It's certainly a delicate balance to maintain, the Inner Party has to keep the population and Outer Party close to but not quite at the starvation point, but letting it drop too far (to the point the proles have nothing to lose) will cause a revolution. They're quite clever though and seem to have a good feel on the pulse of things. At present the Thought Police are too efficient and have spies amongst the proles to offset any rare figures among them who may be able to harness and stoke any bubbling anger to a boiling point.
@@nineteen-eighty-four-lore I’m not so sure about the thought police. Considering how vast and expansive their intelligence network is and the sheer amount of information passing through it every day it’s only a matter of time before someone slips through the cracks assuming they haven’t already done so and are just biding their time.
@leaf0nthewind625 most likely cause would be a prolonged internal power struggle, one where there is no clear winner or center of power, with the apparatus of state focused inward or purged in furtherance of said internal struggle the control over the population is decayed coupled with say a famine or something that pushes the masses to action. Not even am organized one but a situation involving simple anarchy you can't pluck out leaders from a movement when there aren't any
An interesting point. Consider this: do we ever hear of who handles things like, the repair or replacement of the all-seeing telescreens in the Inner and Outer Party members' homes? Who builds them in the first place?
Considering how real social orders evolve over time, it could be argued the period of time in history would be fleeting; either the society would fall apart completely when they can no longer recycle the population sustainably; warfare becomes far too destructive that it prevents total resource allocation; or mass sudden hysteria when the social order conflicts with the natural psychological mechanics of the human mind a la Robespierre’s France/“Dancing Plague”/Yellow Turban Rebellion
The fact Winston is still remembered, makes me think that whatever happened, happened quickly, before there was time to completely eliminate every last trace of him.
Actually, I think you are right, from a certain point of view, but not quite; TBH, I think that the fact he's alive at the end of the book, is precisely WHY they fall in a sense. He knows too much, has been too highly trained, too much is invested in him to discard him, BUT, how many have they done this to besides him; this "Forcing them to love Big Brother"? Many minds fracture under the kinds of torture we see, and thus the inner core of Winston, the rebel who Loathes and despises "Big Brother"; may well have survived. Entombed, buried, hidden, yes; but alive, and WAITING. Waiting only for the right moment, to STRIKE, decisively, against the inner party and big-brother at the heart of it all; like some kind of REVERSE "Manchurian Candidate", a sleeper-agent for any opposing group, OF THIER OWN MAKING. If there were hundreds of them like him, no more, one miss-step, one fault or failure of sufficient caliber to ignite ANY attack on the party, might have spread to such dry yet gasoline impregnated tinder INSIDE the party and, well: how do you cope with a riot outside, when the man you took your meals next to for ten years inside just saw it out the window and STUCK A FORK IN YOUR EYE, while two tables over a tray got smashed into the face of your collective boss...? And the "Ministry of Truth", controls the news, and the broadcasts, if the inner rioters reach the radio-control room, and broadcast ONE of them singing the former anthem of "God Save the Queen!"... At that point, it's all over but the shouting and gunfire.
There is something else that might happen, no matter how unlikely; a rebellion might be done in Big Brother's name. If Big Brother is treated like a god, then one has to keep in mind no one has a real control over a god. They might see the ideals taught violated by the inner party and decided they need to be overthrown.
@@nineteen-eighty-four-loreOr like Mao's Cultural Revolution. Done in the name of the God like cult of personality Mao was very good at brewing, and how this purge was done by the new generation, their fiery youth used as fuel to rid the party, to rid their society of what Mao said were bourgeois infiltrators, we now know we're merely people Mao saw as those who slighted his authority due to the Great Leap Forward, many innocents of course, caught in the crossfire of the Red Guard. Ah, forgive my rant. I just find it fascinating how traces 1984 and Brave New World were echoed around the world less than a few decades after Huxley and Orwell put them to pen respectively.
@@BaronVonPurpI'd compare it more to sth that happened in the Soviet Union. Sadly I forgot the guy's name, but he was trained as a naval commissar and thus knew all about the ideals of the USSR's system. Which led him to noticing that the USSR wasn't following these principles and thus attempted to overthrow it. Now his attempt only went as far as taking over the ship he was on and not even the entire crew at that (I think the captain managed to get a message about the mutiny out). But if happening more large scale, I can see a similar thing happening in the name of Big Brother (another example could be the initial break aways from the catholic church, after all most happened because the clergy was not acting in accordance to the Bible)
I think the Party fell because of the new generation's infighting. We see that Ingsoc is trying to mold the children into sociopathic spies for Big Brother, with the Parson children being a prime example. The issue is that, in their zeal to eliminate all enemies of Big Brother, the Parson children also have no qualms taking out totally loyal party members like their own father. I think you can see why this is a problem for Ingsoc. When the children are just spies, this works great, as it inspires yet more fear in the adult Party workers. But once the children grow up, this paranoid mindset isn't going to disappear, and they'll have no one left to accuse but each other. This would lead to infighting and factionalism as different groups accused other groups of thoughtcrime until the Party ate itself alive, allowing another form of government to fill the vacuum it left. We can see a real life example of this with China's Red Guard, which started off as a CCP youth paramilitary group that devolved into factionalism over different interpretations of Mao's statements, and even ended up having a minor civil war with China's PLA before being put down.
@@tamlandipper29Same thing happened in a game called Heart of Iron 4 : The New Order where the Nazi party got split up into different factions and waged a war on each other after Fuhrer died
@@someguy4512but it does contain a grain of truth. Considering that Hitler always gave contradictory orders to his subordinates, infighting was notorious among German government branches. In other words, it was only a matter of time before factionalism takes over the Nazi government and collapse like dominos.
I always thought it had to be a military coup. Any high ranking military officer would have to know that their life would be in constant danger if the inner party thought them becoming too popular with their troops. If the wars are real and the officers spend any time away from airstrip one, the chances of creating other loyalties would also be very real.
Military leaders are bound by reality too much as well. Theories rarely apply on the battlefield and in all likelihood military leaders would have to defy party policy to gain victories. The men would remember.
My personal belief is that the Party itself eventually decided Newspeak was not going anywhere and memoryholed it. The Party is known to distract people with intellect, like Syme, with pointless endeavours intended to keep them occupied but which are not anticipated to ultimately bear fruit. It may have ultimately turned out that Newspeak had inherent defects which were not anticipated at the planning stage.
Probably, the tendency of humans to invent new words to describe concepts they lack the words for. Like Parenti said when he described all the times he tried to do an analysis of the society he lived in and just got called a marxist over and over "that shit wasn't Marx, that was reality."
@@seekingabsolution1907 Many real languages operate on principles extremely similar to Newspeak, such as Finnish, yet Finnish does not restrict thought in the way Newspeak was intended to. This suggests to me that Newspeak was eventually abandoned. I don't necessarily think INGSOC fell completely, but I think it may have undergone reforms to reinforce the system, similar to China in our world.
The funny thing is, even if the Party got its way and Newspeak worked as intended this would actually be a negative in the long-run as O'Brien all but admits that they NEED thought criminals to exist to exercise their absolute power, which is all they are interested in and is the entire point of their system. Newspeak is supposed to narrow the range of thought to the degree that thought crime is psychologically impossible, yet if successful they would have no victims to exercise their absolute power upon. Weird.
@@nineteen-eighty-four-lore The party invetned newspeak with the idea that thoughts soley rely on words to be expressed or exist. (If a rebellion existed during a time when new speak was implimented crowds of people would be screaming b.b ungood!" Also The party wouldn't even need an excuse, Just on a whim or even like someone pulling an orange out of a bunch. O'brein says "The disapperances and excutions will never stop." They do it soley just to incite terror. And lets face it despite the party wanting to exterminate all emotions sadism is pretty much thriving.
Also makes it hard if not impossible for the party to spy on the proles communication if they don't know what they're saying since newspeak is mostly used by the party.
Dystopia, much like Utopia, requires such outlandish conditions to survive. And reality doesn't work that way, it's always changing and both require a level of stagnation that's just not possible. To bring up a line in Jurassic Park 'Life finds a way'
I mean, Eretreia is led by a dystopian, and the leader outright states they are a dystopia and people don’t care, despite the leader outright saying that to his citizens with a reputation of it being African North Korea 🇰🇵 so it is actually possible to create a dystopia and succeed
@@orrorsaness5942 I'm pretty sure they meant *permanently*, given the context of the video. Like yeah, there are numerous countries both right now and historically that fit the bill of dystopia, but they are all doomed to fail eventually. As all countries, regardless of their circumstances, are.
@@orrorsaness5942 Yeah, I wouldn't compare a failed African State most people can't even point out on a map to INSOC. A failed State does not a dystopia make. A failed State you can flee it....INSOC? There's no escape. Also, saying it's "an African North Korea" isn't accurate either....North Korea doesn't claim to be a dystopia...more like a Utopia.....so does that mean Utopias can also exsist and succeed?
Perhaps there was a plague, When you consider how filthy everything looks. Also the party killed pretty much everyone who was educated, there would be very few people left who knew how to fight such an existential threat.
In addition to that, running a totalitarian system is expensive, not just in terms of cash, but also in terms of brainpower. The Party would have to be particularly flexible and adroit to maintain power, which might not be possible between the economic strain and the brain drain.
@@richardarriaga6271 exactly and it also led to major wage increases, due to massive labor shortages across Europe. Newly empowered serfs and peasants had numerous revolts. None succeeded long term, but they did gain more rights and protections as Europe moved out of the Middle Ages and towards the Renaissance.
I always found it hard to believe that Oceania could hold onto such sparse and geographically isolated regions with as much control as they have over London. Revolts and breakaways are inevitable, just like if Hitler had held onto his acquisitions post-occupationally.
Alas for the former kingdom of William the Conqueror, the Party's hold is strong. I think the Book explains that since all administrators of a particular area are drawn from those areas this helps to alleviate feelings of being a colonised region, though I'm not sure I buy this. Inevitably de facto areas of importance will be obvious. London or New York, for example, will likely be much more important than Canberra or Buenos Aires, so I tend to agree with you that dissent on this basis is ultimately unavoidable.
To me it is not even clear if the party actually controls the Americas nor as large parts of Africa, Asia, and Oceania as they claim. Who is to say it really controls much beyond Britain?
I have a different take: When reading 1984, it might occur to you that no one mentions other places within Oceania. Thought control is so strong, I doubt the party encourages thought about other places in Oceania at all. As well as implying (through names like 'Airstrip One') that all places are similar. I don't think disunity or fracture will come from geographic difference. As well, it should be noted a very popular fan theory is that Oceania and it's supposed wars are all lies: that it's just Britain that's under this horrific regime, and the bombings are self imposed.
@@nineteen-eighty-four-lore And in some parts of the territory the party will be pretty much inexistent, I mean on the interior of the now Brazilian State Mato grosso, there barely are people, someone could build a community there and it would be very hard for the party to notice
@@nineteen-eighty-four-lore Wouldn't that be similar to how Great Breitain managed to control it's vast colonial empire for so long? For example they had not many men in India but managed to control basically the entire country with the help of it's local leaders. As long as they didn'Ät step on the locla's toes nothing happened. Well until they tried to teach them to use rifles with bullets coated in a certain fat that was detrimental to the beleifs of the locals which in turn lead to riots.
One major facet of Oceania that I think would ultimately lead to its collapse is its complete insistence of technological and cultural stasis, leaving it completely incapable of adapting to changing circumstances. Without educated men, what happens when plague spreads through the masses and no cure can be found? Without renewable energy, what happens when the fossil fuels run out and the entire war machine grinds to a halt? What happens when some extraordinary natural event (i.e. meteor impact, solar storm, global warming, etc.) occurs that completely shatters the party's image of invincibility? The party insists that they must control history, but in practice this is impossible, and eventually they *will* lose control to factors outside their control.
I think the answer for the Directing Brains of the Inner Party is doublethink. I don't think it's simply a case of shutting down technological or scientific research, but it is heavily controlled and only directed in the areas where it benefits the Party, most obviously in developing mind reading / control drugs or tech, for example, or in developing deadlier weapons of war. They acknowledge that they can mould "reality" any way they wish up to the point where it becomes existentially significant, for example, jumping off the top of a building and expecting to fly. I think that at least within the Inner Party (or perhaps its middle to higher ranks) they have detailed records of past events and research is permitted, as - like you say - they would be shooting themselves in the foot by not being able to adapt to unforeseen circumstances. With doublethink though they are perfectly capable of accepting both, they can acknowledge reality and the need for a certain amount of intellectual curiosity and research while also believing "educated men" require suppression and perhaps following through in many cases.
Do you know the table top game called Battletech? In the lore there is one civilization that has a culture some would call Orwellian (a strict language, castes, no "cross pollination" between civilians and the military). At first this group thrived in their selfimposed exile (after a bloody civil war) but then it's leadership decided that "all significant scientific achievements have been discovered" and basically froze their research. Then said group decides to invade their old home and while at first very sucessful their opponents who are way larger manage to replicate their advanced tech (albeit only partially) within a few years. Suddenly they demand their scientists to find new weapon tech only to realize that their scientists have to invent the research process again which had stagnated for nearly a century. That and the constant contact with their opponents slowly but surely changes this group and it culminates in a bloody civil war. So maybe, this has happened here too: at one point the system simply breaks. You think Winston with his attempt at "double think" (or perhaps parallel think) was the only one? I doubt it. And at one point the dam simply breaks
The thing about the war machine is I don’t think there are any real wars (hell I don’t even think the other countries are real) put two bases close to each other but not in range and just have them patrol their area but not advance claiming they are advancing elsewhere and bam you have a war soldiers who think they did things without any actual war
@@clarkkent7049I think the other two countries are real by virtue of the criterion of embarrassment. The party has nothing to gain from lying about Eurasia and Eastasia suddenly switching sides.
It was probably sheer Autocratic Incompetence. Obedience of that level necessitates stupidity and inefficiency to maintain control. It probably became a matter of just pretty much-checking boxes that weren't truly checked just to keep the party off their backs and if any serious problems occurred, no one was eager to report it.
Of all the theories here I believe this one the most because of one simple reason- Orwell would have known that exact thing happens all the time in totalitarian society. Why report a shortcoming that might result in your head removed? It's even possible that this culture of lying even caused a major disaster akin to the 30s Ukrainian famine which was largely caused and perpetuated by officials overreporting the yield of the farms. The same thing happened again after the book's writing in the Great Leap Forward. This could have culminated with some party members deciding enough is enough and blowing the whistle on what's going on to create a mass revolt that the party couldn't stop
That’s an interesting take. There’s a lot of evidence to support the idea that a lot of dictatorships suffer from a two-headed problem: the stupidity of those who blindly follow the rules without question, and the intelligence of those who seek power for themselves and are skilled at manipulating circumstances to their favour. Where both are present there is a strong likelihood that the dictatorship will weaken. There needs to be people in the middle: willing enough to follow most of the rules for practical purposes, but also able to point out deficits without any nefarious intentions.
@@thefuturist8864 Any pragmatist or useful man in the Regime will also end up dead because eventually the powers that be will fear that they are becoming to powerful and destroy them. Can't win in a System designed to Benefit a few people.
There’s the other factor which arguably crippled the Soviet Union in real life, where intelligent and capable members of government are systematically eliminated by those who perceive them as a threat, leaving no one competent enough to keep things running.
I had always assumed (in high school lol) the party faced some existential threat like food production, resource shortages, or natural disaster. Since the empire is so antithetical to progress by nature there was nothing they could do.
That's a pretty good guess considering that there's no way international trade is impossible in the structures of that world. They'd be too brittle and inflexible to survive any shortage. And empty stomachs are often the finest way to cure political ignorance.
@@unorthodoxpickle7014 A big point of the book is that this is not necessarily true. Excessive oppression breeds resentment but as long as there's no leaders to lead rebellions they'll stay as some ideas only. Consider how in the history of civilization the vast majority of time has been spent under tyrannical governments. The concept of mass unified rebellion is a fairly new one. Rebellions mostly occurred on cultural, racial, religious or geographical lines with some minor influence of tyranny. Human nature is activity, not necessarily action.
@user-ez9ng2rw9c it's a great way to turn the army against you, too. It marches on its stomach, afterall, and if soldiers get hungry, they lay down arms, or turn them on their superiors.
If there’s one thing that will always haunt me when thinking of 1984 is that if the theory that it’s only Britain that’s ingsoc it would imply that either ingsoc is capable of holding off the us and others from liberating Britain or ingsoc is shelling its own cities and for some reason no one cared to even try to liberate Britain and just left it to rot not even North Korea was given that treatment
-It could be that they have nukes. -The constant fighting could be in Ireland. -The bombing raids could actually just be the US bombing them and having a government that doesn’t want to have an invasion of Britain on their plate.
It's kind of implied Oceania arose from World War 3, perhaps after limited nuclear exchanges. The line "we never should have trusted 'em!" could imply war with the Soviet Union, not long after WW2. Perhaps the USA and other nations are in no state to "help" Britain?
I had this thought recently. Who is to say ingsoc controls anything besides the UK? Obviously this point can be risen for anything in the novel but I find it especially fascinating. I doubt those regions even have the same leaders or speak or whatever. They are just incorporated in theory because it makes Oceanía seem more powerful
If I remember correctly the party always underestimated the ressources it needs for its people. That would mean they also did not produce enough tools or spare parts for machinery. So the infrastructure of ozeania would gradually break down.
I always presumed something similar. Basically they continually lose more and more control as infrastructure breaks down. Even the thought police would breakdown as they'd be unable to recruit effective members. By the time of the novel I thinks it's clear they are already well into such a collapse it's just that London is a central hub and thus one of the areas they'd put serious effort to maintaining control of. It'd be a slow collapse right up until it wasn't.
