Postman's Rhetorical Analysis Of 'Orwell In The Year 2000'

Postman strengthens his argument by focusing on shared assumptions. While his audience shares his pessimistic view of the present, his argument rests on the assumption that people can change if they so desire. Because the fair has been given the theme, “Orwell in the year 2000” (448), Postman assumes that his audience might entertain a doubtful view of society’s future. For those who believe in the collapse of civilization that is to come, he presents an image of a nation pulled into complacency. He asks, “To whom do we complain … when serious discourse dissolves into giggles? What is the antidote to a culture dying of laughter?” (452). This proves to be a fearful, pessimistic view of our nation. As part of that fear, Postman then taps into the audience’s utmost desire to return to a more idealistic time when he states, “In 1984, politics in America is not the Federalist Papers. …show more content…
It is not even Roosevelt’s fireside chats” (450). He emphasizes that today’s politics lack the heart and idealism that came during the times of Madison, Roosevelt, or even Lincoln. We’ve lost something, not necessarily lost for good though. Postman then hints that change is possible, but that change requires engagement: “everything in our background has prepared us to know and resist a prison when the walls begin to close around us” (452). Americans are capable of great resistance—and he states that the resistance used to fight totalitarianism should be used to resist this. Yet Postman shows that he fears what will happen “if there are no cries of anguish to be heard” (452). Change is possible if people are proactive and decide to resist. If not, the future is rather bleak: “I fear, ladies and gentlemen, that our philosophers have as yet given us no guidance in this matter” (452). Postman’s awareness of his audience fills his speech and builds on their shared assumptions of fear and hope for the