Examples Of Doublethink In 1984

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In the book 1984, by George Orwell, Winston Smith is living in an oppressed, dystopian, society where every means of a citizen’s life is monitored and controlled by the government. As the story develops, Winston learns how the Party is able to keep everything just the way it wants. He also learns that the most important elements in the government’s system are communication and language. One such instance is the Party’s attempt to replace the language of Oceania with Newspeak. In 1984, Newspeak is being carefully altered and developed to perfectly fit the needs of Big Brother and the Party. As Winston’s comrade, Syme, explained in the book: “Don’t you see that the whole aim of Newspeak is to narrow the range of thought? In the end we shall make thoughtcrime literally impossible, because there will be no words in which to express it.” The …show more content…

For example, if the Party announces that Oceania is currently at war with Eurasia, and always has been, everyone immediately believes that to be true. This is possible, even though just seconds earlier, they had been cheering on their military as it marched into battle against Eastasia. One reason this can actually work is because of a principle of Newspeak called doublethink. Doublethink allows someone to firmly believe multiple truths or meanings of a word even if they are contradictory. This also happens to be the foundation of the country’s slogans: IGNORANCE IS STRENGTH WAR IS PEACE FREEDOM IS SLAVERY. Additionally, doublethink is essential to the Oceanians when trying to understand the purposes of the three departments of the government: the Ministry of Love tortures people, the Ministry of Plenty pretends to produce millions of products then withholds them from the poor population, and the Ministry of Truth lies to the people of Oceania by altering the past to make Big Brother a bold, infallible