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By Sharon Leighton

movie is being shown. On the screen, a ship full of ees is trying to escape from hovering helicopters. A

need as he is shot full of holes and the water around urns red. In the ship, a mother tries vainly to protect her -year—old son from the guns. A bomb is dropped. The nces cheers as the boy’s arm soars into the air above the f the debris.

an meets an elderly married woman. Without thinking, lles her, “Mrs. Smith”. She is gracious; she overlooks. social blunder. He reminds himself that there is not sed to be any difference between the sexes now, tha .” is a word “somewhat discountenanced”. ‘

t old man tries to buy something. An angry exchange places as he demands a pint. “Litres and half~litres, . all we serve,” he is told. He pretests, “A half litre » enough. It don’t satisfy. And a whole litre’s too much.“ ~' ' George,_Orwell’s book,

ed date, I was jubilant. “1984! And the world isn’t like t all!” -

n I read the book again.

4 was published in 1949, a dire prophecy of a dismal . An entire generation used it Was a warning, a sign g, “Don’t let this happen.”

it the warning was forgotten.

“two e t

- bout the Past

e of the'most objectionable features of Orwell’s 1984 is the perpetual falsification of history by those in rity. The hero, Winston, is never certain of a fact. He is en sure that the year really is 1984. If a persOn should aporized” — that is, killed by the State of his political ns — a massive research project would uncover all (1 references to that person. Then the books, magazines, ewspapers containing those references would either be yed or rewritten with'out mention of him.

ple were told that they were much wealthier than their parents had been, when in fact they were a great deal r. A common official announcement‘ was: “The rd of living has risen by no less than 20% over the 'ear.” People were expected to believe this, although ad to make razor blades last six weeks, there was enough food, people 'slept naked because they could fford pajamas, and the houses they lived in were apart due to lack of repairs.

ple are not, as far 'as I know, vaporized in Canada in l 1984. However, lie after lie is told us about out past, - swallow them.

most obvious lie today is the same one Orwell sied. “The ,standard of living has risen ...” We are ed to believe that we are immensely better off than were arhundred years ago.

is not true. Walkd down some of the older streets of ttetown and count the twenty-and thirty-room :25 you see. These ,were all built roughly a hundred go as single family dwellings. Today, they are apartment oming houses; who can afford a house that size? Only ky can afford a house ‘at all. The difference, we are made up for by the things we own.

3', everyone has a car. True enough, and a hundred $0 eVeryotle had a horse and carriage, which represmts lvalent c0st. That’s all right, we’re told, but today 6 has a television, a stereo, a refrigerator, a her. That is true to an extent, and to the same extent,

red years ago everyone had a piano or fiddle and one ervants. « -

tries to swim from the ship; the audience watches ‘

ten 1 first realized that we had actuallryreached thai “’

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The costs of these things are basically equivalent. The people of the 18805 were at least as well off as we are, and probably were wealthier. .

Another common lie is about women. In the January, 1984, issue of Ladies’ Home Journal, the Journal celebrates its hundredth anniversary by gloating over the “fact” that women are no longer the fragile, useless creatures of 1884.

A book called The Household Guide, or Domestic Cyclopedia published in 1894, offers this advice to young women: “If you are in the country, or can get there, ramble over the hills and through the woodlands; hunt bird nests, and chase butterflies Take a lesson from the English girl who spends more than one-half of her waking hours in physical amusements She rides, walks, drives, rows upon the water, runs, plays, swings, jumps the rope, throws the ball, hurls the quoit, draws the box, keeps up the shuttle- cock ...” This is fragile?

Ordinary women in the 18805 had to do more actual work while doing their week’s laundry than the average woman of today does all week. No one who looks at the facts, no one who listens to reminiscences about their own great- grandmothers, no one who reads anything published before the First World War can believe that Victorian women were fragile, useless creatures who sat around doing embroidery all day. Ye the lie is still told to us.

Proliferation of Arms

In Orwell’s 1984, the major powers of the world were in a constant state of war, although the actual fighting was of secondary importance. “The primary aim of modern warfare,” stated an underground book read by the hero, “is to use up the products of the machine without raising the general standard of living A Floating Fortress (one of Orwell’s imagined super-weapons), for example, has locked up init the

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labour that would build

several Ultimately it is scrapped as obsolete, never having brought any material benefit to anybody, and with further enormous labours another Floating Fortress is built ...”

hundred cargo—ships.

Replace the words “Floating Fortress” with “Cruise Missile” and you have a timely discussion of a current problem. If the money spent on one missile were poured into agriculture or fisheries or small business, it would be difficult to talk about “Hard Times in the Maritimes” anymore. Canada, of course, does not take part in this arms race to any great extent. However, the arms race does exist, almost exactly as described by Orwell. And it does affect Canadtans.

Undermining of the Thought Process

A major focus of the efforts of the authorities in Orwell’s 1984 was the undermining of thought. The more important methods used were propaganda and the destruction of the language. What was important was that people learn to accept what they were told, in spite of the evidence of their senses.

“How easy it was, thought Winston, if you did not look about you, to believe that the physical type set up by the Party as an ideal — tall, muscular youths and deep-bosomed maidens, blond-haired, vital, sunburnt, carefree —— existed and evern predominated.” And how easy it is, in the real 1984, to believe that the only normal men are handsome, dis- tinguished, with cigarettes in their hands and an air of freedom; how easy it is to believe that all normal women weigh less than 120 lb. and wear designer jeans. The pro— paganda is not put out by a political party, but it exists.

The destruction of the language had the simple purpose of making speech “independent of thought”. Once good English called “Oldspeak”, was forgotten, a heretical thought would

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