My view was always that the Party eventually does fall; because of the lack of infrastructure maintenance, the continued poverty and systematic dumbing down of the population, a self destructive society of universal distrust and suspicion, perpetual warfare destroying the world's ecology and exhausting much of the easy to access resources... The system finally collapses. I imagine Eastasia is the first of the three superstates to do so, it then gets gobbled up by Oceania and Eurasia in an engineered "victory" and the latter two collapse later close to the same time. After the time of the Party comes anarchy, not democracy or revival. A deepening of the dark age the world has already fallen into since the nuclear war of the 1960s. Because the population has no past to fall back onto, no heirloom knowledge or cultural history, it creates a social void that lasts for centuries. But shreds of the past do get found, the party didn't completely wipe out "Oldspeak" of course and may have even walked back attempts at totally erasing it but the attempt at "Newspeak" served its intended purpose, to dumb people down and decouple the past from the present, allowing the Party to survive perhaps well into the 21st century.
I like the idea that the government eventually just stopped caring , or lost its motivation to rule as tightly as it needed to be sustained. Just like what Aldous Huxley said in his letter to Orwell, he couldnt imagine a government with such an arduous means of ruling being very sustainable, which is why he thought the government in Brave New World would be more successful in the long run. It's easy to imagine Ingsoc had a terrifying, but short reign, and with that in mind it's easier to see some of their more extreme ideas (eg replacing English with Newspeak) not as genuine possibilities but as the egotistical pipe dreams of a mad dictatorship. It's like when Mussolini tried to ban all non-Italian words from the language. Dictators get wild grand ideas about how to completely reshape society but they can only do so much
You don't have to go as far as Cambodia or North Korea. Such a state existed in Eastern Europe - Ceausescu's Romania became so extreme that even the Soviets thought about removing him. The man was certifiable, egged on by that vicious, uneducated wife of his into indulging his most grandiose fantasies like putting up that monster of a building at the heart of Bucharest. To say nothing of interfering in the lives of the nation's women by banning abortion and contraception in order to raise the birthrate, resulting in a generation of children ending up in those horrific orphanages. And everyone watched over by the all-pervasive Securitate.
My theory is that the Party was not overthrown, but changed form. It found more subtle, insidious ways of maintaining total control without the need for direct rule. It allowed itself to be "replaced" with facades: new governments and new institutions. But these "new" institutions are still part of the Party organism. The Party didn't die, it evolved.
It is fair that you have described this as practically a scenario of the fall of all communist governments. Throughout the former Soviet Union, they simply abandoned ideology and formed new parties and movements, becoming heads of state, or plundering and privatizing the state property fund and becoming capitalists and plutocrats. The loudest anti-communists in the countries of the former USSR are literally yesterday's functionaries of the CPSU, who changed their shoes according to the wind, or initially joined the party for the sake of a career
@@DouglasMcArthur-zs8ou The "fall" of communism in our own history is what inspired this theory. Though, where the communists in real life were reacting to circumstances outside of their control, the Party here changed on purpose. Because the Party is a singular organism that only cares about its own perpetuation and survival, it has no loyalty to form or ideology. So long as it survives, it wins.
With absolute, unreasonable rationing, eventually everyone is either living on black market goods and/or slinking off to work at the edge of farmlands, and the blue flu gets so bad no one shows up...
The society described in 1984 is closest to North Korea... North Korea almost collapsed in the 1990s due to economic issues, with flooding that almost broke the camel's back. It's likely that Oceania would too suffer primarily from economical collapse due to their decaying economic system. In 1984 there's no China to save it, as North Korea did. Another example, if we look into the Soviet Union, the original state control system first collapsed under Lenin due to economic reasons leading to the NEP, then it was reformed again under Khrushchev also largely with economic aims in an attempt to raise living standards. Then it collapse for good in the 1980s-1991 also largely due to economic issues... I think it's a good bet that any collapse would be caused by the worsening of living standards, inflation, reduction of rations, and similar issues since those would create a loss of trust and the formation of a large black market that would be hard to control since it might be the only source of basic necessities for most that partake on it. Weakening central authority and undermining legitimacy.
I would also think its very similar to Pol Pot's Democratic Kampuchea, such as the government trying to wipe out the past by declaring Year 0, and also with the higher ups being very secretive towards their own members.
The leadership of Democratic Kampuchea was also similar to Ingsoc as their leaders were called Brothers like Big Brother, with Pol Pot being called Brother Number 1
The idea that the party "will fall because it is literally North Korea" sounds very stupid considering that North Korea has just survived from all communist regimes and in our time it is perhaps even in a much better position than during the Cold War. At the moment, their regime has great prospects against the background of the confrontation of their two neighbors against the West, the acquisition of their own nuclear weapons, as well as a deep economic crisis in South Korea. In addition, the crisis in Korea was largely due to the cessation of support from Russia and the countries of the socialist camp, while the regimes from the novel are described as closed economic systems and, unlike Korea, they clearly do not lack any resources, since, with the exception of East Asia, they must have all possible resources in abundance, therefore all there will be economic problems only because of corruption, bureaucratization, rationing and ineffective use, as well as attributions to state plans, which were mentioned only in the film, but not in the book.
@@nigelbaddock And as for Kampuchea, you are right, the Khmer Rouge actually ruled anonymously, although they had a plan to create a cult of personality, they used conspiracy in everything from their own membership to the names of government bodies and ministries, replaced the language with their own newspeak with a lot of distorted concepts and neologisms, and also led the country through military governors, also non-public, but possessed full power in your area. Perhaps their leaders learned something from Orwell, or maybe these transformations were the result of their utopian views, let me remind you that there is a rather thin line between dystopia and utopia and one was born from the other
NK is still there however. There was no revolt. The military remained absolutely loyal. If a population is half-starved already any logistical collapse would just kill most of the dissidents within a week or two. The malnourished cannot form any effective attacks.
There's a book called "1985: What Happens when Big Brother Dies," it was written by an Eastern European dissident and is meant to be an unofficial sequel to 1984. I bought it and read part of it - not a fan but it's an interesting piece of lore.
The book is a friggin leaflet, you can probably do the whole thing on a short haul flight or a mid length drive. Honestly though, the story is a bit crap.
The current toalstarianism of INGSOC formed in the mid 60’s after the consolidation of the party. Think about that. The system that people keep saying is invincible is only around 20 years old. There is no reason to think this system will last forever.
Well, in principle, "totalitarian regime" only means "very not democratic regime" And "democratic regime" only means "this country is USA-aligned". In a world where USA isn't an independent superpower, totalitarianism is forever (which is a pretty good world)
One thing to notice is that Winston had his diary because there was one blind spot in the house where the TV could not watch and he could write there. If, like in the Soviet Union, his flat was actually copypasted, it means *every flat* has a blind spot, it's just a matter of finding it. How many Winstons are out there, unchecked? What if one of them becomes closer to V from V for Vendetta, making bombs in their blind spot with black market materials, and blows up the Parliament?
It might be wishful thinking. I read the novel twice in my life and felt depressed by it both times because there was no happy ending. The appendix on Newspeak might be there to give the reader an easy out. However, such a society is going to collapse sooner or later. It might linger on for a few decades but sooner or later it will murder itself, we've seen such societies in world history that were either fascist or communist that eventually spiraled out of control. The Proles were bound to have a part in it. In the movie Gandhi he's quoted as saying that the government can't control the people if millions people refuse to comply with it, force and violence only goes so far when things get intolerable and unlivable. A bunch of women fighting over pots might not cause alarm, but several million women fighting over craps of food means all hell is about to break loose.
Plot twist: The humans of Britain end up being overthrown by an animal revolution, led by the pig leaders of Manor Farm, as prophesied by Old Major in Orwell's own "Animal Farm". This is definitely what happens. (Seriously though, I wouldn't be surprised if the Manor Farm in "Animal Farm" ends up meeting the same fate as the Soviet Union it's based on. Napoleon's empire ends up crumbling in both film adaptations of that book. But much like with 1984, I feel like it's up to the reader's interpretation as to whether or not these totalitarian systems will ever be overthrown.)
My idea, well I have two 1. The controlled rebellion they created slowly actually becomes a full on secret rebellion, take for example the 7 or 9 or 5 I forgot how mucj trillion dollars the Pentagon "lost" in its 9 audits in a row, now imagine a pentagon audit in a government like Ingsoc, and since their resource is techincally people, I could see them losing a section of rebellion by doing what they do, because the person controlling them had unpersoned. 2. Loss of resources, I mean if the war is ment to be forever lasting, well, eventally all lf those unrenewable unrecyacle resources, like metal, minerals, and oil will eventally well, stop being around, so eventally they will go through all of the earth's supply of say iron, or zinc, or copper, which would mean, no more guns, or floating iron fortresses, or even helments, or boots, which would they would no longer be able to even stage a forever war, since there wouldn't be anything to destory.
My headcanon post ending for 1984 is that while The Party suffers an internal struggle which causes the collapse of The Party, The Party lives on after its death in spirit resulting in an "Anarcho-Ingsoc" for a lack of a better term, as in a post totalitarian anarchism in which while the government may be gone everybody whether out of fear or brainwashing continues on living as if nothing has changed.
Another great one as always I think Winston being 'cured' is as good as him being vaporized from the point of view of the tragedy of the text. When I was a younger man it always frustrated me that the book wasn't more about overthrowing the party but it definitely is more powerful that it technically doesn't have a happy ending. It certainly fits the tone more. As to how I feel like it's inevitable and that Winston and you are on the right track 'If there's any hope it lies with the proles'. I think there is a little classism here though. I feel like any person no matter how uneducated will have a point that you can't push them past without a reaction and when some reacts in a situation like that things can happen very fast. Can't wait to see what facet you get me thinking about next
I certainly agree there are points that push a people into revolt. I think prices with certain food products are a good way to go. I can't recall the exact thing I read or watched but I think the price of bread in pre-revolutionary France is a good one. Once a particular point of scarcity was reached it all exploded. Obviously not THE single factor there, but an important one. Maybe the breaking point for an overthrow would be a Black Swan event with the food or water supply - perhaps some crop disease that wipes out a large proportion of the yield in a couple of years, this has a knock-on effect and is the spark. There's probably a tonn of ways it could happen. I think Winston is probably right though, in any scenario the proles will have to be used, just as Goldstein's Book states and then unfortunately thrust back into the horrid conditions they usually suffer, though they'll probably be slightly better than under Ingsoc (at least for a while).
@@nineteen-eighty-four-lore There definitely wouldn't be a single factor that historians could point at and say this is the moment that that issue caused the downfall. The way the proles are packed together and wound tight the whole keg could blow when somebody gets annoyed at a shortage and throws a brick through a window. I think that's way more likely to cause major change than 'educating' them and slowly having them rise to better their own conditions.
@@scitchmunkey5587 Well...classism is true, whether you like it or not. The poor and uneducated masses really are, for all intents and purposes, nothing but gears to continue the economy.
When you think about all Totalitarian Systems, controlling thought becomes a very, very expensive venture - even with technology. The cycle of continually proving political purity would eventually degrade the government from managing the (lack of an) economy. There has to be some proof that the system of government is working for the benefit of the people, or the seeds of its downfall will sprout. I agree with the premise of this video - there is still hope for Oceania and the people of Airstrip One. No lie can be maintained forever, as eventually the lie will ask for more and more to be sacrificed to it to keep it alive. In 1984, we see the Party on the knife-edge of being overthrown, as they have wasted too much energy in trying to police thought.
That's similar to my own headcanon that the party was overthrown by Inner Party members who decided that they're not happy with the quality of life they had under a system built for power for its own sake. I'd say a society like Brave New World would be quite aligned with such a movement's values.
No, winston was *not* being monitored for 7 years. 7 years is how long he had spent at the ministry of love being 'cured' this is stated explicitly in the novel
However, O'Brien is really an agent of the Thought Police, which has had Winston under surveillance for seven years (or so they claim). Winston and Julia are soon captured. Winston remains defiant when he is captured, and endures several months of extreme torture at O'Brien's hands.
Hmmm I don't think so. Quote: “[Winston] knew now that for seven years the Thought Police had watched him like a beetle under a magnifying glass. There was no physical act, no word spoken aloud, that they had not noticed, no train of thought that they had not been able to infer. Even the speck of whitish dust on the cover of his diary they had carefully replaced. They had played sound-tracks to him, shown him photographs. Some of them were photographs of him and Julia.” - Part 3, Chapter 4.
True, Winston somewhat loses track of time when in the Ministry of Love, but he is definitely not in there for seven years. He seems to spend the autumn and winter of 1984-85 in captivity. It was April when the novel began, he was arrested in August, and in the final chapter it is said that after being released, he met Julia again on a cold day in March. (Despite the title, the final part of the novel actually happens in 1985,) The seven years went before his arrest; when he came to the Ministry of Love a voice (almost certainly O'Brien's) whispered to him that "for seven years I have watched over you" and promising that now the "turning-point" had come.
I like to think that, over time, deserting soldiers on the equatorial front created little communities alongside the local inhabitants, simply because life was more pleasant there than it was at home. I imagine that they play both sides off each other, collecting weapons and building up quietly, eventually forming a united front against the superpowers, initially just to protect themselves. Of course, no one outside of the inner party knows this.
Honestly it wouldn't even take deserters, the whole system is ripe for all three field armies to decide they'd have a better chance of living staging a joint coup of all 3 nations, and then declaring peace.
Hello mate I must say I'm thoroughly enjoying your content, when it comes to totalitarian regimes they all eventually fall. There's a quote by Integra Hellsing from Hellsing Ultimate. "A monster's reign of terror may be bloody and long, but it's only a matter of time before they fall." The party may try to control everything but the human spirit, morality and free will always triumphs in the end, you can't control history or language or thought or people forever. And who knows maybe after Ingsoc and the other super states are gone maybe the different countries and people can finally reclaim what's left of their history, cultures and try to rebuild a better world with democracy going forward. Evil can never win, good always triumphs. Anyway keep up the good work mate and greetings from Australia.
I am inclined to agree to a certain extent, and even if INGSOC found a way to effectively keep humanity under its control forever, it is doing it at the cost of slowed down technological development which could spell doom for any civilization even one spanning an enitre planet... the fermi paradox doesn't protect fools for long.
Oceanias Party is not the same as the historical totalitarian regimes. I don't know what the human spirit is supposed to mean. It is common in the Anglosphere for people to believe in things like that for no reason. Morality is objective and the Party is objectively immoral, as they destroy history, lower the quality of life and maintain an eternal status of war. However, morality and "free will" (which does not and can not exist) do not win automatically at the end. Where do beliefs like that come from? If you destroy history and the human spirit (whatever that even is), there will not be a direct comeback of a humane society that was present directly before IngSoc took over. Humans can live under extreme inequality and think that's natural and they can also live under extreme equality and think that's natural. It depends on the economic circumstances. There is no such thing as an inherent drive towards democracy. "Evil can never win". Why not? To me, these are statements without any logical foundation to make yourself feel better. But why are people not willing to face reality? People denying reality are closer to IngSoc than I am with my borderline-totalitarian worldview. Maybe IngSoc will fall, but doesn't mean good wins. Because the good society will also be replaced by an "evil" one. So I could also say that evil always triumphs.
Yes, this appears to be a universal law of existence, let alone state structures (of all kinds). Nothing lasts forever and history shows us ALL types of government and state inevitably change or perish.
One thing I notice was not mentioned is the references to texts and dates that should have been eradicated, like the fact that they mention the 1960s, and the Declaration of Independence. By nature, the Declaration of Independence would have been destroyed by the Party to keep members in line. So how do you guys think it survived?
The world of 1984 is a world of decay and rot. Everything is falling apart. There are continual shortages, continual decay of buildings and machines. Apparently rampant petty corruption and Party that seems intent on self devouring self destruction via constant purging. One of the things I always found amusing in 1984 is that although there are continual shut downs of heat, electricity, gas etc., and buildings and infrastructure are decaying it appears that the devices called telescreens don't seem to breakdown or not work. For example assume a part doesn't work anymore would the parts be easily available, would it be repaired quickly etc. I doubt it. I consider that to be an apparent flaw in the novel. I would think in "real life' those devices would be offline a lot of the time. It appears that the overall rot would likely cause the system to eventually implode. I would also just like to say that O'Brien is an idiot. His utterances to Winston while Winston is being tortured are amazingly stupid.
There are two perspectives on the Newspeak Appendix. Some assume that it is a text that exists in-universe, just like the excerpts from Winston's diary and Goldstein's book. It is then regarded as a text from the post-Ingsoc era, written by some unknown academic or historian who looks back on the (failed) plans of the (former) regime to establish a new language. The other perspective is that the Newspeak Appendix does not exist in-universe, no more than the main text of the novel does. It is just George Orwell using the format of an academic essay to do some extra world-building and fill in some details that he could not easily fit into the main text of the novel. The perspective of the essay is then not after, but BEFORE 1984; Orwell is adressing his original audience in the late 1940s, telling them more about the hellish future society he has described in the novel. But it is still fiction, and so written in the past tense, simply because that is the near-universal convention in English novels. Even a novel set in the future is not written in the future tense; that would sound ridiculous. As for which interpretation of the Newspeak Appendix is the correct one, I believe a definite answer is provided by a single occurrence of the word "already": "The A vocabulary. ... was composed almost entirely of words that we already possess -- words like hit, run, dog, tree, sugar, house, field ..." There you have it. "Already." An academic in a post-Ingsoc future would instead have written either "words we STILL possess" or "words that already existed in Oldspeak". But no. The perspective of this essay is not after Ingsoc, but before it. "We" who "already possess" these words are George Orwell's original readership in the mid-20th century. Therefore the Newspeak appendix is NOT a text that exists in-universe, it is NOT written by some future academic after the fall of Ingsoc, and the fact that it is written in the past tense does NOT imply the future failure of Ingsoc. Sorry. Strictly speaking, we obviously know nothing about what happened after the mid-1980s in the fictional timeline. Orwell's novel doesn't cover any later period, except for mere plans of the Party (like definitely abandoning Oldspeak by 2050, or O'Brien's long-term visions of a world with no art, literature or science, indeed not even orgasms). We may like to imagine that Ingsoc somehow failed in the end, but Orwell's intention was apparently to describe the "perfect dictatorship" that could never be overthrown, or that might at least cling to power for thousands of years. It can only be fought by not letting it solidify in the first place. Once the system is in place, it is too late, forever.
