1984 Blog #1

What are the Party mottos? What is unusual about them?

“War is peace. Freedom is slavery. Ignorance is strength.” Their mottos are complete contrasts and they contradict each other. They are oxymorons by our society’s standards.

What is Newspeak? What is its purpose?

It’s the language that the people in Oceania now use instead of the traditional Oldspeak. In the Newspeak words are shorter and less descriptive. The whole purpose is to control people even more because they won’t be able to commit thoughtcrime when using Newspeak.

Why is it essential for the Party to rid the language of synonyms and antonyms?

Again the whole point of Newspeak is control. Synonyms and antonyms eliminate all words except one word from a feeling/etc. In this way, thoughcrimes couldn’t even be possible and people wouldn’t have to be “vanished”. People couldn’t even comprehend rebellion.

How does the Party control history? Why?

They have workers who go into the old newspapers, documents, etc. and change records so that they fit the propaganda that Big Brother is currently representing. They also destroy records of people who were “vanished” and sometimes create people. The history is altered so that people always believe that Big Brother is right and their lies become the truth.

Who is Emmanuel Goldstein and how is he presented to the people of Oceania?

He is a leader of the opposition of Big Brother. His face is used in the “Two Minute Hate” where people are forced to watch his speeches against Big Brother and taught to hate him. He is shown as a sheep in Oceania and at the end of the “Two Minute Hate” his face is shown baaing.

Cloning: "Right" or "Wrong"?

I used to think most cloning was wrong but, as with any grey-area issue, there are positives and negatives. I think that the cloning used to help patients is a good thing because there could be life-saving effects. But I do understand that it could be seen as harvesting humans for our own gain. I’m honestly torn between the two sides and I don’t think I’m in a position to say whither it is “right” or “wrong”.

The use of cloning to protect endangered species is one type I’m for. But I think that only species who are endangered or extinct because of our doing should be candidates for cloning. If we bring back naturally extinct species we will be messing up the natural order of nature. I know the opposition to this kind of cloning says that people will feel less guilty about destroying habitat knowing the animals that live there can be cloned, but I think those people will destroy habitat no matter what. The only real problem with this is the fact that the cloned animals might not have any habitat or niche to return to in the wild anymore.

As for the cloning of humans, I am completely against that. Call me conservative on this one but I just think that humans weren’t made to be duplicated in that way. I also don’t think that pets should be cloned for no reason. Cloning is a scientific tool that has a lot of power and I don’t think it should be used lightly.

Who knows? The future might look like Brave New World. For now though I think there are a lot of moral and ethical questions that need to be answered before cloning takes the next step to humans. Then again, everyone’s moral and ethical range and tolerance is different so human cloning might not be very far off.

Ecstasy and Soma

The problem is that the mind is such a powerful and complex mystery that it seems unlikely that any society or drug could completely control every mind. The problem is that the drug soma is only creating fake happiness instead people having complete happiness. The problem with having truth and happiness combined together is that they can’t always co-exist all the time. Truth can lead to pain and unhappiness but it can make the happiness all the more important.

People like Bernard and Helmholtz probably feel a part of that truth and so they can’t fit in with the happy society. Ecstasy is similar to soma in that it is a hallucinogen. Soma and ecstasy also both raise heart rate and, while soma won’t kill a person in the short-term, they both have long-term effects. Ecstasy can make a person feel temporarily happy but increase depression and anxiety afterwards. Soma doesn’t seem to have that effect. Both create a false happiness that isn’t based on anything.

Brave New Babies

I think that having the ability to determine gender has both pros and cons. The deciding factor (of if we should use this technology) should be whichever one (pros or cons) outweighs the other. But really that is an opinion and therefore will probably be debated for a long time. Personally I believe that deciding the gender of one’s baby has more cons to it. As the article states, history has shown that cultures will value one gender over the other and, with the new technology, it could lead to gender discrimination (the chart really has nothing to do with gender preselection but it has some interesting facts on gender discrimination). It also seems unfair that only relatively well-off parents could afford such a procedure. And with all the things we waste money on, should it really be on a child’s gender when either gender should be good enough?

However, I don’t think that people shouldn’t go as far as say that this technology will lead to choosing intelligence etc. because, again as the article states, there are more factors to those characteristics. What I object to is the desire to create a “perfect”, “balanced” family. There is no such thing as a perfect family and the desire for perfection shouldn’t be the goal of a family anyway. I think that if parents aren’t ready for one gender then their not ready for either; they should be able to be happy with either gender. Plus, the fact is some of those gender-chosen babies might be gay or transgender probably destroying the “perfect” family image that the parents created. If someone was really focused on one gender, there are a lot of babies who need adoptive parents. But in the end, gender shouldn’t define how much a parent loves or wants their child.

Health Article

In the Sydney Morning Herald on April 2, 2009, an article was published about a need for better veteran mental health care. The article describes how a report will be published soon about the number of suicides among veterans and the quality of care veterans are receiving. The government is apparently working with veteran groups to improve their system of care. The Australian government says that the system has improved but that is still could be better. This article is similar to reports we hear on the news about the American health services for veterans; there have been scandals about their care in the past. It seems both health systems need
to be changed.


Article found on: http://news.smh.com.au/breaking-news-national/veterans-mental-health-could-be-better-20090402-9kr1.html

Brave New World Reaction

Brave New World is like most science fiction novels when it tries to describe a world both drastically different from our own but still has a resemblance so the readers can somehow connect. I was a little horrified with the way no one seemed to show emotions in the new world; it seems to me that emotions are what definitions humanity and without them, the people act like robots. As for the connection with today’s world, I think the fears some people have for technology are addressed in Brave New World. It’s on the news a lot about how people are against stem cell research because some believe it will lead to cloning or “baby farming”. Brave New World is interesting because when Huxley wrote the novel, it was probably based on trends or fears he saw in his own society. Huxley took some social taboos of his time (and some are still relevant today) and made them the social norms of the future.