The doctrine that O’Brien proclaims to Winston is of crucial importance to maintaining the system of oligarchical collectivism; “Reality exists in the human mind, and nowhere else. Not in the individual mind, which can make mistakes, and in any case soon perishes; only in the mind of the Party, which is collective and immortal. What-ever the Party holds to be the truth is truth. It is impossible to see reality except by looking through the eyes of the Party.” The basis of INGSOC is built on the fundamentals ideas of totalitarianism; isolation, the use of telescreens to invade citizens’ privacy, complete governmental ownership of all resources, and unchallenged authority. Although Winston initially rejected this doctrine and tried to fit his pre-INGSOC lifestyle into the era of INGSOC, after this encounter with O’Brien in which he is physically threatened, Winston embraces this doctrine as his new way of living.
In order for Big Brother and the Party to stay in power, they must isolate the society from outside influence and erase the former mindset. By rewriting history and changing the language into Newspeak, the Party successfully cut off all contact to other societies and previous times except through one’s personal memory, in which Winston wrestled with as he suppressed and questioned some of his own memories. Late in the novel he recalls a happy time of him and his mother, but doubts whether it could have been true.
Another tactic that the Party used successfully was the manipulation of the language in which former and multiple meanings and associations with words were lost and mandated by the Party. This changed the way people thought of political and social ideas. For instance, the word “free” no longer could be associated with the idea of freedom from control. This prevented people from thinking about rebelling against the Party and developed an absence of thinking beyond the Party’s boundaries. The idea that the Party instituted of crimethink also further prevented people from thinking and expressing negative thoughts and notions against the party.
The telescreens further enhance the Party’s security of control by monitoring the details of everyone’s daily lives. In the beginning of the novel, Winston worries about being spied on by the telescreens as he writes in his diary thoughts against the Party and his suspicions about Julia and O’Brien. This idea of constant monitoring of people’s everyday lives and activities instills fear in the citizens and causes them to be apprehensive to resist the Party’s laws.
Through the use of these tactics, the society formed a reliance on the Party and no longer saw themselves as individuals who can be self-reliant. They willfully accepted the Parties lies through the rewriting of history and adopted the complete distortion of the language, which the Party called an improved and more efficient language. They looked to the Party as the final authority that was concerned with their welfare and saw a need for the Party; which is why the majority of the society did not resist the changes that an INGSOC society brought on a grand scale.
Winston was contrary to most of society; it bothered him how the Party was rewriting history, constantly invading everyone’s privacy, the lack of freedom to think and express thoughts publicly, and was not willing to conform to be bound to the Party like the rest of society. O’Brien calls Winston “a minority of one” in their last encounter because he failed to submit to the Party as everyone else. Winston struggled with letting go of the former lifestyle and ended up alone in his recollection of what he renders truth. He was the last connection society had to the past. As Winston realized he was the only one left, he finally relented and embraced this new doctrine in which he finds a love and admiration for Big Brother; forsaking his previous efforts to preserve the truth. Winston shifted his paradigm to that of the Party’s, as the doctrine called for. By the close of the novel, Winston almost makes a complete turn-around; from thinking as an individual outside of the Party’s lines and resisting the doctrine for preservation of “the truth” to accepted everything he once denounced as lies in order to preserve his own life.
In order for Big Brother and the Party to stay in power, they must isolate the society from outside influence and erase the former mindset. By rewriting history and changing the language into Newspeak, the Party successfully cut off all contact to other societies and previous times except through one’s personal memory, in which Winston wrestled with as he suppressed and questioned some of his own memories. Late in the novel he recalls a happy time of him and his mother, but doubts whether it could have been true.
Another tactic that the Party used successfully was the manipulation of the language in which former and multiple meanings and associations with words were lost and mandated by the Party. This changed the way people thought of political and social ideas. For instance, the word “free” no longer could be associated with the idea of freedom from control. This prevented people from thinking about rebelling against the Party and developed an absence of thinking beyond the Party’s boundaries. The idea that the Party instituted of crimethink also further prevented people from thinking and expressing negative thoughts and notions against the party.
The telescreens further enhance the Party’s security of control by monitoring the details of everyone’s daily lives. In the beginning of the novel, Winston worries about being spied on by the telescreens as he writes in his diary thoughts against the Party and his suspicions about Julia and O’Brien. This idea of constant monitoring of people’s everyday lives and activities instills fear in the citizens and causes them to be apprehensive to resist the Party’s laws.
Through the use of these tactics, the society formed a reliance on the Party and no longer saw themselves as individuals who can be self-reliant. They willfully accepted the Parties lies through the rewriting of history and adopted the complete distortion of the language, which the Party called an improved and more efficient language. They looked to the Party as the final authority that was concerned with their welfare and saw a need for the Party; which is why the majority of the society did not resist the changes that an INGSOC society brought on a grand scale.
Winston was contrary to most of society; it bothered him how the Party was rewriting history, constantly invading everyone’s privacy, the lack of freedom to think and express thoughts publicly, and was not willing to conform to be bound to the Party like the rest of society. O’Brien calls Winston “a minority of one” in their last encounter because he failed to submit to the Party as everyone else. Winston struggled with letting go of the former lifestyle and ended up alone in his recollection of what he renders truth. He was the last connection society had to the past. As Winston realized he was the only one left, he finally relented and embraced this new doctrine in which he finds a love and admiration for Big Brother; forsaking his previous efforts to preserve the truth. Winston shifted his paradigm to that of the Party’s, as the doctrine called for. By the close of the novel, Winston almost makes a complete turn-around; from thinking as an individual outside of the Party’s lines and resisting the doctrine for preservation of “the truth” to accepted everything he once denounced as lies in order to preserve his own life.