This does fit with the doomer worldview Orwell had that hope doesn't exist and things are only bound to get worse over time. The Party lasts forever and hope, history and truth stop existing forever as well.
I played this video while I was doing the shopping and walking back home in terrible rain. I understood nothing for other things demanded my attention, but your voice is very pleasing to listen to, impeccable vibe! (I had an umbrella so I'm almost dry, thank you for asking)
Ultimately, it can be summarized in the idea that evil destroys itself. While rebellions may be crushed by the mindlessly loyal fanatics, those same fanatics dont really make competent governors. It would fall into decay, meeting its end in some sort of fate, whether it be rebellion or just general collapse.
No junta that has ever been has been composed of selfless characters like O'Brien. Every Junta succumbs to the personal ambitions and weaknesses of their own top eschelon. The internal stresses within and the mis allocation of resources will cause a fracture.
Look at how the real USSR and Nazi Germany collapsed. Hitler's breathtaking incompetence regarding the execution of WWII led to a lot of attempted coups by the military to try to create a "smart Hitler." It collapsed because of the war, but it would've fallen eventually anyway. As for the USSR, Goldstein is really obviously based on Trotsky (real name, "Bernstein"). Trotsky claimed that the revolution had been betrayed by Stalin, and a lot of communists in the rest of the world started to sympathize with that view. What really killed the USSR, though, was that it wasn't really feasible to keep up that level of oppression. They had to relax a bit, and that was when the proles realized just how bad things were. The USSR collapsed within the decade after that.
As a prol I can say that prols aren't as stupid as people assume. Also what they say and what they think are not the same. Playing dumb is a strategy. Quantity has a quality all it's own. Revolution has happened and can happen when a certain point is reached.
What about North Korea or Venezuela; which regimes managed to stand in spite of the dire situation that in other circumstances would make the people rebel like Louis XVIth incompetent rule
@@ernestorivas3764 Neither regime has stood the test of time. North Korea is younger than my grandfather, and Venezuela’s regime is younger than me. Just because things haven’t happened yet doesn’t mean they won’t happen. Both regimes will eventually be overthrown. Just look at the world today. I can’t think of a single authoritarian regime more than a century old.
@@azlanadil3646 if we consider monarchism as authoritarian, then arguably all European monarchies. Also, Venezuela faced a ton of crisis, including the pandemic, hyperinflation and massive protests, but Maduro still manages to stand, no matter what's thrown at him. The nearest chance to his fall was Guaido, but in the end Guaido couldn't do jack sht
@@ernestorivas3764 European monarchies are not authoritarian states. Also, Mudaro has weathered everything that’s been thrown at him *so far*. He’s been in power for 11 years which on one head is a long time, but on the other hand a very short time. If you actually think that Venezuela’s government system will last forever than you delusional beyond compare.
@ernestorivas3764 There are a plethora of reasons why North Korea hasn't fallen, the main one being, which I assume is something that many North Koreans have wondered is; what is the alternative, what comes after? They could arm themselves with pitchforks, throw themselves at the government in a bloody civil war, but for what? Will they be the ones in control of the government after they sacrifice their lives, or will America roll in with tanks over the rubble and occupy their land? Will they have any ability to decide their future or will they be forced to endure whatever decisions South Korea and foreign countries impose on them? There's still Koreans who remember the war, and there are millions of people who grew up hearing stories about the atrocities (of which there are MANY) committed against them. It's easy for us to think they're dumb or ignorant for not revolting, but that is a very real concern that they have to have. And when you pair this with the fact that North Korea is gradually getting better, both economically and in regards to the freedoms that are afforded to its citizens, they might think it's better to just wait. As for Venezuela, I think your overstating the issues that country has. They aren't committing severe human rights violations or outright oppressing their people (at least to the same extent as was done before the current government and throughout Latin America to this day). A lot of the opposition comes from the middle and upperclasses, and many of the poor people who are against Maduro aren't necessarily going to be against the PSUV or the system as a whole, as its improved their lives. The PSUV still enjoys a plurality of support, and Chavez and his policies in particular remain widely popular. Why would they take up arms to overthrow a government that is broadly popular when they can just vote them out? Venezuela's a multiparty democracy lol. PSUV hasn't been voted out (just as they were voted in..) yet because of how inept the opposition is.
Ingsoc relied totally on its complete control of all communication to stay in power. If whichever of Eurasia or Eastasia that Oceania was at war with at the time managed to knock out the party’s communication apparatus, so if even just for a day or two Big Brother was *not* watching, then that would have been that.
Its implied that no-one wants to actually win the war and probably couldn't even if they tried. The war is always going on somewhere far away and against someone far away, but always happening. You could also interpret it as there being no war or that the war is realistically just border skirmishes. The important thing is that Eurasia/Eastasia are "Them" as opposed to Oceania's "Us", which is a very good way to get a population on board and willing to dump freedoms for security (see: P.A.T.R.I.O.T Act, the entire cold war, Germany in the mid -30's).
Historically, most popular revolts against repressive regimes happened after failed or aborted attempts of reforms, or "periods of thawing". When the system tries to put on a friendlier face, but then throws it away and desperately tries to restore its air of implacability. Thusly exposing itself as fallible and disoriented, and confirming that alternatives to the iron heel do in fact exist. It is fun to speculate how such a scenario might have transpired in Oceania.
The governments and corporations nowadays are its biggest fans. They love the book so much they want to do a worldwide roleplay, replicating all aspects of the Party. You get what I’m saying?
@@thiswillagenicely9702Orwell was privy to the workings of the British establishment and warned even back then about government overreach. It was a warning of what was to come
@@thiswillagenicely9702 No, things aren't at all like 1984 - they're like Fahrenheit 451. 1984 is a dystopia in which information is actively withheld and restricted. Fahrenheit 451 is a dystopia in which the world is flooded with so much information at every second that critical analysis becomes impossible and everyone stops trying. 1984 is a dystopia in which the government rules at gunpoint. Fahrenheit 451 is a dystopia in which the government rules by convincing everyone into willingly handing over their entire lives. This is an important distinction, and in fact everyone's obsession with 1984 is what got us into this mess. We've been so hyper-focused on guarding against Orwell that Bradbury wasn't even patted down as he walked through the front door.
I think the book does hint at what happens, notice the statue of cromwell? I belive this is a hint of that after a revolution leading to such a bad regime, people return to the old system prior, flaws of that included that is aluded to in the book
The Restoration of 1660? Going by this, we can assume a General Monck-like figure, perhaps from the army or something, manages to cobble together some form of government resembling the pre-revolutionary one.
I think the main reason why IngSoc would fail is if it had a dissent group within the Inner Party. Histrory shows time and time again that revolutions and revolts against an elite by the lower classes rarely succeeds if it doesnt have backing from a parallel elite who also want change of some sorts
Good analysis. It seems staggeringly unlikely that all Inner Party members are maniacal enthusiasts like O'Brien. There would be many who would doubt the existing system, perhaps for no other reason than the lack of personal advancement you refer to.
My hypothesis is that at some point an individual in the inner party managed to gain dictatorial power, an even more powerful and paranoid Stalin. After all, the inner party attracts the power-hungry. After a decade ot three of the inner party being oppressed by the tyrant, they lost the will to maintain power through fear and oppression and they either slowly reformed or were unwilling to fight a growing movement against the party.
I always took the book's meaning to be a hopeless, unchangeable situation that's supposed to scare the reader. It's basically an example of the worst possible thing we could do, and a warning not to let it happen.
Yes it could certainly be read that way. I was just thinking on the shaky assumption they were overthrown. A lot of people disagree that the Appendix even indicates that the Party was overthrown, which is a valid interpretation too.
The thing is, that IS supposed to be the message, don't let something like this happen. Except, it's based on Stalinist USSR, which eventually was reformed, then again, then it collapsed. While it turned into another dictatorship, such dictatorship relies too much on a single powerful man and it probably won't survive the death of said man. While the Appendix may be a literary device to explain the reader some notions, the implication the party eventually collapses makes sense, *because it already did*
It's just not how human society works, though. Political, civic, and cultural concepts exist in specific circumstances that change over time because reality changes.
Great analysis. Its always been my impression that Big Brother was simply the machinery of state oppression that devoured its creators; so even people like O'Brian were simply victims, programmed nodes of control within a system that became self sustaining. Certainly anyone mentioned who seemed to have had an ideology was destroyed or broken by the Big Brother system. This is perhaps illustrated by the fact that Big Brother, when exposed, reveals absolutely no ideological justification for its existence. It was a means that became the ends. Within that context Big Brother's failure to provide for the masses would have been impossible to correct, it was a system of oppression not improvement, and only accepted the illusion of truth it created. So (happily) revolution was inevitable. Given Orwell's era, I think a military uprising of the type that started the Russian revolution was the most likely spark. Certainly since Orwell many similar systems to those described in 1984 have fallen due to a gulf that grew between the governing and the governed. Their fall came about quickly, and when it did none made an appeal to ideology to save their system, or if they did they were so weak they were ignored.
Your analysis seems to me correct-Big Brother is not a person, but the personification of a powerful oligarchy (the Inner Party). But the inner party is not unified, despite presentations otherwise. There are cliques and factions-Winston sees some of these fallen Inner Party members at a cafe in the book before their ‘disappearance’ In truth, highly concentrated oligarchies are unstable. Infighting with no means to gracefully exist the system eventually leads to a sole dictator. Dictatorships only rely on the policies of a single individual (the dictator) and are staffed by people willing to implement those policies without review or question? For any questioning is a threat that can lead to infighting. This leads to an unstable system where certain societal elements are exaggerated and others left to rot. Eventually the dictator dies, whether in power or out, leaving a successor with an entirely different set of talents. Replacing one for another is a supremely delicate processes that can easily lead to new infighting. If the old policies are continued without review, unchecked instabilities might lead to a collapse of the system. Given this, I think it would only be a matter of time before the oligarchy of 1984 gave way to a single dictator who would possibly retire Big Brother, with each successor increasing the risk of collapse
@@ApocGenesis my impression of 1984 is that the system of oppression and control the Party created has replaced ideology, making the Party itself simply a mechanism of the system of oppression. It is the ultimate nightmare, where even the term 'elite' only denotes the role of those who manage aspects of the system. Even O'brien, like Winston, was broken. The result is a self perpetuating system of power, where brainwashed victims oppress and create other brain washed victims, all in service of the system. The ultimate horror being that they are all then the system. Ideologists mentioned in 1984 are all broken or made effigies of hate. At no point does the system mention or preach an ideology. It simply requires obedience. Orwellian, yes. But from Orwells own point if view he might have desctibed it as very Kafka.
Another important point is that totalitarian states always tend to incompetence. Anyone being too good at their job results in a power imbalance, which results in their being punished. Thus you end up with a state where the people who actually need to be good at their jobs aren't, because of the fear of a coup. But that means eventually the very people who have to be competent to keep the regime in power aren't, because the competent people in the political police have been purged. So they lose the ability to detect actual threats. And with the continually declining standard of living and the increasing insanity of the forever war idea, the whole state implodes.
It probably fell the way the USSR did: any attempt at reform immediately sends the whole lot crashing down. The system here, which is authoritarian, is very vulnerable to change--easily toppled from within as well as without.
No system, no matter how well constructs, can last forever. This is true of both good and bad systems. So while creating an eternal utopia on earth is impossible, so is creating an eternal dystopia.
Terrific summary!! While reading the book I was so weighed down by the misery, and the seemingly complete Omniscience of the Party that I could not see any way to overthrow them except by the Proles. But that seemed a futile hope, given that even they were under constant surveillance. O'Brien seemed too pompous at times during Winston's "re-education", that maybe the Inner Party was human after all, and could make mistakes. At the same time I was awed by the fact that the Party had figured out that the Ministries' purposes were in direct contradiction to the names they were given. But all governments fall, or at least morph into something that no one intended. Even the North Korean copy of the 1984 model will someday be destroyed.
It is possible that the Party loses to an internal rebellion that swept the country without much resistance. Similar to the fall of Zaire Focus on supression>ignores state maintenance>drop of quality of life>state withers, local bureaucrats empowered>rebellion, state is powerless, country is now a confederation of de facto "duchies"
TBH the line "He loved big brother" almost reminds me of how people born and lived in the Soviet Union before its collapse have a nostalgia of how good the Soviet Union, even if they may have not agreed with the system at the time. Winston was looking for some form of control at a time when he felt he didn't have any. Now the party has fallen there is likely some form of anarchy and chaos just like the USSR as it transformed into Russia in the 90s. So Winston is now looking for some form of control again so he takes a more nauanced look at the party.
The difference between the Soviet Union and INVSOC is that Winston only knew INVSOC, he has no point of reference to compare it. The citizens of the Soviet Union on the other hand experienced different environments post and pre fall. For all intents the Soviet Union was just as good as the US at the time, it had different advantages(no fear for survival, better education, more persuasion on the future)and disadvantages (it terribly failed in some locations and propaganda) . But it was nowhere near INVSOC levels of control or evilness . Another thing that's different from INVSOC is that the USSR was collapsed from outside US intervention (Gorbachev and Yeltsin) with Russia prior to putin being in a total mess, it was economically disinigraded and any industry was sold to foreign investors, the government became obsolete and thus everything plunged into anarchy and "every man for themselves ", the MPs were literally stormed by tanks from Gorbachev and most of the Democratic institutions were vaporized (Americas goldem boy am I right) etc. The USSR had flaws but its collapse brought harm than good compared to INVSOC.
Great video! The movie and then the book struct me hard as a teenager... I went into this video wondering how anyone could expand on the 'Lore' of that story and your analysis really surprised me!
Yeah. I definitely got the vibe that dissidence in the outer party was much more entrenched and active than INGSOC was willing to let on. Their classism also makes them underestimate the prolls to a dangerous degree. It’s pretty easy to fool someone who thinks your entire societal class is too stupid to rebel. There may very well have been a secret organized resistance of outer party members and prolls that Big Brother was frantically trying to hide from the rest of the public.
Control has a heavy opportunity cost; it takes a lot of work. Even with machines the maintenance and production of those machines requires large and complex organizations.
one remark about this book I read on tvtropes that's been forever burned into my mind is "trying to classify Oceania as any form of government more specific than 'totalitarian' only reveals what form of government you most hate."
Someone here said that whatever happened, happened fast. My guess is that what may have happened is that a spontaneous form of protest shocked people to their core and also showed that the party in fact weren't all seeing and all knowing. Someone may have performed an act of martyrdom, throwing themselves at a member of the Inner Party during the moments of hate. Or got fed up with everything and charged one of the machine gun bunkers guarding the government buildings in a moment of depression or rage or insanity or a combo of all three. There is real life equivalents to some of these, the one I find most notable is Tunisia in 2010 when a man set himself alight to protest his harsh treatment by local officials. All it would take is the right thing at the right moment to move people into action, to show that even in death they can have an impact and the entire INGSOC Party could come crumbling down.
I've always thought that a fps video game similar to Wolfenstein The New Order but more realistic set in 1984 universe where we fight as a real resistance to overthrow INGSOC would be the best thing ever.
Likely a large part of the revolution was the inability for the current party to pass down this absolute power to those underneath them. Once the few people who make up big brother have died or are aged well beyond their time, a revolution is much more possible with the younger group split over how to run this government they’ve been gifted.
You cannot win forever. It may take generation, but things change. It's the way of life. At any one moment in time, some people with responsibility and power will want to stay alive, or won't be content with what they have, or just die, and leave a hole in the structure of power and things will simply start failling apart. The frightening things is that you can aply this to any form of power, from tyranny to democracy
While I agree with your statement, democratic country would survive losing because they're truthful about it. Totalitarian regimes will collapse if such things happen. The only other exception is that his place is so important that they shouldn't be allowed to collapse (like North Korea} or just transition themselves well enough at the right time (like UK)
I always got the impression that the system would collapse. I mean eventually the means of control would fail because of obsolete infrastructure. And a lack of competent people to handle the system they inherited.
My personal belief is that huminity itself will save the world. Characters like Winston, who require years of being watched and months upon months of continued torture to finally break will prove to be too much for the party to ever keep up with. If every outer party member took as long to break as it took winston, if each one resists for as long as Winston did, it would be too expensive and too laborious to break each and every man and woman. Humanity itself will overthrow big brother.
Good point although I suspect different individuals pose different challenges. O'Brien does say that Winston was a "difficult case" whereas Julia supposedly gave in almost immediately. There are probably different classes of thought criminal, some easier to convert than others.
I always believed the system collapsed after some natural disaster started the domino effect of change. The system the party created doesn’t seem flexible enough to handle outside challenges. A nasty plague or a mass crop failure may cause enough death to push the proles over the edge.
There’s an amazing quote by Charlie Chaplin in his iconic 1940 film The Great Dictator. “so long as men die liberty will never perish.” But, what if your ruler isn’t a man. What if your ruler is an idea, a notion, a concept. Something that can’t be outlived, can’t be dispelled and can’t die. That is what makes George Orwell’s 1984 so terrifying and why humanity needs to be so careful. How do you defeat something, that cannot to be defeated?
Ideas are just social infections, passing between people and mutating to better adapt to their circumstances. Once an idea stops being viable, it tends to have trouble reproducing itself, and thus functionally goes "extinct." Once people stop believing in Big Brother, he dies, because while a man has charisma and intelligence and strength, a belief is only as strong as its followers.
@@TheAngryXeniteEven better, ideas with a strong man behind them still can collapse if the successor is dumb enough to do so. Stalin is a strong man, the one who could survive Nazis by "ideas of communism". And yet, the Soviet Union can't even last until the 2000s.
