The novels, 1984 by George Orwell and Brave New World by Aldous Huxley, depict how tight control over a people skews and diminishes their ideas of independence and free thought.
To begin, the societies of the two novels are extensively controlled by their governments to the point where the people are forced into orthodoxy or are incapable of being anything but orthodox. In Orwell's 1984, citizens are expected to blindly follow Big Brother and the Party, who are considered the only reliable source of information. At the Ministry of Truth, information is constantly being altered so that the Party's predictions and claims are always right, thus rendering human memory unreliable and subject to outside influence (Orwell 38-39). Unsurprisingly, …show more content…
Firstly, all of the people born into the State are genetically engineered to have class-specific traits. At the Hatchery and Conditioning Centre, Bokanovsky's process makes a single human egg, which normally develops into one human, grow instead into 96 humans (Huxley 6). This process is considered a "major instrument in social stability (Huxley 7)." This sort of control over people is intended to create "community, identity, [and] stability (Huxley 3)" by eliminating the chance of undesirable traits from arising in the population as well as breed a population incapable of becoming anything they are not intended to become. Additionally, order is maintained by structuring their society around a predetermined hierarchy. At the top of society are the Alphas, followed by the Betas, Gammas, Deltas, and lastly, the Epsilons. Each class is exposed to certain amounts of oxygen, nutrients, and other substances that mimic natural human embryonic development. The more nurturing an embryo receives, the more capable and intelligent the person will be, and vice versa (Huxley 14). The system makes certain that people can only do as much as they are designed to do, effectively creating top-tier people who hold the power and bottom-tier people who are unable to realize the inequality of their situation.The capacity for power …show more content…
Firstly, people can develop unorthodox thoughts and as a result, are converted back into Party supporters. The character, Winston, is tortured in the Ministry of Love so that he will come to love Big Brother and abandon his treacherous ideas (Orwell 282). He finally succumbs after months of torture, and leaves the Ministry of Love an orthodox citizen (Orwell 298). Winston's incident demonstrates how the Party maintains its control over the people by rectifying any contradictions to their power as it arises. In addition, the peoples' thoughts are being diminished by a shrinking vocabulary. Newspeak serves to eliminate range of thought by combining simple words with new prefixes and suffixes, conveniently replacing extraneous synonyms and antonyms (Orwell 51). In the future, people would only speak in a language whose vocabulary decreases every year (Orwell 52). On the surface, Newspeak appears to be a clear and concise method of communication, but in reality, it will narrow down thought to the point where concepts like freedom and slavery can no longer be expressed, let alone thought. How can others gain power if there is no word for oppression or tyranny? To continue, the sole purpose of the Ministry of Truth is to alter information. Winston, like many who work at
To begin, the societies of the two novels are extensively controlled by their governments to the point where the people are forced into orthodoxy or are incapable of being anything but orthodox. In Orwell's 1984, citizens are expected to blindly follow Big Brother and the Party, who are considered the only reliable source of information. At the Ministry of Truth, information is constantly being altered so that the Party's predictions and claims are always right, thus rendering human memory unreliable and subject to outside influence (Orwell 38-39). Unsurprisingly, …show more content…
Firstly, all of the people born into the State are genetically engineered to have class-specific traits. At the Hatchery and Conditioning Centre, Bokanovsky's process makes a single human egg, which normally develops into one human, grow instead into 96 humans (Huxley 6). This process is considered a "major instrument in social stability (Huxley 7)." This sort of control over people is intended to create "community, identity, [and] stability (Huxley 3)" by eliminating the chance of undesirable traits from arising in the population as well as breed a population incapable of becoming anything they are not intended to become. Additionally, order is maintained by structuring their society around a predetermined hierarchy. At the top of society are the Alphas, followed by the Betas, Gammas, Deltas, and lastly, the Epsilons. Each class is exposed to certain amounts of oxygen, nutrients, and other substances that mimic natural human embryonic development. The more nurturing an embryo receives, the more capable and intelligent the person will be, and vice versa (Huxley 14). The system makes certain that people can only do as much as they are designed to do, effectively creating top-tier people who hold the power and bottom-tier people who are unable to realize the inequality of their situation.The capacity for power …show more content…
Firstly, people can develop unorthodox thoughts and as a result, are converted back into Party supporters. The character, Winston, is tortured in the Ministry of Love so that he will come to love Big Brother and abandon his treacherous ideas (Orwell 282). He finally succumbs after months of torture, and leaves the Ministry of Love an orthodox citizen (Orwell 298). Winston's incident demonstrates how the Party maintains its control over the people by rectifying any contradictions to their power as it arises. In addition, the peoples' thoughts are being diminished by a shrinking vocabulary. Newspeak serves to eliminate range of thought by combining simple words with new prefixes and suffixes, conveniently replacing extraneous synonyms and antonyms (Orwell 51). In the future, people would only speak in a language whose vocabulary decreases every year (Orwell 52). On the surface, Newspeak appears to be a clear and concise method of communication, but in reality, it will narrow down thought to the point where concepts like freedom and slavery can no longer be expressed, let alone thought. How can others gain power if there is no word for oppression or tyranny? To continue, the sole purpose of the Ministry of Truth is to alter information. Winston, like many who work at