Control In 1984

In students’ day to day lives, the time they wake up, go back home, and spend in each class is decided by higher authorities, regardless of each individual’s opinion. They’re forced to hide their eyebags and morph into half alive zombies barely making it through the week. A similar concept of control is introduced in 1984, when the main character, Winston Smith, feels unhappy with the dystopian city he’s living in and rebels against the government, only to be thwarted by their domination tactics, eventually becoming another one of their subordinates. In 1984, George Orwell emphasizes that complete control, whether it be through the government or another higher-up power, causes individuals to hide the truth and change their identity. Through

Deciding that he needs love and physical contact in his life, Winston begins an affair with an inner party member named Julia, who he secretly meets up with and talks about rebellion. Explaining to Julia why the Party frowns upon love marriages and tries to distance people so they can’t have sex, Winston describes that “When you make love you’re using up energy; and afterwards you feel happy and don’t give a damn for anything. They can’t bear to feel like that. They want you to be bursting with energy all the time. All this marching up and down and cheering and waving flags is simply sex gone sour” (Orwell 167). Having control over an individual’s relationships with others and limiting the amount of contact they can have is a way the Party controls a person’s mindset and leaves them craving for more that they can’t get. Sexual contact is forbidden with the fear that people would get close and experience true happiness, leading to a disregard of the Party’s control, which would eventually spread to more people, meaning less people who fall into the Party’s trap. The more people that start to find this sense of happiness and contentedness, the less people the Party can manipulate, leading to a rebellion, which would eventually mean the downfall of the