Animal Farm, 1984 et al

Lately I’ve been reading quite a few interesting books. Right now I’m finishing “Animal Farm” from Orwell and just before it I finished “1984″. I must say, these are really-really good books and they paint, let’s say, ‘interesting’ picture of near would-be future. “1984″ is classic among such books and unfortunately it took me more than 2 years from reading idea to actually doing it.

It’s astonishing how much things Orwell got right when predicting future (now it’s our present). To me most interesting ideas were so-called free-will projects that characters in “1984″ took part of. These acts weren’t really mandatory, but if you didn’t do them, then you looked suspicious and guys from Love minstry could come and ‘ask a few questions’. So because of that everyone looked happy (trust me, it would be better to pretend you’re doing ok than to be sent to Love ministry for interrogation). Fortunately right now this is not so bad, but some hints of it I can find even in my own life – it’s much easier to look good and do the ‘voluntary’ things, rather than to show what’s really going on inside and ‘face the consequences’ like questioning from friends, superiors or whomever.

Second thing was this ‘it’s for your own protection’ idea. Big Brother is watching your every move, everything you do, because you might do some silly things and not even realise it. So, it’s better if we catch you before you might do something stupid, we ‘help’ you get rid of these unorthodox thoughts – and after that everyone is happy. You Just Love Big Brother.

I loved ‘hate minutes’. I think this is just spot on what’s going on right now in certain coutry. Idea of ‘hate minute’ was to get people hate Big Brothers enemy (whoever that might be at the moment) and get people to be in ecstasy when our army wins some battle somewhere. And because of war government can justify everything, why there isn’t food, clothes etc. Let’s take America’s war on terrorism – from 9/11 there has been less than 4000 deaths because of terrorism (at same time millions die in car accidents, cancer, AIDS etc), but they spend trillions of dollars for that war (what could that money do in medical research?). Why? I don’t know, but it seems really strange if you think about it for a while. And just like in “1984″ whole nation was in ecstasy when their army won some fight, mind you that news was always delivered via TV, so it is right now – everybody seems just jumping from happiness that terrorist miltary leader was killed. Does anything change because of that, let’s wait and see.

There were many more interesting ideas, but maybe I’ll write about them in future.

Movies and books that I really like from this genre (in no particular order):

• V for Vendetta
• Fahrenheit 451 – Ray Bradbury
• Equilibrium
• Matrix
• Brave New World – Aldous Huxley