Grid failure. That's how it started. Most folks don't understand that an electrical grid is a dynamic system that requires constant fiddling and fixing to work. By SKILLED smart people! The very first thing to go is the grid. After that the water stops being pressurized and pumped. Food stores only have 2 to 5 days of food in rich capitalism stores, and even when stocked they need power for cooling the food. Petrol storage needs pumps to USE the stored petrol. After the power goes off the petrol powered stuff shuts down in 3 to 5 days. Look at South Africa, where the grid is failing in real time. Stupid people can't make the power work no matter how motivated they are. I would venture a guess as to how this happens. Slowly until it happens suddenly without warning. Something trips a breaker or downs a power line and the grid has cascade failure due to either inadequate base load available, or phase variance not managed fast enough. (AC power from multiple sources need the waves to be synchronized, or it fights it's self causing power loss or destruction of transformers )
I think also there’s an element to which the human mind itself rebells constantly, even when it’s not conscious of it. As Winston described, there is always the “mute feeling in your bones” that tells you that life is better than this and even seemingly loyal people like Parsons prove they harbour subconscious resentments. It reminded me of Fahrenheit 451 where a consistent thread throughout is that the people in this society are all subconsciously suicidal with the fire chief and Montag’s wife showing numerous times that they are not as content as they appear to be on the surface. It’s possible that the party ended up sabotaging themselves over time, in a thousand little inefficiencies and eyes turned the other way. Perhaps it would be a very long time before any of the anxieties could be spoken out loud, but I don’t think the human mind ever fully settles in to tyranny- always there’s a part, however suppressed, that tries to break free, even if that freedom means death.
Great video, just found your channel at random. Such authoritarian systems can't hold together for long (North Korea being an odd outlier), as you say there are many threats to their existence. I think Winston said that all that was needed was for the Proles to be convinced that enough was enough, and it would be over almost overnight since they represented a big majority of the population. Hence the Inner Party doing their best to keep the Proles sated, stupored, and distracted.
@@Meade556 with foreign support. That is China North Korea gets enough subsidies to survive, not to thrive. The prioritization of the military doesnt help either
North Korea has outside help, otherwise it would have collapsed long ago. Who would be helping INSOC in this scenario? The other two nations they flip between allied and at war with? I don't think so, I think at some point one of the nations gets in trouble and neither of the others helps it. It collapses and then there's only two. With no outside ally to bolster them, one or the other collapses, with the remaining one coming apart not long after as the military refuses to disband and lose their supplies.
😂 this is literally the question I always asked myself after reading this in 2014. And i never had a good answer. Thanks for this video! Great style of RUclips video! You got another sub!
They probably fell due to a domino effect that was likely started by some environmental disaster / crop failure / plague. INGSOC like all totalitarian regimes had an all or nothing philosophy. Every possibility, outcome and factor had to controlled to occur in their favour with the only alternative being them having no power at all. A single instance of weakness would unravel the entire system, with decades of their actions being inevitably questioned by the populace in the process. This of course always leads to intense dissent and usually Revolution. The problem is that not all factors can be controlled. A plague can devastate any society and is rarely foreseen. Mass crop failure would tip the scales too much in the direction of abject suffering which will make the proles have absolutely nothing to lose. Environmental disaster is self explanatory. It also doesn’t help that the structure of absolute power that is maintained through absolute cruelty only encourages individuals in upper echelons of government to be inherently power hungry as a means to protect themselves from political purges or political opponents trying to get one up on them. This only creates the perfect conditions for factionalism that would quickly grow out of control when even inner party members feel the heat of previously mentioned unforeseen circumstances. The infrastructure as seen in 1984 is obviously in a state of total disrepair due to the nature of government; basically ensuring that it will be the first thing to go when external crises put any pressure on the already fragile system. The habit of excessively promoting loyalty over competence alongside liquidating skilled personnel only ensures that basic maintenance of things will be extremely difficult. Even competent individuals would be forced into a fear induced incompetence when confronted with liquidation for revealing an unsavoury truth about the system to an inner party member. There are many more factors that could play a part as well. The army which seems to be related to but mostly separate from the party could always overthrow said party when guarantees are no longer provided, which again could easily be brought on by external crises. Or alternatively the natural entropy of nation states which would be accelerated by INGSOC’s method of governance would just run its course and result in a collapse of the system due to time. The main point about these systems is that they’re not sustainable. They try to do what can’t be done and touch what shouldn’t be touched. In my opinion I think an INGSOC collapse would contain elements of cubas special period, the soviet collapse and collapse of Chinese dynasties via Mandate of Heaven (environmental disaster domino effect)
My view is that a revolt is started by an outer or inner party defector. Some party member sneakily disguises himself as a prole, and leaves the party to live the rest of his life as a prole sneakily staying out of the party's sight and sparking a rebellion and is just never heard of again by the rest of the party for the rest of his life
I earnestly believe the inner party begins to shrink due to its inefficiency and inability to find enough skilled individuals to continue to facilitate its existence due to the general squalor of Oceania, this leads to the party eventually losing control by virtue of limited governing capacity.
There is so little infrastructure maintenance that it is possibable that the infrastructure that the party needs to survive might break down and thus the party falls
The longer a system we design operates the more chances the imperfections of the system have to make themselves known and to cause problems. And if those problems line up in just the right way, it all falls apart.
Both on a Watsonian basis and on a Doylist basis, the Party must have failed. To take the latter first, George Orwell deliberately wrote the appendix as he did, referring to the Party in the past tense. He was after all a democratic socialist, and understood that the system he describes in the book wasn't stable, even though O'Brien thought it was. On the latter, the Party's whole approach was based on a series of huge mistakes, and therefore it carried within itself the seeds of its own eventual dissolution. A state of permanent warfare - actual warfare with bombs falling and troops killed - would inevitably not just use up excess resources, but would lead to a slowly worsening standard of living and a breakdown of infrastructure. A state of constant hostility is one thing, a state of constant war something quite different. And totalitarian states are always in danger from power struggles within the ruling party. Hitler deliberately set the leading Nazis in competition with one another in order to keep them from competing with him, but the Party in 1984 has been in power long enough for the Inner Party to be presumably really a mass of different groups competing for power. And the more secure the Party seems to be in its power, the greater the temptation for these groups to fight one another, eventually bringing the whole thing down. And leading, one presumes from Orwell's own views, to an actual socialist state governed by the people for the people, not by a clique for the clique.
I have thought about this at well. My theory is based on two factors. 1. An authoritarian regime has interest in uneducated people, for they have no knowledge to instigate a rebellion against the ruling class. 2. The foreign enemy is able to overrun and conquer its rivaling regieme, if it has the tecnological advantage. Combine these two and you are left with a loose loose situation, not only for one singular government, but totalitarianism as a whole. Neglect the education of your citizens to much and the enemy will have an advantage over you. Esucate them to much and the newly created middle class will rebell against you. There seems to be a counter argument countering this conclusion - the foreign enemy, given it is real, has no interest in conquering other governments, because it is in need for this very conflict to maintain its own grip on power. However, i dont think this holds up very well. The other powers do not trust each others, they cobstantly shift alliances and backstab each other. Its more like a gentlemens agreement and because they cant be shure the other powers will hold it up, they have an interest to end the constant and growing threat from outsinde. The whole geopolitical system is very much instable and is more likely to blow up with every passing year. It simply can not remain.
It’s also possible that the people, simply, rose up, someone realized that the resistance was fake and started their own, or perhaps there was an active rebellion somewhere else in Oceania, like America
My idea is that resource exhaustion caused the electrical systems required for surveillance to break down. I'm also going with the assumption that Oceania is only the UK instead of a multi-continental state.
One thing that's missed here is the likelihood of a plague. There are tons of rats in prole areas. I could see an illness jumping though the classes pretty fast. Another thing is less and less food. At some point the proles could be pushed to a breaking point.
Good questions. I'm not so sure the other superpowers do exist. If they do it serves the Party to maintain the necessary siege mentality that is essentially to maintain their particular hierarchy and societal structure, if they don't exist then they would have to invent them and have the propaganda that they totally control reflect this.
Airstrip one could be a North Korea situation where not even Australia and America are part of Oceania and we wouldn't know and to be fair it wouldn't change the story one way or other from Winston's point of view
The other superpowers don’t make sense to me. Why would East Asia and Eurasia not work together? Why do they always fight each other and switch alliances with Oceania?
@@hermannabt8361 it's implied in the Part One Chapter One that on occasion they do, with Winston saying "generally" Oceania was in alliance with one or the other, this implies that there were times when this happened. This is interesting as I'd like to know how such a reality would square with the Party's idea of "being in the right"? If BOTH other superpowers are at war with Oceania this seems to imply it is in the wrong, which the Party could never abide. BB and the Party must always be right and just, hence the constant changing of history, etc. 🤔
@@hermannabt8361 this is what leads me to believe it's not as simple as the Ministry of Truth says. I think if they do exist it's more that the war is with everyone and everyone just says what they want to their populations without caring what each other do in that area. It has always struck me as odd the lack of open military recruitment propaganda. I just figure the 2 minute hate would end in a join now or something. And it's a shame we don't see any view from the military at all.
lol I never even thought the appendix was actually a part of the book, I just assumed Orwell talked about Newspeak for interest, outside of the story world
"The rule of the Party is forever" - O'Brien. That's what makes the book so scary. If readers knew it would eventually fall, that would spoil the horror. And the warning.
This is more a criticism of the book/fundamental position of the writing but I somewhat reject the notion that the Proles would not either revolt or just collapse as a class (mass refusals to work and so on) and thus bring everything down with them because it assumes that they would not want change or life to be better. Humans who are in poverty with terrible conditions *inherently* want life to be better, in fact this seems to be an innate desire in almost all people but it grows exponentially in intensity when we're exposed to adversity. The book seems to completely ignore this despite the fact that we have fantastic real world evidence to prove that even under the most dire, crushing, literal starvation death camp oppression people still seek improvement and opportunities to rebel. Really the only way to prevent this type of discontent would be to alleviate a significant amount of their poverty to placate them. If we look to nations like North Korea then it becomes clear that food scarcity in particular is *extremely* destabilising to the lower classes as famines there are some of the only times we actually hear about the people being significantly upset and discontented, meaning it's strong enough and acceptable enough to go out to an international audience. Long term stability of the Proles could likely only be achieved with acceptable conditions on top of complete media control to placate them and make them think they have it as good as it can get. Even then however you would still expect widespread corruption and attempts at improvement which still leaves a significant amount of instability in place, just perhaps a 'manageable' amount if everything else is working and if they feel their leader is strong and doing the 'right' things. I do find the idea of internal power struggles at the top the most likely cause of an overthrow, though, as we see most dictatorships or similar go this way due to the internal pressure/ power struggles and inherent issues with subordinates and corruption that this type of government creates. They are essentially operating at all times as a finely kept balance of internal stresses and because the power must be delegated down the hierarchy this creates a situation where if any one high ranking official feels threatened the likelyhood of a coup attempt skyrockets. Even the Proles themselves being in discontent could likely be enough to cause a power imbalance at the top if it causes disagreements and tension. Oh and as a last note, the control of language in 1984 has basically been proven just not to work since we now know that ideas lead language, not vice-versa, studies have shown that the words available in languages do not seem to affect the ideas and thoughts people have globally. So people will simply seek out new ways of communication to replace old ones and they will adapt if they cannot get their ideas across. This is not how it works in the universe of the book though, so it is pretty hard to account for the effect it would have in a realistic way and I suppose if it did work that way it *would* be a fantastic method of control.
A pet theory i like to imagine is the idea of a Second American Revolution. Of all the lands in Oceania the former United States seems like the prime candidate to launch a revolution against big brother
And considering that all of those televisors and secret microphones would require regular maintenance and upkeep, I could totally see a mountain ghost town or the middle of the Nevada desert having tons of damaged or nonfuctional microphones or televisors, because the party would be like, well those could wait, since the onoy person who actully goes there is the handyman team, but John Smith's Televisor needs fixed first. I mean there are hundreds of inaccessable areas in Canada alone, if you took the entirety of both American Continents there would have to be _atleast_ one area with no hidden microphones or televisors, take the Apilatchain mountains, it would be nearly impossible to put hidden microphones in all of the hard to find cave systems, and mountain mounatiny places. So all it would take is just one person to find a hidden mine shaft no one has been in since like 1930, to start up any hints of a rebellion.
It's very possible that around the time of the book, there may be a revolution on the horizon in Oceania's other territories beyond England which would inevitably lead to the whole nations collapse.
We see at the end of the most recent version of the film that even Inner Party members are subject to purges. Three Inner Party members are seen at 12:37 in the same holding area as Winston -- the cafe, playing chess while waiting to be executed, as was Winston. Sooner or later, two or more major factions within the Inner Party would go at one another in civil war and shatter their hold over Oceania, just as constant civil war was the chief reason the Roman Empire collapsed, because they became such a drain on resources, the Empire could no longer hold back the barbarians, or in this case hold back aggression from East Asia or Eurasia. And these powers too would at some point suffer their own internal struggles. Revolutions ALWAYS end up eating their own, with the American Revolution perhaps the only real exception. At some point during an Oceania civil war, the temptation to integrate millions of Proles by feuding Inner Party factions into their fighting forces as an advantage over rival factions to counter Army and/or Outer Party members support alone would be too great to pass up. And that would crack the entire system. BTW: The Russian Revolution, born out of the catastrophe of World War I, the Communist totalitarian rule that took over, and all the mind perversions and organized secret police terror necessary to maintain their control, was the inspiration to George Orwell for his writing 1984. Big Brother symbolized Stalin, and IngSoc symbolized Communism. Goldstein symbolized Leon Trotsky (whose real name was Bronstein) -- who, just as Stalin, was a key figure in the Revolution. In fact, Trotsky was higher in rank originally than Stalin. Trotsky commanded the Red Army and was one of the most important Communist theoreticians next to Lenin, while Stalin handled the bureaucracy and did the work considered vital but unglamorous and messy. This set the stage though for Stalin to outmaneuvered Trotsky for power once Lenin died. Stalin eventually had him executed by an assassin in Mexico City where Trotsky had fled to live in exile. Once Stalin took power, Trotsky became the omnipresent symbol of impurity, treason and perversion just as Goldstein was in IngSoc propaganda. And similarly Goldstein's last name implies he was ethnically Jewish as was Trotsky, even if Goldstein was a convenient fiction used by the Party's propaganda. To this day, there is a small but vocal pro-Trotsky faction -- the Trotskyites -- who believe they are the pure vision of Communism which was corrupted by the Stalinists and other deviant factions. I'd imagine there'd have been a similar vocal faction of Goldsteinites as well who the Inner Party feared.
The system was permanently in decay. Eventually the focus on control may have led to loss of all the infrastructure that enabled the control.
It's certainly a delicate balance to maintain, the Inner Party has to keep the population and Outer Party close to but not quite at the starvation point, but letting it drop too far (to the point the proles have nothing to lose) will cause a revolution. They're quite clever though and seem to have a good feel on the pulse of things. At present the Thought Police are too efficient and have spies amongst the proles to offset any rare figures among them who may be able to harness and stoke any bubbling anger to a boiling point.
@@nineteen-eighty-four-lore I’m not so sure about the thought police. Considering how vast and expansive their intelligence network is and the sheer amount of information passing through it every day it’s only a matter of time before someone slips through the cracks assuming they haven’t already done so and are just biding their time.
@leaf0nthewind625 most likely cause would be a prolonged internal power struggle, one where there is no clear winner or center of power, with the apparatus of state focused inward or purged in furtherance of said internal struggle the control over the population is decayed coupled with say a famine or something that pushes the masses to action. Not even am organized one but a situation involving simple anarchy you can't pluck out leaders from a movement when there aren't any
An interesting point. Consider this: do we ever hear of who handles things like, the repair or replacement of the all-seeing telescreens in the Inner and Outer Party members' homes? Who builds them in the first place?
Considering how real social orders evolve over time, it could be argued the period of time in history would be fleeting; either the society would fall apart completely when they can no longer recycle the population sustainably; warfare becomes far too destructive that it prevents total resource allocation; or mass sudden hysteria when the social order conflicts with the natural psychological mechanics of the human mind a la Robespierre’s France/“Dancing Plague”/Yellow Turban Rebellion
The party would need to win every day forever. Its victims would only need to win once.
Eventually the boot on the human face will be grabbed, and the face will bark back: "NO MORE!!!"
There's a reason why Equilibrium is often seen as a sequel of sorts to 1984.
Is this an IRA reference?
Is this... based?
@@TheAzureNightmareIt'll be Nigel Farage's foot, and the shoe will be some kind of appalling brogue.
The fact Winston is still remembered, makes me think that whatever happened, happened quickly, before there was time to completely eliminate every last trace of him.
Actually, I think you are right, from a certain point of view, but not quite; TBH, I think that the fact he's alive at the end of the book, is precisely WHY they fall in a sense. He knows too much, has been too highly trained, too much is invested in him to discard him, BUT, how many have they done this to besides him; this "Forcing them to love Big Brother"? Many minds fracture under the kinds of torture we see, and thus the inner core of Winston, the rebel who Loathes and despises "Big Brother"; may well have survived. Entombed, buried, hidden, yes; but alive, and WAITING. Waiting only for the right moment, to STRIKE, decisively, against the inner party and big-brother at the heart of it all; like some kind of REVERSE "Manchurian Candidate", a sleeper-agent for any opposing group, OF THIER OWN MAKING. If there were hundreds of them like him, no more, one miss-step, one fault or failure of sufficient caliber to ignite ANY attack on the party, might have spread to such dry yet gasoline impregnated tinder INSIDE the party and, well: how do you cope with a riot outside, when the man you took your meals next to for ten years inside just saw it out the window and STUCK A FORK IN YOUR EYE, while two tables over a tray got smashed into the face of your collective boss...? And the "Ministry of Truth", controls the news, and the broadcasts, if the inner rioters reach the radio-control room, and broadcast ONE of them singing the former anthem of "God Save the Queen!"... At that point, it's all over but the shouting and gunfire.
