The purpose of a totalitarian government is to ensure its survival and to keep the people under check. This means that the people are not becoming aware and rebelling against the idea of government spying and controlling them. This concept of a class becoming aware is termed as class consciousness, however, there exists prerequisites needing to be met if a class is to truly able become aware. Orwell details this ideology in his book through Winston when he writes that, “until they become conscious they will never rebel, and until after they have rebelled they cannot become conscious” (Orwell 70). He explains that class consciousness among the proles is impossible because they will never be made fully aware since the statement he writes is a contradiction in itself. It is a contradiction because to become aware, one needs to rebel, but one can’t rebel without being aware. If this is the case, then it is meaningless to surveille people such as the proles due to the fact that they do not pose a true threat to the government for the reason that there is no way for them to attain a form of class consciousness. There is no need to constantly surveille the …show more content…
In real life situations, it typically takes a group or an individual from the higher class to cause the lower to become aware of the injustices that are being done to them. The only ones that can make the lower class aware is an individual from the upper class who has first hand experiences with the methods that the upper class employs in order to dominate the lower class. Similarly, in the novel, the Brotherhood, which is an organization the may exist with the purpose of taking down the totalitarian government because they do not agree with the government’s ideologies, is led by an individual who originated from the Inner party itself, Emmanuel Goldstein. The party understands that in order for revolutions to occur and the government to fall, those who constantly work with the government and those who understand the working of the government must be the ones who are watched constantly. In the book constantly it is stated that the ones that are constantly watched by the government are not the proles, but rather the Inner and Outer Party members. Those in the Inner and Outer Party, such as Winston Smith are the ones that have access to the workings of the government and become aware of the methods that are used to silence the masses. For example, Winston alters