By Brian Lee, Coleman Smith, Yong jo
George Orwell’s intention
“War is peace, freedom is slavery, ignorance is strength” are the three mottos of Oceania.
These quotes are great examples of “Double thinking”, which is defined as: the mental capacity to accept opposite opinions or beliefs at the same time.
Even though Oceania is in a constant state of war, the citizens think there is peace as well. The citizens have been brainwashed by the state, so they will obey whatever the state tells them to believe.
It’s a good example of Double thinking because the people are believing lies at the same time.
Significance of the society’s quotes
Because all of us live in the United States, we view each of the three quotes as being strange and very different. This is because we have the freedoms that most other countries have never dream of having.
For example, a sixteen year old kid from North Korea, may view this book as a glimpse of reality of what he lives in, but a sixteen year old in the U.S. views this book as being completely ridiculous.
The significance of Thought Police
The Thought Police are the secret police of Oceania, similar to the Gestapo from Nazis who would arrest you and take you away suddenly and unexpectedly.
They work as undercover officers and punish those who have committed thought crimes which are thoughts an individual have against what the government wants them to believe.
To brainwash the people of Oceania, they use psychology and telescreens to arrest the members in the society. They always use terror and torture to achieve what they want.
(They Never give up)
Ex) Winston was captured through the telescreen in his safe house, he was tortured mentally, and was brainwashed to be like Big Brother’s puppet.
Ministry of Love
The Ministry of Love is ironic because it is the complete opposite of what it is thought as.
The Ministry of Love is the center of Oceania’s brainwashing activity. The building of the Ministry of Love has no windows, is completely dark inside and out, and is known as “a place where there is no darkness”.
Room 101 contains everyone’s worst fear, such as large, human eating, carnivorous rats.
To brainwash the people of Oceania, the Party takes them to a torture chamber, where each prisoner will slowly be brainwashed back into loving Big Brother and believing all that he says.
Ministry of Truth
This is where Winston once worked before he had a run in with the Thought Police and was brainwashed.
This Ministry focuses on the language of Newspeak as they use this language to communicate with the people of
Oceania.
Newspeak is a language made by the state to tell only the
“truth” to people.
EX) If the state says 2 plus 2 equals 5, then you must agree with them, or you will be taken to Room 101.
Their purpose is to rewrite history, to make the state look superior, to do this, they use propaganda. Orwell even said that the purpose of this ministry is to show people that the party is absolute, and can be never changed.
Ministry of Peace
The Ministry of Peace is the complete opposite of what most people believe it is. Instead of keeping the peace by settling out conflicts, the Ministry of
Peace keeps things peaceful by actually going to war with other countries.
As George Orwell said, The Ministry of Peace concerns itself with war, these contradictions are not accidental , nor do they result from from ordinary hypocrisy: they are deliberate exercises in doublethink.” Each Ministry in Orwell’s story contains an abundant amount of irony, for the Ministry of Peace, that irony is going to war with other countries to keep the peace. Ministry of Plenty
Of course just like all the other Ministries, the
Ministry of Plenty does the complete opposite of what it should. It uses the method of starvation to manipulate the people of Oceania.
As Orwell stated in one of his quotes, “...the Ministry of Plenty concerns itself with starvation of the people…” This method of starvation is used very