Under the shade of the chestnut tree, I sold you and you sold me.
There is something else that might happen, no matter how unlikely; a rebellion might be done in Big Brother's name. If Big Brother is treated like a god, then one has to keep in mind no one has a real control over a god. They might see the ideals taught violated by the inner party and decided they need to be overthrown.
Yes, I could see that. Kind of like a Valykrie for Ingsoc. Lol
@@nineteen-eighty-four-loreOr like Mao's Cultural Revolution. Done in the name of the God like cult of personality Mao was very good at brewing, and how this purge was done by the new generation, their fiery youth used as fuel to rid the party, to rid their society of what Mao said were bourgeois infiltrators, we now know we're merely people Mao saw as those who slighted his authority due to the Great Leap Forward, many innocents of course, caught in the crossfire of the Red Guard.
Ah, forgive my rant. I just find it fascinating how traces 1984 and Brave New World were echoed around the world less than a few decades after Huxley and Orwell put them to pen respectively.
@@nineteen-eighty-four-loremore like the cultural revolution
@@BaronVonPurpI'd compare it more to sth that happened in the Soviet Union.
Sadly I forgot the guy's name, but he was trained as a naval commissar and thus knew all about the ideals of the USSR's system.
Which led him to noticing that the USSR wasn't following these principles and thus attempted to overthrow it.
Now his attempt only went as far as taking over the ship he was on and not even the entire crew at that (I think the captain managed to get a message about the mutiny out). But if happening more large scale, I can see a similar thing happening in the name of Big Brother
(another example could be the initial break aways from the catholic church, after all most happened because the clergy was not acting in accordance to the Bible)
@@NoFlu Valery Sablin?
I think the Party fell because of the new generation's infighting. We see that Ingsoc is trying to mold the children into sociopathic spies for Big Brother, with the Parson children being a prime example. The issue is that, in their zeal to eliminate all enemies of Big Brother, the Parson children also have no qualms taking out totally loyal party members like their own father. I think you can see why this is a problem for Ingsoc. When the children are just spies, this works great, as it inspires yet more fear in the adult Party workers. But once the children grow up, this paranoid mindset isn't going to disappear, and they'll have no one left to accuse but each other. This would lead to infighting and factionalism as different groups accused other groups of thoughtcrime until the Party ate itself alive, allowing another form of government to fill the vacuum it left. We can see a real life example of this with China's Red Guard, which started off as a CCP youth paramilitary group that devolved into factionalism over different interpretations of Mao's statements, and even ended up having a minor civil war with China's PLA before being put down.
Is that echoed in the latter seasons of Man in the High Castle? Good theory.
@@tamlandipper29Same thing happened in a game called Heart of Iron 4 : The New Order where the Nazi party got split up into different factions and waged a war on each other after Fuhrer died
This seems really likely IMO
@@hafizihilmibinabdulhalim1004 bro seriously talking about TNO HOI4 unironically, its a mod btw not a game
@@someguy4512but it does contain a grain of truth. Considering that Hitler always gave contradictory orders to his subordinates, infighting was notorious among German government branches. In other words, it was only a matter of time before factionalism takes over the Nazi government and collapse like dominos.
I always thought it had to be a military coup. Any high ranking military officer would have to know that their life would be in constant danger if the inner party thought them becoming too popular with their troops. If the wars are real and the officers spend any time away from airstrip one, the chances of creating other loyalties would also be very real.
Interesting. Kind of like a Caesar or Napoleon emerging from the High Command. 🤔
And thus a stratocracy is born
@@MYBALLSARERUNNING and this is why i love the internet, id never heard of the term Stratocracy.
Military leaders are bound by reality too much as well. Theories rarely apply on the battlefield and in all likelihood military leaders would have to defy party policy to gain victories. The men would remember.
@@simonphelon7221it means military government
My personal belief is that the Party itself eventually decided Newspeak was not going anywhere and memoryholed it. The Party is known to distract people with intellect, like Syme, with pointless endeavours intended to keep them occupied but which are not anticipated to ultimately bear fruit. It may have ultimately turned out that Newspeak had inherent defects which were not anticipated at the planning stage.
Probably, the tendency of humans to invent new words to describe concepts they lack the words for. Like Parenti said when he described all the times he tried to do an analysis of the society he lived in and just got called a marxist over and over "that shit wasn't Marx, that was reality."
@@seekingabsolution1907 Many real languages operate on principles extremely similar to Newspeak, such as Finnish, yet Finnish does not restrict thought in the way Newspeak was intended to.
This suggests to me that Newspeak was eventually abandoned.
I don't necessarily think INGSOC fell completely, but I think it may have undergone reforms to reinforce the system, similar to China in our world.
The funny thing is, even if the Party got its way and Newspeak worked as intended this would actually be a negative in the long-run as O'Brien all but admits that they NEED thought criminals to exist to exercise their absolute power, which is all they are interested in and is the entire point of their system.
Newspeak is supposed to narrow the range of thought to the degree that thought crime is psychologically impossible, yet if successful they would have no victims to exercise their absolute power upon. Weird.
@@nineteen-eighty-four-lore The party invetned newspeak with the idea that thoughts soley rely on words to be expressed or exist. (If a rebellion existed during a time when new speak was implimented crowds of people would be screaming b.b ungood!" Also The party wouldn't even need an excuse, Just on a whim or even like someone pulling an orange out of a bunch. O'brein says "The disapperances and excutions will never stop." They do it soley just to incite terror. And lets face it despite the party wanting to exterminate all emotions sadism is pretty much thriving.
Also makes it hard if not impossible for the party to spy on the proles communication if they don't know what they're saying since newspeak is mostly used by the party.
Dystopia, much like Utopia, requires such outlandish conditions to survive. And reality doesn't work that way, it's always changing and both require a level of stagnation that's just not possible.
To bring up a line in Jurassic Park 'Life finds a way'
Buddy, North Korea has been going on for three generations now
I mean, Eretreia is led by a dystopian, and the leader outright states they are a dystopia and people don’t care, despite the leader outright saying that to his citizens with a reputation of it being African North Korea 🇰🇵 so it is actually possible to create a dystopia and succeed
@@orrorsaness5942 I'm pretty sure they meant *permanently*, given the context of the video. Like yeah, there are numerous countries both right now and historically that fit the bill of dystopia, but they are all doomed to fail eventually. As all countries, regardless of their circumstances, are.
North Korea has managed to pull it off somehow for now anways.
@@orrorsaness5942 Yeah, I wouldn't compare a failed African State most people can't even point out on a map to INSOC.
A failed State does not a dystopia make. A failed State you can flee it....INSOC? There's no escape. Also, saying it's "an African North Korea" isn't accurate either....North Korea doesn't claim to be a dystopia...more like a Utopia.....so does that mean Utopias can also exsist and succeed?
Perhaps there was a plague, When you consider how filthy everything looks. Also the party killed pretty much everyone who was educated, there would be very few people left who knew how to fight such an existential threat.
An especially virilent disease would be hard to control and cause significant enough economic damage perhaps to tip the delicate balance.
The Black Death shook up the noble and religious order of Europe. There were fewer serfs to sustain the system.
Wow, that would be a very interesting idea for a sequel
In addition to that, running a totalitarian system is expensive, not just in terms of cash, but also in terms of brainpower. The Party would have to be particularly flexible and adroit to maintain power, which might not be possible between the economic strain and the brain drain.
@@richardarriaga6271 exactly and it also led to major wage increases, due to massive labor shortages across Europe. Newly empowered serfs and peasants had numerous revolts. None succeeded long term, but they did gain more rights and protections as Europe moved out of the Middle Ages and towards the Renaissance.
I always found it hard to believe that Oceania could hold onto such sparse and geographically isolated regions with as much control as they have over London. Revolts and breakaways are inevitable, just like if Hitler had held onto his acquisitions post-occupationally.
Alas for the former kingdom of William the Conqueror, the Party's hold is strong.
I think the Book explains that since all administrators of a particular area are drawn from those areas this helps to alleviate feelings of being a colonised region, though I'm not sure I buy this.
Inevitably de facto areas of importance will be obvious. London or New York, for example, will likely be much more important than Canberra or Buenos Aires, so I tend to agree with you that dissent on this basis is ultimately unavoidable.
To me it is not even clear if the party actually controls the Americas nor as large parts of Africa, Asia, and Oceania as they claim. Who is to say it really controls much beyond Britain?
I have a different take:
When reading 1984, it might occur to you that no one mentions other places within Oceania.
Thought control is so strong, I doubt the party encourages thought about other places in Oceania at all. As well as implying (through names like 'Airstrip One') that all places are similar.
I don't think disunity or fracture will come from geographic difference.
As well, it should be noted a very popular fan theory is that Oceania and it's supposed wars are all lies: that it's just Britain that's under this horrific regime, and the bombings are self imposed.
@@nineteen-eighty-four-lore And in some parts of the territory the party will be pretty much inexistent, I mean on the interior of the now Brazilian State Mato grosso, there barely are people, someone could build a community there and it would be very hard for the party to notice
@@nineteen-eighty-four-lore Wouldn't that be similar to how Great Breitain managed to control it's vast colonial empire for so long? For example they had not many men in India but managed to control basically the entire country with the help of it's local leaders. As long as they didn'Ät step on the locla's toes nothing happened. Well until they tried to teach them to use rifles with bullets coated in a certain fat that was detrimental to the beleifs of the locals which in turn lead to riots.
One major facet of Oceania that I think would ultimately lead to its collapse is its complete insistence of technological and cultural stasis, leaving it completely incapable of adapting to changing circumstances. Without educated men, what happens when plague spreads through the masses and no cure can be found? Without renewable energy, what happens when the fossil fuels run out and the entire war machine grinds to a halt? What happens when some extraordinary natural event (i.e. meteor impact, solar storm, global warming, etc.) occurs that completely shatters the party's image of invincibility? The party insists that they must control history, but in practice this is impossible, and eventually they *will* lose control to factors outside their control.
I think the answer for the Directing Brains of the Inner Party is doublethink.
I don't think it's simply a case of shutting down technological or scientific research, but it is heavily controlled and only directed in the areas where it benefits the Party, most obviously in developing mind reading / control drugs or tech, for example, or in developing deadlier weapons of war.
They acknowledge that they can mould "reality" any way they wish up to the point where it becomes existentially significant, for example, jumping off the top of a building and expecting to fly.
I think that at least within the Inner Party (or perhaps its middle to higher ranks) they have detailed records of past events and research is permitted, as - like you say - they would be shooting themselves in the foot by not being able to adapt to unforeseen circumstances.
With doublethink though they are perfectly capable of accepting both, they can acknowledge reality and the need for a certain amount of intellectual curiosity and research while also believing "educated men" require suppression and perhaps following through in many cases.
Do you know the table top game called Battletech? In the lore there is one civilization that has a culture some would call Orwellian (a strict language, castes, no "cross pollination" between civilians and the military). At first this group thrived in their selfimposed exile (after a bloody civil war) but then it's leadership decided that "all significant scientific achievements have been discovered" and basically froze their research. Then said group decides to invade their old home and while at first very sucessful their opponents who are way larger manage to replicate their advanced tech (albeit only partially) within a few years. Suddenly they demand their scientists to find new weapon tech only to realize that their scientists have to invent the research process again which had stagnated for nearly a century. That and the constant contact with their opponents slowly but surely changes this group and it culminates in a bloody civil war. So maybe, this has happened here too: at one point the system simply breaks. You think Winston with his attempt at "double think" (or perhaps parallel think) was the only one? I doubt it. And at one point the dam simply breaks
The thing about the war machine is I don’t think there are any real wars (hell I don’t even think the other countries are real) put two bases close to each other but not in range and just have them patrol their area but not advance claiming they are advancing elsewhere and bam you have a war soldiers who think they did things without any actual war
@@clarkkent7049I think the other two countries are real by virtue of the criterion of embarrassment. The party has nothing to gain from lying about Eurasia and Eastasia suddenly switching sides.
you love delusions
It was probably sheer Autocratic Incompetence. Obedience of that level necessitates stupidity and inefficiency to maintain control. It probably became a matter of just pretty much-checking boxes that weren't truly checked just to keep the party off their backs and if any serious problems occurred, no one was eager to report it.
Hey, lay off the Russians already.
Of all the theories here I believe this one the most because of one simple reason- Orwell would have known that exact thing happens all the time in totalitarian society. Why report a shortcoming that might result in your head removed? It's even possible that this culture of lying even caused a major disaster akin to the 30s Ukrainian famine which was largely caused and perpetuated by officials overreporting the yield of the farms. The same thing happened again after the book's writing in the Great Leap Forward. This could have culminated with some party members deciding enough is enough and blowing the whistle on what's going on to create a mass revolt that the party couldn't stop
That’s an interesting take. There’s a lot of evidence to support the idea that a lot of dictatorships suffer from a two-headed problem: the stupidity of those who blindly follow the rules without question, and the intelligence of those who seek power for themselves and are skilled at manipulating circumstances to their favour. Where both are present there is a strong likelihood that the dictatorship will weaken. There needs to be people in the middle: willing enough to follow most of the rules for practical purposes, but also able to point out deficits without any nefarious intentions.
@@thefuturist8864 Any pragmatist or useful man in the Regime will also end up dead because eventually the powers that be will fear that they are becoming to powerful and destroy them.
Can't win in a System designed to Benefit a few people.
There’s the other factor which arguably crippled the Soviet Union in real life, where intelligent and capable members of government are systematically eliminated by those who perceive them as a threat, leaving no one competent enough to keep things running.
I had always assumed (in high school lol) the party faced some existential threat like food production, resource shortages, or natural disaster. Since the empire is so antithetical to progress by nature there was nothing they could do.
That's a pretty good guess considering that there's no way international trade is impossible in the structures of that world. They'd be too brittle and inflexible to survive any shortage. And empty stomachs are often the finest way to cure political ignorance.
Also, it is human nature to defy tyranny. The INGSOC party was bound to be overthrown one way or the other.
Much like Chernobyl, something too big to lie about, but once they admitted they lied once, they've admitted they lied other times...
@@unorthodoxpickle7014 A big point of the book is that this is not necessarily true. Excessive oppression breeds resentment but as long as there's no leaders to lead rebellions they'll stay as some ideas only.
Consider how in the history of civilization the vast majority of time has been spent under tyrannical governments. The concept of mass unified rebellion is a fairly new one. Rebellions mostly occurred on cultural, racial, religious or geographical lines with some minor influence of tyranny. Human nature is activity, not necessarily action.
@user-ez9ng2rw9c it's a great way to turn the army against you, too. It marches on its stomach, afterall, and if soldiers get hungry, they lay down arms, or turn them on their superiors.
If there’s one thing that will always haunt me when thinking of 1984 is that if the theory that it’s only Britain that’s ingsoc it would imply that either ingsoc is capable of holding off the us and others from liberating Britain or ingsoc is shelling its own cities and for some reason no one cared to even try to liberate Britain and just left it to rot not even North Korea was given that treatment
-It could be that they have nukes.
-The constant fighting could be in Ireland.
-The bombing raids could actually just be the US bombing them and having a government that doesn’t want to have an invasion of Britain on their plate.
I've always hated this idea, thought it stupid but funny enough I can't really say why.
It's kind of implied Oceania arose from World War 3, perhaps after limited nuclear exchanges. The line "we never should have trusted 'em!" could imply war with the Soviet Union, not long after WW2. Perhaps the USA and other nations are in no state to "help" Britain?
I had this thought recently. Who is to say ingsoc controls anything besides the UK? Obviously this point can be risen for anything in the novel but I find it especially fascinating. I doubt those regions even have the same leaders or speak or whatever. They are just incorporated in theory because it makes Oceanía seem more powerful
No one is trying to liberate North Korea or Eritrea or Equatorial Guinea or Turkmenistan or any of those totalitarian dictatorships.
If I remember correctly the party always underestimated the ressources it needs for its people. That would mean they also did not produce enough tools or spare parts for machinery. So the infrastructure of ozeania would gradually break down.
I always presumed something similar. Basically they continually lose more and more control as infrastructure breaks down. Even the thought police would breakdown as they'd be unable to recruit effective members. By the time of the novel I thinks it's clear they are already well into such a collapse it's just that London is a central hub and thus one of the areas they'd put serious effort to maintaining control of. It'd be a slow collapse right up until it wasn't.
They didn't underestimate the resources people need, they consciously shortened to make them suffer (just 4 lulz).
Production _did_ stagnate tho.
My view was always that the Party eventually does fall; because of the lack of infrastructure maintenance, the continued poverty and systematic dumbing down of the population, a self destructive society of universal distrust and suspicion, perpetual warfare destroying the world's ecology and exhausting much of the easy to access resources... The system finally collapses. I imagine Eastasia is the first of the three superstates to do so, it then gets gobbled up by Oceania and Eurasia in an engineered "victory" and the latter two collapse later close to the same time. After the time of the Party comes anarchy, not democracy or revival. A deepening of the dark age the world has already fallen into since the nuclear war of the 1960s. Because the population has no past to fall back onto, no heirloom knowledge or cultural history, it creates a social void that lasts for centuries. But shreds of the past do get found, the party didn't completely wipe out "Oldspeak" of course and may have even walked back attempts at totally erasing it but the attempt at "Newspeak" served its intended purpose, to dumb people down and decouple the past from the present, allowing the Party to survive perhaps well into the 21st century.
I like the idea that the government eventually just stopped caring , or lost its motivation to rule as tightly as it needed to be sustained. Just like what Aldous Huxley said in his letter to Orwell, he couldnt imagine a government with such an arduous means of ruling being very sustainable, which is why he thought the government in Brave New World would be more successful in the long run.
It's easy to imagine Ingsoc had a terrifying, but short reign, and with that in mind it's easier to see some of their more extreme ideas (eg replacing English with Newspeak) not as genuine possibilities but as the egotistical pipe dreams of a mad dictatorship. It's like when Mussolini tried to ban all non-Italian words from the language. Dictators get wild grand ideas about how to completely reshape society but they can only do so much
I imagine its similar to pol pots regime, where its 4 years of absolute horror and torture.
