After having been diagnosed with tuberculosis, Eric Arthur Blair, better known as George Orwell, and shortly before his death, wrote his (most?) famous political satire, fiction, dystopian novel Nineteen Eighty Four.
The novel postulates a future in which governments have become totalitarian and all controlling. Spying on their citizens at every possible opportunity, controlling every aspect of their lives, including who can breed and when/where.
The ‘ultimate extreme’ of ‘thought crimes’ (crimes one commits by merely thinking something which has been labeled ‘wrong’) is another feature of the novel, right down to the ministry in charge of reeducating those who have committed such offenses.
As with much fiction, especially political and sci-fi, major portions of the novel have eventually come to pass, while not exactly on time, shortly after the times listed in the novel.
Having read the book in advance of the year, and then having lived through the year, I have noticed many of these ‘prophecies’ either coming true, or in the process of becoming true.
Among the items from the book which *I* think should cause the most concern because of the ‘psy-op’ (long used term to indicate psychological operations, also called psychological warfare) nature of these issues and their coming true:
- modification of language such as simplification, combining meanings under more general words, and even eliminating the use of ‘offensive’ words and replacing them with ‘politically correct’ words which often have the same or worse feel to the ‘protected’ group. “AWESOME” becomes “double plus good” or even “sick”, “American Indian” becomes “Native American” (which everyone born on US soil is by definition), autistic becomes “person with autism”, becomes “person experiencing autism”, etc.
- heavy use of terms such as ‘pro life’ when in reality both sides are pro life, neither is pro death, only the life they are protecting is defined differently and from a different angle, yet the use of the term automatically engenders hatred from the ‘unwashed masses’. These terms have become so common in political speak that it is nearly impossible to list them all before I run out of pixels.
- Politicians (hereafter often polidiots) who respond to their own personal needs instead of the needs of the people. People who fear their government (or should if they had not been cowed into compliance slowly first), instead of the government properly fearing it’s people.
- Big corporations (see #OPMonsanto, and Apple’s environmental and worker welfare records) who run wild, making money without regard for the consequences next week, let alone next year or century to either people (including customers) or the planet we all share.
- Wars and rumors of wars for the sole purpose of advancing personal and political goals, not for the good of the people/voters. The continuation of these wars on an indefinite basis, without an achievable goal offering benefit to the people as a whole anywhere in sight (at least we are not experiencing the rotation of friends and enemies yet).
- Segregation of the people against themselves, look at recent elections in several countries (admittedly the US leads this and little else these days) and the absolute polarity of these events, down to mud slinging and name calling that hints at past troubles of race and class taking root again. Look also at the inability of governments to accomplish anything because they are so steadfast in their beliefs in ‘party’ or ‘theology’ that every issue comes down to a rock versus a hard spot and neither can possibly win in the end.
- The grouping of rights for the haves and the have nots such as the US constitution clearly stating “all men are created equally.” (full stop, no exceptions) yet we need to argue about exceptions for gay men, lesbian women, non-white men, regular (read white) women, etc. and the following demonization of groups outside of the currently accepted ‘good list’ of people/groups.
- (not directly from 1984 but related in so many ways) The passing of laws restricting people from having a means to fight their government when needed, especially when there is already a law in place which punished the action being further limited. Example: controlling weapons when murder is already illegal.
- (also not directly from the book) The common theory that prohibitions work, when thousands of years of history prove that all they do is enable criminals and black-marketeers, funnel monies into polidiot’s pockets, and feed the companies (buying those polidiots) who produce goods and services to both sides of the prohibition (think weapons makers who supply the governments and drug cartels in the failed ‘war on drugs’)
- (not from the book directly) The legislation of one minorities ‘morality’ on the majority because the minority is wealthy, politically powerful, and/or willing to purchase or blackmail polidiots to their ends. This is particularly shameful/evil when in cases such as the USA you have a founding document/constitution which clearly states “there shall be no law establishing a religion” and this minority taking to the streets to demand both “a return to constitutional values” and “a return to the Christian values which founded this country”. Most of the original founders of the USA were fleeing religious persecution, and the state religions they did not fully agree with.
- Rewriting history to fit the needs of the ruling class today, despite what that same history said yesterday.
This is a lot of points to think about, and far from a complete list.
Lets pick just one above point, and start there. Since it connects to so many other worthwhile causes, lets pick “prohibitions”
I will use enforcement and prohibition pretty much interchangeably in this article because in the end they are the same thing in this context. Prohibition leads to enforcement which leads to more prohibition, rinse lather and repeat, again …
First, look back through history, the real history, not the rewritten 1984 like history, where even the newspapers today say “it has always been this” despite what they wrote yesterday.
