Any Old Actress

… the concept that the novel mirrors the current state of affairs. Here’s where I disagree: We don’t become faceless and uniform due to a lack of free will. After all, Winston can still choose to act. I think it’s a bit more complex in that, it involves eliminating the desire for choice. And to accomplish that you’ve got about 3 options. 1, maintain complacency through pleasure. 2, maintain apathy through deprivation. And 3, maintain a numbed state-of-mind by pre-occupation. Which all amount to taking away any standard of comparison. (i.e. this is how it’s always been; this is NORMAL, why should I want anything different). It involves manipulating people into exercising their choice to NOT use free will.

Our particular U.S. brand of 1984 exploits the pleasure/preoccupied aspects most. Instead of keeping us apathetic because of deprivation we are inundated with goods. We have no discomfort/needs/negative elements to motivate dissatisfaction or questions. And if that doesn’t work, we are busied with activities from the moment we wake from our appointed sleeping time. We never acquire literal time or space to question.