You don't have to go as far as Cambodia or North Korea. Such a state existed in Eastern Europe - Ceausescu's Romania became so extreme that even the Soviets thought about removing him. The man was certifiable, egged on by that vicious, uneducated wife of his into indulging his most grandiose fantasies like putting up that monster of a building at the heart of Bucharest. To say nothing of interfering in the lives of the nation's women by banning abortion and contraception in order to raise the birthrate, resulting in a generation of children ending up in those horrific orphanages. And everyone watched over by the all-pervasive Securitate.
My theory is that the Party was not overthrown, but changed form. It found more subtle, insidious ways of maintaining total control without the need for direct rule. It allowed itself to be "replaced" with facades: new governments and new institutions. But these "new" institutions are still part of the Party organism. The Party didn't die, it evolved.
Careful. They're watching.
It is fair that you have described this as practically a scenario of the fall of all communist governments. Throughout the former Soviet Union, they simply abandoned ideology and formed new parties and movements, becoming heads of state, or plundering and privatizing the state property fund and becoming capitalists and plutocrats. The loudest anti-communists in the countries of the former USSR are literally yesterday's functionaries of the CPSU, who changed their shoes according to the wind, or initially joined the party for the sake of a career
I hate that. It's a good theory but I hate it.
In one of Huxley’s letters to Orwell he suggests that 1984 could basically be a prequel to Brave New World.
@@DouglasMcArthur-zs8ou The "fall" of communism in our own history is what inspired this theory. Though, where the communists in real life were reacting to circumstances outside of their control, the Party here changed on purpose. Because the Party is a singular organism that only cares about its own perpetuation and survival, it has no loyalty to form or ideology. So long as it survives, it wins.
With absolute, unreasonable rationing, eventually everyone is either living on black market goods and/or slinking off to work at the edge of farmlands, and the blue flu gets so bad no one shows up...
The society described in 1984 is closest to North Korea... North Korea almost collapsed in the 1990s due to economic issues, with flooding that almost broke the camel's back. It's likely that Oceania would too suffer primarily from economical collapse due to their decaying economic system. In 1984 there's no China to save it, as North Korea did. Another example, if we look into the Soviet Union, the original state control system first collapsed under Lenin due to economic reasons leading to the NEP, then it was reformed again under Khrushchev also largely with economic aims in an attempt to raise living standards. Then it collapse for good in the 1980s-1991 also largely due to economic issues... I think it's a good bet that any collapse would be caused by the worsening of living standards, inflation, reduction of rations, and similar issues since those would create a loss of trust and the formation of a large black market that would be hard to control since it might be the only source of basic necessities for most that partake on it. Weakening central authority and undermining legitimacy.
I would also think its very similar to Pol Pot's Democratic Kampuchea, such as the government trying to wipe out the past by declaring Year 0, and also with the higher ups being very secretive towards their own members.
The leadership of Democratic Kampuchea was also similar to Ingsoc as their leaders were called Brothers like Big Brother, with Pol Pot being called Brother Number 1
The idea that the party "will fall because it is literally North Korea" sounds very stupid considering that North Korea has just survived from all communist regimes and in our time it is perhaps even in a much better position than during the Cold War. At the moment, their regime has great prospects against the background of the confrontation of their two neighbors against the West, the acquisition of their own nuclear weapons, as well as a deep economic crisis in South Korea.
In addition, the crisis in Korea was largely due to the cessation of support from Russia and the countries of the socialist camp, while the regimes from the novel are described as closed economic systems and, unlike Korea, they clearly do not lack any resources, since, with the exception of East Asia, they must have all possible resources in abundance, therefore all there will be economic problems only because of corruption, bureaucratization, rationing and ineffective use, as well as attributions to state plans, which were mentioned only in the film, but not in the book.
@@nigelbaddock
And as for Kampuchea, you are right, the Khmer Rouge actually ruled anonymously, although they had a plan to create a cult of personality, they used conspiracy in everything from their own membership to the names of government bodies and ministries, replaced the language with their own newspeak with a lot of distorted concepts and neologisms, and also led the country through military governors, also non-public, but possessed full power in your area. Perhaps their leaders learned something from Orwell, or maybe these transformations were the result of their utopian views, let me remind you that there is a rather thin line between dystopia and utopia and one was born from the other
NK is still there however. There was no revolt. The military remained absolutely loyal. If a population is half-starved already any logistical collapse would just kill most of the dissidents within a week or two. The malnourished cannot form any effective attacks.
There's a book called "1985: What Happens when Big Brother Dies," it was written by an Eastern European dissident and is meant to be an unofficial sequel to 1984. I bought it and read part of it - not a fan but it's an interesting piece of lore.
What's the plot
As someone who never touched 1984 ever in my life, this is going to be an interesting bit of lore.
Give it a shot. It’s honestly not that long of a book.
I got through the audio book in a couple days of work. It’s fantastic, do read/listen to it.
The book is a friggin leaflet, you can probably do the whole thing on a short haul flight or a mid length drive. Honestly though, the story is a bit crap.
The current toalstarianism of INGSOC formed in the mid 60’s after the consolidation of the party. Think about that. The system that people keep saying is invincible is only around 20 years old. There is no reason to think this system will last forever.
Well, in principle, "totalitarian regime" only means "very not democratic regime"
And "democratic regime" only means "this country is USA-aligned".
In a world where USA isn't an independent superpower, totalitarianism is forever (which is a pretty good world)
@@Слышьты-ф4ю What are you, twelve?
@@Слышьты-ф4ю Hey everyone, we got a geopolitical guru over here!
@@Слышьты-ф4юare you stupid? There are non-US aligned democracies, like south africa or Botswana
@@Слышьты-ф4ю lmao who told you that?
One thing to notice is that Winston had his diary because there was one blind spot in the house where the TV could not watch and he could write there. If, like in the Soviet Union, his flat was actually copypasted, it means *every flat* has a blind spot, it's just a matter of finding it. How many Winstons are out there, unchecked? What if one of them becomes closer to V from V for Vendetta, making bombs in their blind spot with black market materials, and blows up the Parliament?
It might be wishful thinking. I read the novel twice in my life and felt depressed by it both times because there was no happy ending. The appendix on Newspeak might be there to give the reader an easy out. However, such a society is going to collapse sooner or later. It might linger on for a few decades but sooner or later it will murder itself, we've seen such societies in world history that were either fascist or communist that eventually spiraled out of control. The Proles were bound to have a part in it. In the movie Gandhi he's quoted as saying that the government can't control the people if millions people refuse to comply with it, force and violence only goes so far when things get intolerable and unlivable. A bunch of women fighting over pots might not cause alarm, but several million women fighting over craps of food means all hell is about to break loose.
Such a preposterous idea! This is doubleplusungood! The party would never fall!
That's some darned good quackspeak yer talkin' there, comrade.
But...Like Some Wise Man Said No Dictatorships Can Last Forever
@@billtomson5791😂😂 I actually laughed out loud at this .. that’s a good one
@@silentlamb2077 😊
Plot twist: The humans of Britain end up being overthrown by an animal revolution, led by the pig leaders of Manor Farm, as prophesied by Old Major in Orwell's own "Animal Farm". This is definitely what happens.
(Seriously though, I wouldn't be surprised if the Manor Farm in "Animal Farm" ends up meeting the same fate as the Soviet Union it's based on. Napoleon's empire ends up crumbling in both film adaptations of that book. But much like with 1984, I feel like it's up to the reader's interpretation as to whether or not these totalitarian systems will ever be overthrown.)
My idea, well I have two
1. The controlled rebellion they created slowly actually becomes a full on secret rebellion, take for example the 7 or 9 or 5 I forgot how mucj trillion dollars the Pentagon "lost" in its 9 audits in a row, now imagine a pentagon audit in a government like Ingsoc, and since their resource is techincally people, I could see them losing a section of rebellion by doing what they do, because the person controlling them had unpersoned.
2. Loss of resources, I mean if the war is ment to be forever lasting, well, eventally all lf those unrenewable unrecyacle resources, like metal, minerals, and oil will eventally well, stop being around, so eventally they will go through all of the earth's supply of say iron, or zinc, or copper, which would mean, no more guns, or floating iron fortresses, or even helments, or boots, which would they would no longer be able to even stage a forever war, since there wouldn't be anything to destory.
My headcanon post ending for 1984 is that while The Party suffers an internal struggle which causes the collapse of The Party, The Party lives on after its death in spirit resulting in an "Anarcho-Ingsoc" for a lack of a better term, as in a post totalitarian anarchism in which while the government may be gone everybody whether out of fear or brainwashing continues on living as if nothing has changed.
The aristocracy of old has rebranded themselves, it seems appropriate that INGSOC would too. Hiding their influence and control.
Another great one as always
I think Winston being 'cured' is as good as him being vaporized from the point of view of the tragedy of the text. When I was a younger man it always frustrated me that the book wasn't more about overthrowing the party but it definitely is more powerful that it technically doesn't have a happy ending. It certainly fits the tone more. As to how I feel like it's inevitable and that Winston and you are on the right track 'If there's any hope it lies with the proles'. I think there is a little classism here though. I feel like any person no matter how uneducated will have a point that you can't push them past without a reaction and when some reacts in a situation like that things can happen very fast.
Can't wait to see what facet you get me thinking about next
I certainly agree there are points that push a people into revolt. I think prices with certain food products are a good way to go. I can't recall the exact thing I read or watched but I think the price of bread in pre-revolutionary France is a good one. Once a particular point of scarcity was reached it all exploded. Obviously not THE single factor there, but an important one.
Maybe the breaking point for an overthrow would be a Black Swan event with the food or water supply - perhaps some crop disease that wipes out a large proportion of the yield in a couple of years, this has a knock-on effect and is the spark. There's probably a tonn of ways it could happen.
I think Winston is probably right though, in any scenario the proles will have to be used, just as Goldstein's Book states and then unfortunately thrust back into the horrid conditions they usually suffer, though they'll probably be slightly better than under Ingsoc (at least for a while).
@@nineteen-eighty-four-lore There definitely wouldn't be a single factor that historians could point at and say this is the moment that that issue caused the downfall. The way the proles are packed together and wound tight the whole keg could blow when somebody gets annoyed at a shortage and throws a brick through a window. I think that's way more likely to cause major change than 'educating' them and slowly having them rise to better their own conditions.
@@scitchmunkey5587 Well...classism is true, whether you like it or not. The poor and uneducated masses really are, for all intents and purposes, nothing but gears to continue the economy.
When you think about all Totalitarian Systems, controlling thought becomes a very, very expensive venture - even with technology. The cycle of continually proving political purity would eventually degrade the government from managing the (lack of an) economy. There has to be some proof that the system of government is working for the benefit of the people, or the seeds of its downfall will sprout.
I agree with the premise of this video - there is still hope for Oceania and the people of Airstrip One.
No lie can be maintained forever, as eventually the lie will ask for more and more to be sacrificed to it to keep it alive. In 1984, we see the Party on the knife-edge of being overthrown, as they have wasted too much energy in trying to police thought.
My headcanon is that after the party was defeated, society went to the other extreme and brave New world society was made
That's similar to my own headcanon that the party was overthrown by Inner Party members who decided that they're not happy with the quality of life they had under a system built for power for its own sake. I'd say a society like Brave New World would be quite aligned with such a movement's values.
@@rezajafari6395 whats the brave new world
@Maxfromohio2155 It's a different book
No, winston was *not* being monitored for 7 years. 7 years is how long he had spent at the ministry of love being 'cured' this is stated explicitly in the novel
This is interesting take. I just understood the idea now. But how can we be survive torture for seven years without personality fragmentation?
However, O'Brien is really an agent of the Thought Police, which has had Winston under surveillance for seven years (or so they claim). Winston and Julia are soon captured. Winston remains defiant when he is captured, and endures several months of extreme torture at O'Brien's hands.
Hmmm I don't think so.
Quote: “[Winston] knew now that for seven years the Thought Police had watched him like a beetle under a magnifying glass. There was no physical act, no word spoken aloud, that they had not noticed, no train of thought that they had not been able to infer. Even the speck of whitish dust on the cover of his diary they had carefully replaced. They had played sound-tracks to him, shown him photographs. Some of them were photographs of him and Julia.”
- Part 3, Chapter 4.
True, Winston somewhat loses track of time when in the Ministry of Love, but he is definitely not in there for seven years. He seems to spend the autumn and winter of 1984-85 in captivity. It was April when the novel began, he was arrested in August, and in the final chapter it is said that after being released, he met Julia again on a cold day in March. (Despite the title, the final part of the novel actually happens in 1985,) The seven years went before his arrest; when he came to the Ministry of Love a voice (almost certainly O'Brien's) whispered to him that "for seven years I have watched over you" and promising that now the "turning-point" had come.
I like to think that, over time, deserting soldiers on the equatorial front created little communities alongside the local inhabitants, simply because life was more pleasant there than it was at home. I imagine that they play both sides off each other, collecting weapons and building up quietly, eventually forming a united front against the superpowers, initially just to protect themselves. Of course, no one outside of the inner party knows this.
Honestly it wouldn't even take deserters, the whole system is ripe for all three field armies to decide they'd have a better chance of living staging a joint coup of all 3 nations, and then declaring peace.
Hello mate I must say I'm thoroughly enjoying your content, when it comes to totalitarian regimes they all eventually fall. There's a quote by Integra Hellsing from Hellsing Ultimate. "A monster's reign of terror may be bloody and long, but it's only a matter of time before they fall." The party may try to control everything but the human spirit, morality and free will always triumphs in the end, you can't control history or language or thought or people forever. And who knows maybe after Ingsoc and the other super states are gone maybe the different countries and people can finally reclaim what's left of their history, cultures and try to rebuild a better world with democracy going forward. Evil can never win, good always triumphs. Anyway keep up the good work mate and greetings from Australia.
I am inclined to agree to a certain extent, and even if INGSOC found a way to effectively keep humanity under its control forever, it is doing it at the cost of slowed down technological development which could spell doom for any civilization even one spanning an enitre planet... the fermi paradox doesn't protect fools for long.
Oceanias Party is not the same as the historical totalitarian regimes. I don't know what the human spirit is supposed to mean. It is common in the Anglosphere for people to believe in things like that for no reason. Morality is objective and the Party is objectively immoral, as they destroy history, lower the quality of life and maintain an eternal status of war. However, morality and "free will" (which does not and can not exist) do not win automatically at the end. Where do beliefs like that come from? If you destroy history and the human spirit (whatever that even is), there will not be a direct comeback of a humane society that was present directly before IngSoc took over. Humans can live under extreme inequality and think that's natural and they can also live under extreme equality and think that's natural. It depends on the economic circumstances. There is no such thing as an inherent drive towards democracy. "Evil can never win". Why not? To me, these are statements without any logical foundation to make yourself feel better. But why are people not willing to face reality? People denying reality are closer to IngSoc than I am with my borderline-totalitarian worldview. Maybe IngSoc will fall, but doesn't mean good wins. Because the good society will also be replaced by an "evil" one. So I could also say that evil always triumphs.
Yes, this appears to be a universal law of existence, let alone state structures (of all kinds). Nothing lasts forever and history shows us ALL types of government and state inevitably change or perish.
It's also worth pointing out the other states are a factor, one of them may inadvertently tip the precarious alignment.
Where can I find the image you are using for your youtube Icon? I think it's cool.
One thing I notice was not mentioned is the references to texts and dates that should have been eradicated, like the fact that they mention the 1960s, and the Declaration of Independence. By nature, the Declaration of Independence would have been destroyed by the Party to keep members in line. So how do you guys think it survived?
The world of 1984 is a world of decay and rot. Everything is falling apart. There are continual shortages, continual decay of buildings and machines. Apparently rampant petty corruption and Party that seems intent on self devouring self destruction via constant purging. One of the things I always found amusing in 1984 is that although there are continual shut downs of heat, electricity, gas etc., and buildings and infrastructure are decaying it appears that the devices called telescreens don't seem to breakdown or not work. For example assume a part doesn't work anymore would the parts be easily available, would it be repaired quickly etc. I doubt it. I consider that to be an apparent flaw in the novel.
I would think in "real life' those devices would be offline a lot of the time. It appears that the overall rot would likely cause the system to eventually implode.
I would also just like to say that O'Brien is an idiot. His utterances to Winston while Winston is being tortured are amazingly stupid.
There are two perspectives on the Newspeak Appendix. Some assume that it is a text that exists in-universe, just like the excerpts from Winston's diary and Goldstein's book. It is then regarded as a text from the post-Ingsoc era, written by some unknown academic or historian who looks back on the (failed) plans of the (former) regime to establish a new language.
The other perspective is that the Newspeak Appendix does not exist in-universe, no more than the main text of the novel does. It is just George Orwell using the format of an academic essay to do some extra world-building and fill in some details that he could not easily fit into the main text of the novel. The perspective of the essay is then not after, but BEFORE 1984; Orwell is adressing his original audience in the late 1940s, telling them more about the hellish future society he has described in the novel. But it is still fiction, and so written in the past tense, simply because that is the near-universal convention in English novels. Even a novel set in the future is not written in the future tense; that would sound ridiculous.
As for which interpretation of the Newspeak Appendix is the correct one, I believe a definite answer is provided by a single occurrence of the word "already": "The A vocabulary. ... was composed almost entirely of words that we already possess -- words like hit, run, dog, tree, sugar, house, field ..."
There you have it. "Already." An academic in a post-Ingsoc future would instead have written either "words we STILL possess" or "words that already existed in Oldspeak".
But no. The perspective of this essay is not after Ingsoc, but before it. "We" who "already possess" these words are George Orwell's original readership in the mid-20th century.
