministry of Truth as worked needed to be done and not really aware of what is going on. I think they just do the work and never question what they are actually doing. They are able to do this because of their use of doublethink. Doublethink brainwashes everyone into believing that two contradicting beliefs are right. The party is able to lie to them so much that they are able to forget any memories they have.
This is my response to #4:
I think Winston believes this because intellegent people are automatically going to be curious, no matter how brainwashed they are. They don't just want to be told events are going on, they want to know why they are occuring. Through vaporization, a person's whole existance can be erased along with all of their new thoughts and ideas, just the way Big Brother wants things.
I too chose to respond to question four. Winston probably believes intelligence will lead to vaporization because intelligence allows an individual to see multiple facets of any issue. Even if they espouse the orthodox view on an issue, the party knows that it is dangerous for any one to understand or even know of the existence of any view which contradicts the party’s. Not only are intelligent people able to explore different and potentially dangerous sides of issue, but they are also able to articulate their ideas and thoughts to others. This is extremely threatening to the party because if any intelligent person could sway the opinion of the masses, than this would be absolutely disastrous. Really, the party’s main objective is to prevent any understanding of what’s happening and thus prevent any resistance. Though people like Syme may agree with the party, their intelligence gives them the ability and potential to disagree and therefore they must be vaporized. Vaporization is the party’s most important tool: not only does it give them power through fear, but also the ability to utterly demolish even the potential for dissent or rebellion.
I'm going to kind of break the chain and reply to question 1.
I think that the supporting people working in the Ministry of Truth view their work as the way things should be. I think that the big-uber-in-charge people think that this is the way society should be run: the citizens fallen under the absolute control of the government, which has every action they take seen. I think the people that are still supportive of the Party but not entirely in charge may think a little differently, but not much. They may think that maybe the people higher ranking than they are doing things right, or maybe their just pressured a little bit into doing what, ultimately, the Party wants. But of course, all the people in the Party must think alike, or they will not run a successful government, so the people in the Party must think the same way about the government they are running. But I do think that maybe some people in the Party a bullied a little bit into doing things that may not be their first choice on how to handle things; and since the people outside the Party are so brainwashed (except for people like Winston), the people in the Party have no one to run to or back them up. That's what I think, I'm not so sure if that's entirely valid, but it's a bit of speculation.
And I agree with everybody who replied to question 4. Winston is in fact curious about the way the government is being governed. And he's slightly confused as to how he's going to handle his growing intelligence on the problem that he's grown accostomed to seeing in that strange, brainwashed atmosphere.
Those are all really great questions, but I am going to respond to #2.
By Working in the Ministry of Truth, Winston's perception of reality has been faded. After hours and hours of changing the past, he does not always know what is real and what is made up. The workers don't question what they are doing and just do what they are told to do. So after working there for awhile, Winston will probably lose his since of reality even more, which will hurt him greatly if he does decide to challenge the system.
answering question 2 i believe it has affected his perception by allowing him to see the destruction of the past.
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