1984 the acceptance

The last few chapters of 1984 really bring out the personality in Winston. Being tortured shows his true colors and the power of the government. During his imprisonment and torture you move through the mind of a prisoner and his changing reflections on his society. You can also see the breakdown of the mind after weeks of torment. Then after the mind has been broken down into a fertile state, O'Brien starts rebuilding his sense of right. This is basically the acceptance of Big Brother and the actions of the government. After Winston has been taken care of you start to realize the power that a government force has towards its people. Winston was one of the few rebels and his life and past had been erased leaving no trace of his thoughts or rebel actions.

1984

As Winston and Julia (main characters) plot to see each other, it shows the intricate and clockwork set-up of the thought police. They talk to each other in quick bursts and hardly make eye contact in their short meetings. All that shows the understanding that they have towards the government and the dangerousness of their meeting. Both of their guards start slipping as they fall deeper and deeper into love. Once they have their meeting place in the old house they loose their consciousness of the thought police and stay with each other for hours at a time. All their actions are almost inevitably leading to their capture. What I wonder is if they know this or not...

1984

The beginning of this book starts as an eye opener towards what part of the media we see is the truth. The protagonists job in this novel is to take old newspapers or documentation and forge or re-write the headings and words to erase things that the government of Oceania doesn't want the people to see. In the book this makes it possible to "control" the past and wipe certain events or people from history. Who knows if our media is true, or if its all set-up by the government to mediate what we see as a population. The control that this government has over the city is unfathomable, all the while it gives a look into the thought process communist countries have.

Heros and Zeros

"Most villains are cowards, they do their bad deeds feeling that they are immune to retaliation. Nowhere is this more evident then in the corrupt American media." - Page 149

Nowhere does O'Reilly carry a single speck of respect for "zeros", or "villains". He believes that if anyone has the nerve to make a bold statement and doesn't stand proudly beside their beliefs, that they should be stripped of any rights to publicly distribute their opinions. In a way I totally agree with this "bold" statement, even though freedom of speech is ever present. If someone is so cowardly that they have to hide behind a pen name or become anonymous, don't you think their opinion isn't very accurate. I mean, if you believe in your statement you should be behind your opinions 100%. For someone to hide their name makes me feel they don't believe their own words enough to be accountable for them.

With this quote O'Reilly is partially glorifying himself as a hero by sticking with his statements without being anonymous. In this sense of villainy and heroism I would indeed call him a hero, a hero against false truth. He frequently talks about his ability to detect and depict liers on his television show "The O'Reilly Factor". Personally from seeing his show I enjoy seeing him call out the liers and peace disturbers that think they can spew their lies without consequence.

Simple and straightforward

"My definition of evil, like just about everything else about me, is simple and straightforward: if you knowingly hurt another human being without significant cause, like self-defense, you are committing and evil act." - page 59

This quote by Bill O'Reilly leaves an important variable for the definition of evil. He states that if you knowingly hurt someone its considered evil. So does that mean that if you unknowingly hurt someone its perfectly fine? The Nazis were the most evil people to have ever existed in my opinion. Some of which contributed to the actions that occurred without directly knowing. So these bystanders unknowingly supported the murdering of millions of innocent people. Even though they did not know, I personally consider these people to be evil in nature. So in some way there is a loophole to his personal definition, and a major one if I might add.

Also, since he said that his outlook is "simple and straightforward" there isn't much room for variation, in a way everyone is evil. No one can live a perfect life without sin. No matter how small or insignificant, everyone is considered evil by this "simple and straightforward" definition. Later in this book O'Reilly tells us of past experiences that depict him as "evil" if we were to use his own definition. Now does he consider himself evil? Well I certainly don't this so as most people don't.

After finishing his segment on evil I came to my own conclusion that nothing can be defined by a simple and straightforward way. No matter the patriotism or honor in defining things such as evil, there can be no simple answer.

"The Eternal Struggle"

"Why am I telling you this? Because I believe that overcoming fear is an essential key to living a useful and honorable life," - Page 51
People are remembered by their good deeds and "honorable" actions throughout their lives. Take a funeral for example. The ceremony doesn't dwell on the persons wrong doings, rather it honors and adorns the simple actions and deeds that the person had achieved in their past life. O'Reilly states that fear is what we as a society have to overcome to fight injustice and fix what has been damaged. With fear existing in the back of our minds, we cannot rise above the status quo to receive the proper indulgence at our own funeral.

O'Reilly continues on saying that to fight these injustices, conflict must arise.This inevitably leads to suffering. This is the essence of our "Eternal Struggle" and the importance of fear in our minds. Power creates injustices, which leads to the choice of conflict. Conflict is decided by the amount of fear the individual has towards suffering. Thus the Eternal struggle is to overcome fear, whether that is fear of suffering or the fear of a tyrant.

If I were to take the most important piece of information away from this section. It would be that a happy and "honorable" life can only come from sacrifice. The ability to sacrifice or the amount you are willing to do is your own decision and is dictated on your willingness to suffer.

Imitation is History

"A writer's desire to write can only have come from previous experience of literature, and he'll start by imitating whatever he's read, which usually means what the people around him are writing."


After reading the second chapter that quote was the one that stood out to me the most. This to me seems to not be entirely true to most significant writers in history. Most writers who have made compelling additions to the world made truly unique pieces, such as shakespear and Dickens. That said, I can agree that a lot of less known writers have made very similer stories. Usually in the basic theme or plot of the story. But as an example our modern world of liturature being unique is a must to be sucesfull. This is due to the popularity of books and poems decreasing with the advancement of technology. Which pushes the modern writers to create something so eye catching and unique it can take the attention away from other forms of entertainment. So in a sense he is true with the past history of liturature, but incorrect with our modern day writers.

A completly different level

“What makes our practical life really human is a third level of the mind, a level where consciousness and practical skill come together. This third level is a vision or model in your mind of what you want to construct.” (p.7)

Reading this quote leads me to believe that Northrop is trying to suggest that our society today cannot function on practicality or consciousness alone. If our world was based on practicality everything would be simple and soulless. On the other hand our complex society could not handle on frivolous thinking alone. With these two factors in mind, our perspective of a perfect world is based upon them. As an example, all work and no play isn't a world in which us humans see as enjoyable. Leaving me to do nothing but agree with his statement.