Therefore the Newspeak appendix is NOT a text that exists in-universe, it is NOT written by some future academic after the fall of Ingsoc, and the fact that it is written in the past tense does NOT imply the future failure of Ingsoc.
Sorry.
Strictly speaking, we obviously know nothing about what happened after the mid-1980s in the fictional timeline. Orwell's novel doesn't cover any later period, except for mere plans of the Party (like definitely abandoning Oldspeak by 2050, or O'Brien's long-term visions of a world with no art, literature or science, indeed not even orgasms).
We may like to imagine that Ingsoc somehow failed in the end, but Orwell's intention was apparently to describe the "perfect dictatorship" that could never be overthrown, or that might at least cling to power for thousands of years.
It can only be fought by not letting it solidify in the first place. Once the system is in place, it is too late, forever.
@@amongusus47825 Balam Industries
This does fit with the doomer worldview Orwell had that hope doesn't exist and things are only bound to get worse over time. The Party lasts forever and hope, history and truth stop existing forever as well.
This is the real answer.
F*ck all of the above comments
Then Orwell failed because what he created is completely unsustainable.
I played this video while I was doing the shopping and walking back home in terrible rain.
I understood nothing for other things demanded my attention, but your voice is very pleasing to listen to, impeccable vibe!
(I had an umbrella so I'm almost dry, thank you for asking)
Ultimately, it can be summarized in the idea that evil destroys itself. While rebellions may be crushed by the mindlessly loyal fanatics, those same fanatics dont really make competent governors. It would fall into decay, meeting its end in some sort of fate, whether it be rebellion or just general collapse.
No junta that has ever been has been composed of selfless characters like O'Brien. Every Junta succumbs to the personal ambitions and weaknesses of their own top eschelon. The internal stresses within and the mis allocation of resources will cause a fracture.
Look at how the real USSR and Nazi Germany collapsed. Hitler's breathtaking incompetence regarding the execution of WWII led to a lot of attempted coups by the military to try to create a "smart Hitler." It collapsed because of the war, but it would've fallen eventually anyway.
As for the USSR, Goldstein is really obviously based on Trotsky (real name, "Bernstein"). Trotsky claimed that the revolution had been betrayed by Stalin, and a lot of communists in the rest of the world started to sympathize with that view. What really killed the USSR, though, was that it wasn't really feasible to keep up that level of oppression. They had to relax a bit, and that was when the proles realized just how bad things were. The USSR collapsed within the decade after that.
As a prol I can say that prols aren't as stupid as people assume. Also what they say and what they think are not the same. Playing dumb is a strategy. Quantity has a quality all it's own. Revolution has happened and can happen when a certain point is reached.
What about North Korea or Venezuela; which regimes managed to stand in spite of the dire situation that in other circumstances would make the people rebel like Louis XVIth incompetent rule
@@ernestorivas3764 Neither regime has stood the test of time. North Korea is younger than my grandfather, and Venezuela’s regime is younger than me. Just because things haven’t happened yet doesn’t mean they won’t happen. Both regimes will eventually be overthrown. Just look at the world today. I can’t think of a single authoritarian regime more than a century old.
@@azlanadil3646 if we consider monarchism as authoritarian, then arguably all European monarchies. Also, Venezuela faced a ton of crisis, including the pandemic, hyperinflation and massive protests, but Maduro still manages to stand, no matter what's thrown at him. The nearest chance to his fall was Guaido, but in the end Guaido couldn't do jack sht
@@ernestorivas3764 European monarchies are not authoritarian states. Also, Mudaro has weathered everything that’s been thrown at him *so far*. He’s been in power for 11 years which on one head is a long time, but on the other hand a very short time. If you actually think that Venezuela’s government system will last forever than you delusional beyond compare.
@ernestorivas3764
There are a plethora of reasons why North Korea hasn't fallen, the main one being, which I assume is something that many North Koreans have wondered is; what is the alternative, what comes after? They could arm themselves with pitchforks, throw themselves at the government in a bloody civil war, but for what? Will they be the ones in control of the government after they sacrifice their lives, or will America roll in with tanks over the rubble and occupy their land? Will they have any ability to decide their future or will they be forced to endure whatever decisions South Korea and foreign countries impose on them? There's still Koreans who remember the war, and there are millions of people who grew up hearing stories about the atrocities (of which there are MANY) committed against them.
It's easy for us to think they're dumb or ignorant for not revolting, but that is a very real concern that they have to have. And when you pair this with the fact that North Korea is gradually getting better, both economically and in regards to the freedoms that are afforded to its citizens, they might think it's better to just wait.
As for Venezuela, I think your overstating the issues that country has. They aren't committing severe human rights violations or outright oppressing their people (at least to the same extent as was done before the current government and throughout Latin America to this day). A lot of the opposition comes from the middle and upperclasses, and many of the poor people who are against Maduro aren't necessarily going to be against the PSUV or the system as a whole, as its improved their lives. The PSUV still enjoys a plurality of support, and Chavez and his policies in particular remain widely popular. Why would they take up arms to overthrow a government that is broadly popular when they can just vote them out? Venezuela's a multiparty democracy lol. PSUV hasn't been voted out (just as they were voted in..) yet because of how inept the opposition is.
Ingsoc relied totally on its complete control of all communication to stay in power. If whichever of Eurasia or Eastasia that Oceania was at war with at the time managed to knock out the party’s communication apparatus, so if even just for a day or two Big Brother was *not* watching, then that would have been that.
Its implied that no-one wants to actually win the war and probably couldn't even if they tried. The war is always going on somewhere far away and against someone far away, but always happening. You could also interpret it as there being no war or that the war is realistically just border skirmishes. The important thing is that Eurasia/Eastasia are "Them" as opposed to Oceania's "Us", which is a very good way to get a population on board and willing to dump freedoms for security (see: P.A.T.R.I.O.T Act, the entire cold war, Germany in the mid -30's).
Historically, most popular revolts against repressive regimes happened after failed or aborted attempts of reforms, or "periods of thawing".
When the system tries to put on a friendlier face, but then throws it away and desperately tries to restore its air of implacability. Thusly exposing itself as fallible and disoriented, and confirming that alternatives to the iron heel do in fact exist.
It is fun to speculate how such a scenario might have transpired in Oceania.
1984 should absolutely be a fandom, it kind of is vaguely is a fan club already
First is was me correcting a non-existent mistske
The governments and corporations nowadays are its biggest fans. They love the book so much they want to do a worldwide roleplay, replicating all aspects of the Party. You get what I’m saying?
@@thiswillagenicely9702Orwell was privy to the workings of the British establishment and warned even back then about government overreach. It was a warning of what was to come
@@thiswillagenicely9702 No, things aren't at all like 1984 - they're like Fahrenheit 451. 1984 is a dystopia in which information is actively withheld and restricted. Fahrenheit 451 is a dystopia in which the world is flooded with so much information at every second that critical analysis becomes impossible and everyone stops trying. 1984 is a dystopia in which the government rules at gunpoint. Fahrenheit 451 is a dystopia in which the government rules by convincing everyone into willingly handing over their entire lives.
This is an important distinction, and in fact everyone's obsession with 1984 is what got us into this mess. We've been so hyper-focused on guarding against Orwell that Bradbury wasn't even patted down as he walked through the front door.
Taking notes. This feels more relevant today than ever before in my lifetime.
I think the book does hint at what happens, notice the statue of cromwell? I belive this is a hint of that after a revolution leading to such a bad regime, people return to the old system prior, flaws of that included that is aluded to in the book
The Restoration of 1660? Going by this, we can assume a General Monck-like figure, perhaps from the army or something, manages to cobble together some form of government resembling the pre-revolutionary one.
I think the main reason why IngSoc would fail is if it had a dissent group within the Inner Party. Histrory shows time and time again that revolutions and revolts against an elite by the lower classes rarely succeeds if it doesnt have backing from a parallel elite who also want change of some sorts
Good analysis. It seems staggeringly unlikely that all Inner Party members are maniacal enthusiasts like O'Brien. There would be many who would doubt the existing system, perhaps for no other reason than the lack of personal advancement you refer to.
My hypothesis is that at some point an individual in the inner party managed to gain dictatorial power, an even more powerful and paranoid Stalin. After all, the inner party attracts the power-hungry. After a decade ot three of the inner party being oppressed by the tyrant, they lost the will to maintain power through fear and oppression and they either slowly reformed or were unwilling to fight a growing movement against the party.
A plausible theory. They're certainly power-hungry individuals in the Inner Party.
All it takes is one bad harvest season / natural disaster for all hell to break loose
I always took the book's meaning to be a hopeless, unchangeable situation that's supposed to scare the reader. It's basically an example of the worst possible thing we could do, and a warning not to let it happen.
Yes it could certainly be read that way. I was just thinking on the shaky assumption they were overthrown. A lot of people disagree that the Appendix even indicates that the Party was overthrown, which is a valid interpretation too.
The thing is, that IS supposed to be the message, don't let something like this happen. Except, it's based on Stalinist USSR, which eventually was reformed, then again, then it collapsed. While it turned into another dictatorship, such dictatorship relies too much on a single powerful man and it probably won't survive the death of said man.
While the Appendix may be a literary device to explain the reader some notions, the implication the party eventually collapses makes sense, *because it already did*
It's just not how human society works, though. Political, civic, and cultural concepts exist in specific circumstances that change over time because reality changes.
Great analysis. Its always been my impression that Big Brother was simply the machinery of state oppression that devoured its creators; so even people like O'Brian were simply victims, programmed nodes of control within a system that became self sustaining. Certainly anyone mentioned who seemed to have had an ideology was destroyed or broken by the Big Brother system. This is perhaps illustrated by the fact that Big Brother, when exposed, reveals absolutely no ideological justification for its existence. It was a means that became the ends. Within that context Big Brother's failure to provide for the masses would have been impossible to correct, it was a system of oppression not improvement, and only accepted the illusion of truth it created. So (happily) revolution was inevitable. Given Orwell's era, I think a military uprising of the type that started the Russian revolution was the most likely spark. Certainly since Orwell many similar systems to those described in 1984 have fallen due to a gulf that grew between the governing and the governed. Their fall came about quickly, and when it did none made an appeal to ideology to save their system, or if they did they were so weak they were ignored.
Your analysis seems to me correct-Big Brother is not a person, but the personification of a powerful oligarchy (the Inner Party).
But the inner party is not unified, despite presentations otherwise. There are cliques and factions-Winston sees some of these fallen Inner Party members at a cafe in the book before their ‘disappearance’
In truth, highly concentrated oligarchies are unstable. Infighting with no means to gracefully exist the system eventually leads to a sole dictator.
Dictatorships only rely on the policies of a single individual (the dictator) and are staffed by people willing to implement those policies without review or question? For any questioning is a threat that can lead to infighting. This leads to an unstable system where certain societal elements are exaggerated and others left to rot.
Eventually the dictator dies, whether in power or out, leaving a successor with an entirely different set of talents. Replacing one for another is a supremely delicate processes that can easily lead to new infighting. If the old policies are continued without review, unchecked instabilities might lead to a collapse of the system.
Given this, I think it would only be a matter of time before the oligarchy of 1984 gave way to a single dictator who would possibly retire Big Brother, with each successor increasing the risk of collapse
@@ApocGenesis my impression of 1984 is that the system of oppression and control the Party created has replaced ideology, making the Party itself simply a mechanism of the system of oppression. It is the ultimate nightmare, where even the term 'elite' only denotes the role of those who manage aspects of the system. Even O'brien, like Winston, was broken. The result is a self perpetuating system of power, where brainwashed victims oppress and create other brain washed victims, all in service of the system. The ultimate horror being that they are all then the system. Ideologists mentioned in 1984 are all broken or made effigies of hate. At no point does the system mention or preach an ideology. It simply requires obedience. Orwellian, yes. But from Orwells own point if view he might have desctibed it as very Kafka.
Have you read The League Of Extraordinary Gentlemen: Black Dossier? There was an interesting take on the fall of INGSOC (though obviously not canon).
No, I haven't as yet. Will have to now. :D
Another important point is that totalitarian states always tend to incompetence. Anyone being too good at their job results in a power imbalance, which results in their being punished. Thus you end up with a state where the people who actually need to be good at their jobs aren't, because of the fear of a coup. But that means eventually the very people who have to be competent to keep the regime in power aren't, because the competent people in the political police have been purged. So they lose the ability to detect actual threats. And with the continually declining standard of living and the increasing insanity of the forever war idea, the whole state implodes.
I was so delighted to see Peter Cushing in this! Had no idea he played Winston at a point.
Genuinely delightful video!
It probably fell the way the USSR did: any attempt at reform immediately sends the whole lot crashing down. The system here, which is authoritarian, is very vulnerable to change--easily toppled from within as well as without.
I always assumed in 1984 that oceania was a rumpstate inhabitating the british isles pretending to be the worlds dominate power like north korea
Earogavin spotted
Commence NCD'er handshake
@@ethanjohnstone6865 commencing handshake.
Saw that too
@@ethanjohnstone6865 amogus amogus AMOGUS
That's actually the plot of one fanfic based off it.
No system, no matter how well constructs, can last forever. This is true of both good and bad systems. So while creating an eternal utopia on earth is impossible, so is creating an eternal dystopia.
Terrific summary!! While reading the book I was so weighed down by the misery, and the seemingly complete Omniscience of the Party that I could not see any way to overthrow them except by the Proles. But that seemed a futile hope, given that even they were under constant surveillance. O'Brien seemed too pompous at times during Winston's "re-education", that maybe the Inner Party was human after all, and could make mistakes. At the same time I was awed by the fact that the Party had figured out that the Ministries' purposes were in direct contradiction to the names they were given. But all governments fall, or at least morph into something that no one intended. Even the North Korean copy of the 1984 model will someday be destroyed.
It is possible that the Party loses to an internal rebellion that swept the country without much resistance. Similar to the fall of Zaire
Focus on supression>ignores state maintenance>drop of quality of life>state withers, local bureaucrats empowered>rebellion, state is powerless, country is now a confederation of de facto "duchies"
TBH the line "He loved big brother" almost reminds me of how people born and lived in the Soviet Union before its collapse have a nostalgia of how good the Soviet Union, even if they may have not agreed with the system at the time. Winston was looking for some form of control at a time when he felt he didn't have any. Now the party has fallen there is likely some form of anarchy and chaos just like the USSR as it transformed into Russia in the 90s. So Winston is now looking for some form of control again so he takes a more nauanced look at the party.
But the party is still very much in control at the end of the novel
I always too people liking the USSR and Stalin to liking the power and the idea of strength they had.
The difference between the Soviet Union and INVSOC is that Winston only knew INVSOC, he has no point of reference to compare it. The citizens of the Soviet Union on the other hand experienced different environments post and pre fall. For all intents the Soviet Union was just as good as the US at the time, it had different advantages(no fear for survival, better education, more persuasion on the future)and disadvantages (it terribly failed in some locations and propaganda) . But it was nowhere near INVSOC levels of control or evilness . Another thing that's different from INVSOC is that the USSR was collapsed from outside US intervention (Gorbachev and Yeltsin) with Russia prior to putin being in a total mess, it was economically disinigraded and any industry was sold to foreign investors, the government became obsolete and thus everything plunged into anarchy and "every man for themselves ", the MPs were literally stormed by tanks from Gorbachev and most of the Democratic institutions were vaporized (Americas goldem boy am I right) etc. The USSR had flaws but its collapse brought harm than good compared to INVSOC.
Great video! The movie and then the book struct me hard as a teenager... I went into this video wondering how anyone could expand on the 'Lore' of that story and your analysis really surprised me!
There is a book called Julia set in the 1984 universe.
@@Jezza_One I'll look it up! Thank you for that recommendation!
Yeah. I definitely got the vibe that dissidence in the outer party was much more entrenched and active than INGSOC was willing to let on.
Their classism also makes them underestimate the prolls to a dangerous degree. It’s pretty easy to fool someone who thinks your entire societal class is too stupid to rebel.
There may very well have been a secret organized resistance of outer party members and prolls that Big Brother was frantically trying to hide from the rest of the public.
Control has a heavy opportunity cost; it takes a lot of work. Even with machines the maintenance and production of those machines requires large and complex organizations.
one remark about this book I read on tvtropes that's been forever burned into my mind is "trying to classify Oceania as any form of government more specific than 'totalitarian' only reveals what form of government you most hate."
Someone here said that whatever happened, happened fast. My guess is that what may have happened is that a spontaneous form of protest shocked people to their core and also showed that the party in fact weren't all seeing and all knowing.
Someone may have performed an act of martyrdom, throwing themselves at a member of the Inner Party during the moments of hate. Or got fed up with everything and charged one of the machine gun bunkers guarding the government buildings in a moment of depression or rage or insanity or a combo of all three.
There is real life equivalents to some of these, the one I find most notable is Tunisia in 2010 when a man set himself alight to protest his harsh treatment by local officials.
All it would take is the right thing at the right moment to move people into action, to show that even in death they can have an impact and the entire INGSOC Party could come crumbling down.
I've always thought that a fps video game similar to Wolfenstein The New Order but more realistic set in 1984 universe where we fight as a real resistance to overthrow INGSOC would be the best thing ever.
That would totally undermine the entire point of the book. Just play Half-Life 2.
I think that doesn't work well.
Could work if Oceania was just a communist UK and the rest of the world wasn't like the propaganda claims.
@@psychomantis2485 This, HL2 is so 1984-inspired it is remarkable.
Likely a large part of the revolution was the inability for the current party to pass down this absolute power to those underneath them. Once the few people who make up big brother have died or are aged well beyond their time, a revolution is much more possible with the younger group split over how to run this government they’ve been gifted.
You cannot win forever.
It may take generation, but things change. It's the way of life. At any one moment in time, some people with responsibility and power will want to stay alive, or won't be content with what they have, or just die, and leave a hole in the structure of power and things will simply start failling apart.