Find a prohibition in history, all the way back to the first scribblings of a common tongue thousands of years in the past, which has effectively stopped anyone from doing anything, has stopped them without also adding to the desire of otherwise unconcerned people to ‘try’ this prohibited action/good/service just to see what it is about, without adding to the pocket lining of polidiots and their supporters (who support the particular prohibition), without adding to the wealth of one company/group at the expense of a competing company/group, which has not enabled underground/criminal activity, lastly which has not failed to show benefit within a decade so badly that it was repealed, or as in the case of the “war on drugs” after that decade has not needed doubled budgets every few years, and caused the loss of far more lives than would have been lost due to the prohibited activity/service/goods.
Prohibiting someone from chugging a 1/5th=750ml of whiskey and getting behind the wheel of a car has NEVER stopped anyone but a law abiding citizen, who would not have done such a silly thing in the first place, from doing such a silly thing.
The law has never once saved a life, not kept someone from injury, it has served merely to make uptight people feel safe, and added to the ego of the polidiots who passed the law and/or the governments which would rather spend money on enforcement than on education or treatment. It (the law) has always been about consequences, and making it into prevention is beyond insane.
The list goes on and on, of course, but my electrons are limited.
What we need to do instead of run to legislation/prohibition.enforcement is to educate people about things like manners, compassion, concern for others, how bad it is for you personally when you commit certain acts, educate how bad violence is both to the perpetrator and the victims/families/communities on the other end of that stick, etc.
We can start with our politicians setting a good example, our business leaders setting good examples (right now both are running amok and profiteering from their mayhem at the expense of the common person), our community leaders setting good examples, our theological leaders setting good examples (that is pretty questionable now what with religious leaders calling for the death or injury of so many others), etc.
Instead we have all of the above and more setting the worst examples possible, getting caught and not suffering consequences for their bad actions, even being celebrated and paid bonuses for their illegal and/or immoral and/or anti-society and/or anti-voter activities.
These same people then turn around and demonize anyone who stands up to them, speaks out against their activities, or otherwise gets in the way of their greedalistic and self serving mentality.
Education (even when properly funded, and teachers properly paid) is far less costly than prohibition and the following enforcement, is far more effective, has a positive knock on effect one generation to the next (while enforcement also has a knock on effect, a negative one), and in the end causes people to think about their place in the world in a way which makes them feel better about themselves and the world they live in. This is all particularly true when the education is able to be effectively handled on the sides of buses, billboards, etc. because the populace can read those things without needing a teacher.
Enforcement mentality, on the other hand, is a self perpetuating Rube Goldberg contraption.
A society following the enforcement mentality/model needs to fund more and more enforcers, more and more weapons and tools for those enforcers, more and more consequences (such as jail or prison), and even more laws because the old laws are not “working”, fewer rights for the people because they can not behave within the allotted rights, etc.
Let’s take special notice of how much money it takes to write a piece of legislation, there are politicians to pay, most of whom make far more than any small group of their constituents, they make 3-4 times what anyone who protects them makes fighting a war on distant soil, they make 4-5 times what their staff makes, all for doing little to nothing that actually looks like work to the fly observing on the wall because they have underpaid staff to do the hard stuff.
A good example of enforcement/prohibition run amok, the average US penal facility pays around $30,000/year/inmate (depending on source, some states are much higher out of the gate) while spending less than half of that, more toward one quarter that, per student in public schools. Is it any wonder that the only good paying jobs are held by criminals, either the ones legislating prohibitions or the people they are legislating against.
Look what enforcing above educating has done for that country. Prisons and jails (over) full of people, many of who did not really harm anyone or society to anywhere the level they are being punished.
Take drug possession offenses of a non-violent nature, it costs far more to investigate, process and detain the ‘criminal’ than any possible damage they could have done. Prohibiting drugs has, like all prior prohibitions, failed at it’s goal and accomplished the opposite as well as the enrichment to politicians and businesses supplying the enforcers and the criminals.
Enforcement/prohibition over education (in the USA) has also produced college students who can not find where they live on a map, voters who think it is great to bail out corporations who have mismanaged their money, while also refusing to bail out individuals who were caught on the other end of that mismanagement, let alone individuals who have also mismanaged their own affairs.
In the end a prohibitionist/enforcement societal model only breeds itself, pays politicians and weapon/tool makers, and builds a society of automatons incapable of rebelling because they have been beaten down so badly for so long.
Franque Enigma
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