The frightening things is that you can aply this to any form of power, from tyranny to democracy
While I agree with your statement, democratic country would survive losing because they're truthful about it. Totalitarian regimes will collapse if such things happen. The only other exception is that his place is so important that they shouldn't be allowed to collapse (like North Korea} or just transition themselves well enough at the right time (like UK)
I always got the impression that the system would collapse. I mean eventually the means of control would fail because of obsolete infrastructure. And a lack of competent people to handle the system they inherited.
My personal belief is that huminity itself will save the world.
Characters like Winston, who require years of being watched and months upon months of continued torture to finally break will prove to be too much for the party to ever keep up with.
If every outer party member took as long to break as it took winston, if each one resists for as long as Winston did, it would be too expensive and too laborious to break each and every man and woman.
Humanity itself will overthrow big brother.
Good point although I suspect different individuals pose different challenges. O'Brien does say that Winston was a "difficult case" whereas Julia supposedly gave in almost immediately. There are probably different classes of thought criminal, some easier to convert than others.
I always believed the system collapsed after some natural disaster started the domino effect of change. The system the party created doesn’t seem flexible enough to handle outside challenges. A nasty plague or a mass crop failure may cause enough death to push the proles over the edge.
There’s an amazing quote by Charlie Chaplin in his iconic 1940 film The Great Dictator. “so long as men die liberty will never perish.” But, what if your ruler isn’t a man. What if your ruler is an idea, a notion, a concept. Something that can’t be outlived, can’t be dispelled and can’t die. That is what makes George Orwell’s 1984 so terrifying and why humanity needs to be so careful. How do you defeat something, that cannot to be defeated?
It just dies. See the Soviet Union.
Ideas exist in specific contexts. Even the longest standing political traditions fall eventually. Imperial China existed for mellinia until it didn't.
Ideas are just social infections, passing between people and mutating to better adapt to their circumstances. Once an idea stops being viable, it tends to have trouble reproducing itself, and thus functionally goes "extinct." Once people stop believing in Big Brother, he dies, because while a man has charisma and intelligence and strength, a belief is only as strong as its followers.
@@TheAngryXeniteEven better, ideas with a strong man behind them still can collapse if the successor is dumb enough to do so. Stalin is a strong man, the one who could survive Nazis by "ideas of communism". And yet, the Soviet Union can't even last until the 2000s.
Grid failure.
That's how it started. Most folks don't understand that an electrical grid is a dynamic system that requires constant fiddling and fixing to work. By SKILLED smart people!
The very first thing to go is the grid. After that the water stops being pressurized and pumped. Food stores only have 2 to 5 days of food in rich capitalism stores, and even when stocked they need power for cooling the food.
Petrol storage needs pumps to USE the stored petrol. After the power goes off the petrol powered stuff shuts down in 3 to 5 days.
Look at South Africa, where the grid is failing in real time.
Stupid people can't make the power work no matter how motivated they are.
I would venture a guess as to how this happens. Slowly until it happens suddenly without warning. Something trips a breaker or downs a power line and the grid has cascade failure due to either inadequate base load available, or phase variance not managed fast enough. (AC power from multiple sources need the waves to be synchronized, or it fights it's self causing power loss or destruction of transformers )
I think also there’s an element to which the human mind itself rebells constantly, even when it’s not conscious of it. As Winston described, there is always the “mute feeling in your bones” that tells you that life is better than this and even seemingly loyal people like Parsons prove they harbour subconscious resentments.
It reminded me of Fahrenheit 451 where a consistent thread throughout is that the people in this society are all subconsciously suicidal with the fire chief and Montag’s wife showing numerous times that they are not as content as they appear to be on the surface. It’s possible that the party ended up sabotaging themselves over time, in a thousand little inefficiencies and eyes turned the other way. Perhaps it would be a very long time before any of the anxieties could be spoken out loud, but I don’t think the human mind ever fully settles in to tyranny- always there’s a part, however suppressed, that tries to break free, even if that freedom means death.
Great video, just found your channel at random.
Such authoritarian systems can't hold together for long (North Korea being an odd outlier), as you say there are many threats to their existence. I think Winston said that all that was needed was for the Proles to be convinced that enough was enough, and it would be over almost overnight since they represented a big majority of the population. Hence the Inner Party doing their best to keep the Proles sated, stupored, and distracted.
North Korea should tell you they can hold together for a long, long time.
@@Meade556They are propped up by criminal enterprises and China. They would starve otherwise.
@@Meade556 with foreign support. That is China
North Korea gets enough subsidies to survive, not to thrive. The prioritization of the military doesnt help either
North Korea has outside help, otherwise it would have collapsed long ago. Who would be helping INSOC in this scenario? The other two nations they flip between allied and at war with? I don't think so, I think at some point one of the nations gets in trouble and neither of the others helps it. It collapses and then there's only two. With no outside ally to bolster them, one or the other collapses, with the remaining one coming apart not long after as the military refuses to disband and lose their supplies.
😂 this is literally the question I always asked myself after reading this in 2014.
And i never had a good answer.
Thanks for this video!
Great style of RUclips video! You got another sub!
Thanks for the sub. 😃
They probably fell due to a domino effect that was likely started by some environmental disaster / crop failure / plague.
INGSOC like all totalitarian regimes had an all or nothing philosophy. Every possibility, outcome and factor had to controlled to occur in their favour with the only alternative being them having no power at all. A single instance of weakness would unravel the entire system, with decades of their actions being inevitably questioned by the populace in the process. This of course always leads to intense dissent and usually Revolution.
The problem is that not all factors can be controlled. A plague can devastate any society and is rarely foreseen. Mass crop failure would tip the scales too much in the direction of abject suffering which will make the proles have absolutely nothing to lose. Environmental disaster is self explanatory.
It also doesn’t help that the structure of absolute power that is maintained through absolute cruelty only encourages individuals in upper echelons of government to be inherently power hungry as a means to protect themselves from political purges or political opponents trying to get one up on them. This only creates the perfect conditions for factionalism that would quickly grow out of control when even inner party members feel the heat of previously mentioned unforeseen circumstances.
The infrastructure as seen in 1984 is obviously in a state of total disrepair due to the nature of government; basically ensuring that it will be the first thing to go when external crises put any pressure on the already fragile system. The habit of excessively promoting loyalty over competence alongside liquidating skilled personnel only ensures that basic maintenance of things will be extremely difficult. Even competent individuals would be forced into a fear induced incompetence when confronted with liquidation for revealing an unsavoury truth about the system to an inner party member.
There are many more factors that could play a part as well. The army which seems to be related to but mostly separate from the party could always overthrow said party when guarantees are no longer provided, which again could easily be brought on by external crises.
Or alternatively the natural entropy of nation states which would be accelerated by INGSOC’s method of governance would just run its course and result in a collapse of the system due to time.
The main point about these systems is that they’re not sustainable. They try to do what can’t be done and touch what shouldn’t be touched. In my opinion I think an INGSOC collapse would contain elements of cubas special period, the soviet collapse and collapse of Chinese dynasties via Mandate of Heaven (environmental disaster domino effect)
This. Is very possible that the system just fell apart due to uncontrollable circumstances. So has gone so many nations and empires.
The party's fall was hinted at by the fact that it was reducing chocolate rations and that tobacco and alcohol were also being cheapened.
My view is that a revolt is started by an outer or inner party defector.
Some party member sneakily disguises himself as a prole, and leaves the party to live the rest of his life as a prole sneakily staying out of the party's sight and sparking a rebellion and is just never heard of again by the rest of the party for the rest of his life
I earnestly believe the inner party begins to shrink due to its inefficiency and inability to find enough skilled individuals to continue to facilitate its existence due to the general squalor of Oceania, this leads to the party eventually losing control by virtue of limited governing capacity.
What about a Caesar or a Napoleon?
There is so little infrastructure maintenance that it is possibable that the infrastructure that the party needs to survive might break down and thus the party falls
Perhaps the military got sick of fighting the forever war, and there was a coup.
The longer a system we design operates the more chances the imperfections of the system have to make themselves known and to cause problems. And if those problems line up in just the right way, it all falls apart.
Both on a Watsonian basis and on a Doylist basis, the Party must have failed. To take the latter first, George Orwell deliberately wrote the appendix as he did, referring to the Party in the past tense. He was after all a democratic socialist, and understood that the system he describes in the book wasn't stable, even though O'Brien thought it was.
On the latter, the Party's whole approach was based on a series of huge mistakes, and therefore it carried within itself the seeds of its own eventual dissolution. A state of permanent warfare - actual warfare with bombs falling and troops killed - would inevitably not just use up excess resources, but would lead to a slowly worsening standard of living and a breakdown of infrastructure. A state of constant hostility is one thing, a state of constant war something quite different.
And totalitarian states are always in danger from power struggles within the ruling party. Hitler deliberately set the leading Nazis in competition with one another in order to keep them from competing with him, but the Party in 1984 has been in power long enough for the Inner Party to be presumably really a mass of different groups competing for power. And the more secure the Party seems to be in its power, the greater the temptation for these groups to fight one another, eventually bringing the whole thing down. And leading, one presumes from Orwell's own views, to an actual socialist state governed by the people for the people, not by a clique for the clique.
The second law of thermodynamics would catch up with the party sooner or later. "All conditioned things are subject to decay." - The Buddha
I have thought about this at well. My theory is based on two factors.
1. An authoritarian regime has interest in uneducated people, for they have no knowledge to instigate a rebellion against the ruling class.
2. The foreign enemy is able to overrun and conquer its rivaling regieme, if it has the tecnological advantage.
Combine these two and you are left with a loose loose situation, not only for one singular government, but totalitarianism as a whole.
Neglect the education of your citizens to much and the enemy will have an advantage over you.
Esucate them to much and the newly created middle class will rebell against you.
There seems to be a counter argument countering this conclusion - the foreign enemy, given it is real, has no interest in conquering other governments, because it is in need for this very conflict to maintain its own grip on power.
However, i dont think this holds up very well.
The other powers do not trust each others, they cobstantly shift alliances and backstab each other. Its more like a gentlemens agreement and because they cant be shure the other powers will hold it up, they have an interest to end the constant and growing threat from outsinde.
The whole geopolitical system is very much instable and is more likely to blow up with every passing year. It simply can not remain.
It’s also possible that the people, simply, rose up, someone realized that the resistance was fake and started their own, or perhaps there was an active rebellion somewhere else in Oceania, like America
My idea is that resource exhaustion caused the electrical systems required for surveillance to break down. I'm also going with the assumption that Oceania is only the UK instead of a multi-continental state.
One thing that's missed here is the likelihood of a plague. There are tons of rats in prole areas. I could see an illness jumping though the classes pretty fast. Another thing is less and less food. At some point the proles could be pushed to a breaking point.
I had the same idea too. Though i think it would be the outer party that would revolt against the destabilised party.
What are the dynamics of the overthrow INGSOC given the existence of Eastasia and Eurasia? Who does what, if anything. Do these enemies even exist?
Good questions. I'm not so sure the other superpowers do exist. If they do it serves the Party to maintain the necessary siege mentality that is essentially to maintain their particular hierarchy and societal structure, if they don't exist then they would have to invent them and have the propaganda that they totally control reflect this.
Airstrip one could be a North Korea situation where not even Australia and America are part of Oceania and we wouldn't know and to be fair it wouldn't change the story one way or other from Winston's point of view
The other superpowers don’t make sense to me. Why would East Asia and Eurasia not work together? Why do they always fight each other and switch alliances with Oceania?
@@hermannabt8361 it's implied in the Part One Chapter One that on occasion they do, with Winston saying "generally" Oceania was in alliance with one or the other, this implies that there were times when this happened.
This is interesting as I'd like to know how such a reality would square with the Party's idea of "being in the right"? If BOTH other superpowers are at war with Oceania this seems to imply it is in the wrong, which the Party could never abide. BB and the Party must always be right and just, hence the constant changing of history, etc. 🤔
@@hermannabt8361 this is what leads me to believe it's not as simple as the Ministry of Truth says. I think if they do exist it's more that the war is with everyone and everyone just says what they want to their populations without caring what each other do in that area. It has always struck me as odd the lack of open military recruitment propaganda. I just figure the 2 minute hate would end in a join now or something. And it's a shame we don't see any view from the military at all.
lol I never even thought the appendix was actually a part of the book, I just assumed Orwell talked about Newspeak for interest, outside of the story world
All empires are defeated by time, all that begins, ends.
Yes, change is inevitable, thankfully. 👍
"The rule of the Party is forever" - O'Brien. That's what makes the book so scary. If readers knew it would eventually fall, that would spoil the horror. And the warning.
This is more a criticism of the book/fundamental position of the writing but I somewhat reject the notion that the Proles would not either revolt or just collapse as a class (mass refusals to work and so on) and thus bring everything down with them because it assumes that they would not want change or life to be better. Humans who are in poverty with terrible conditions *inherently* want life to be better, in fact this seems to be an innate desire in almost all people but it grows exponentially in intensity when we're exposed to adversity. The book seems to completely ignore this despite the fact that we have fantastic real world evidence to prove that even under the most dire, crushing, literal starvation death camp oppression people still seek improvement and opportunities to rebel.
Really the only way to prevent this type of discontent would be to alleviate a significant amount of their poverty to placate them. If we look to nations like North Korea then it becomes clear that food scarcity in particular is *extremely* destabilising to the lower classes as famines there are some of the only times we actually hear about the people being significantly upset and discontented, meaning it's strong enough and acceptable enough to go out to an international audience. Long term stability of the Proles could likely only be achieved with acceptable conditions on top of complete media control to placate them and make them think they have it as good as it can get. Even then however you would still expect widespread corruption and attempts at improvement which still leaves a significant amount of instability in place, just perhaps a 'manageable' amount if everything else is working and if they feel their leader is strong and doing the 'right' things.
I do find the idea of internal power struggles at the top the most likely cause of an overthrow, though, as we see most dictatorships or similar go this way due to the internal pressure/ power struggles and inherent issues with subordinates and corruption that this type of government creates. They are essentially operating at all times as a finely kept balance of internal stresses and because the power must be delegated down the hierarchy this creates a situation where if any one high ranking official feels threatened the likelyhood of a coup attempt skyrockets. Even the Proles themselves being in discontent could likely be enough to cause a power imbalance at the top if it causes disagreements and tension.
Oh and as a last note, the control of language in 1984 has basically been proven just not to work since we now know that ideas lead language, not vice-versa, studies have shown that the words available in languages do not seem to affect the ideas and thoughts people have globally. So people will simply seek out new ways of communication to replace old ones and they will adapt if they cannot get their ideas across. This is not how it works in the universe of the book though, so it is pretty hard to account for the effect it would have in a realistic way and I suppose if it did work that way it *would* be a fantastic method of control.
Talking about the end of ingsoc makes me wonder how it began, in what lead to its composition and who or why it got formed
A pet theory i like to imagine is the idea of a Second American Revolution.
Of all the lands in Oceania the former United States seems like the prime candidate to launch a revolution against big brother
And considering that all of those televisors and secret microphones would require regular maintenance and upkeep, I could totally see a mountain ghost town or the middle of the Nevada desert having tons of damaged or nonfuctional microphones or televisors, because the party would be like, well those could wait, since the onoy person who actully goes there is the handyman team, but John Smith's Televisor needs fixed first.
I mean there are hundreds of inaccessable areas in Canada alone, if you took the entirety of both American Continents there would have to be _atleast_ one area with no hidden microphones or televisors, take the Apilatchain mountains, it would be nearly impossible to put hidden microphones in all of the hard to find cave systems, and mountain mounatiny places.
So all it would take is just one person to find a hidden mine shaft no one has been in since like 1930, to start up any hints of a rebellion.
It's very possible that around the time of the book, there may be a revolution on the horizon in Oceania's other territories beyond England which would inevitably lead to the whole nations collapse.
Theory Idea: The party feel just the year after, in 1985
We see at the end of the most recent version of the film that even Inner Party members are subject to purges. Three Inner Party members are seen at 12:37 in the same holding area as Winston -- the cafe, playing chess while waiting to be executed, as was Winston. Sooner or later, two or more major factions within the Inner Party would go at one another in civil war and shatter their hold over Oceania, just as constant civil war was the chief reason the Roman Empire collapsed, because they became such a drain on resources, the Empire could no longer hold back the barbarians, or in this case hold back aggression from East Asia or Eurasia. And these powers too would at some point suffer their own internal struggles. Revolutions ALWAYS end up eating their own, with the American Revolution perhaps the only real exception. At some point during an Oceania civil war, the temptation to integrate millions of Proles by feuding Inner Party factions into their fighting forces as an advantage over rival factions to counter Army and/or Outer Party members support alone would be too great to pass up. And that would crack the entire system.
BTW: The Russian Revolution, born out of the catastrophe of World War I, the Communist totalitarian rule that took over, and all the mind perversions and organized secret police terror necessary to maintain their control, was the inspiration to George Orwell for his writing 1984. Big Brother symbolized Stalin, and IngSoc symbolized Communism. Goldstein symbolized Leon Trotsky (whose real name was Bronstein) -- who, just as Stalin, was a key figure in the Revolution. In fact, Trotsky was higher in rank originally than Stalin. Trotsky commanded the Red Army and was one of the most important Communist theoreticians next to Lenin, while Stalin handled the bureaucracy and did the work considered vital but unglamorous and messy. This set the stage though for Stalin to outmaneuvered Trotsky for power once Lenin died. Stalin eventually had him executed by an assassin in Mexico City where Trotsky had fled to live in exile. Once Stalin took power, Trotsky became the omnipresent symbol of impurity, treason and perversion just as Goldstein was in IngSoc propaganda. And similarly Goldstein's last name implies he was ethnically Jewish as was Trotsky, even if Goldstein was a convenient fiction used by the Party's propaganda. To this day, there is a small but vocal pro-Trotsky faction -- the Trotskyites -- who believe they are the pure vision of Communism which was corrupted by the Stalinists and other deviant factions. I'd imagine there'd have been a similar vocal faction of Goldsteinites as well who the Inner Party feared.