Physical and Emotional State in the Cell

In the beginning of Book Two in "1984," Winston faces the ultimate challenge of survival, not only in the physical state, but also in the mental state in a way that he must stay sane among all the horror that is surrounding him. When Winston is in the cell, he does a immense amount of thinking and observing everything around him which includes his own feelings and physical pain he is enduring. "The dull pain in his belly never went away...when it grew worse he only thought of pain itself...when it grew better, panic took hold of him...he felt the smash of truncheons on his elbows and iron-shod boots on his shins...he saw himself groveling on the floor, screaming for mercy through broken teeth" (Page 228). The dark actions he describes and the images he claims he sees going through his head are horrifying and clearly show the reader that the physical pain is affecting his state of mind and also bringing emotional and mental pain to him as well.
One of the main aspects of Winstons life that is being affected by his situation in the cell is Julia in a way that he becomes worried about the fact that things may change between them through all that is going on. "He hardly thought of Julia. He could not fix his mind on her. He loved her and would not betray her; but that was just a fact. Known as he knew the rules of arithmetic. He felt no love for her and hardly wondered what was happening to her" (Page 229). What Winston means is that nothing had changed between him and Julia as far as his love for her. And that wont change. However, in circumstances like his, it is easy to lose track of something or in this case some one. He may find himself forget about her completely when his mind is more focused on the horror surrounding him. That is what he is afraid of.

What is your worst fear?

Every human being has a fear more horrible than death a fear that can shatter all bonds of love and friendship. Winston asked O'Brien what was in "Room 101" early in book three. In chapter five the question is answered, "The thing that is in Room 101 is the worst thing in the world... In your case the worst thing in the world happens to be rats," O'Brien says to Winston. O'Brien and the Party use people's fears against them to break the last of their spirit and force them to obey big brother. They do this by putting the people in a situation where all bonds with other people are broken and the only bond that can save them is the one with Big Brother. Winston breaks the last of his spirit and all other bonds that were sacred when he cries out,"Do it to Julia! Do it to Julia! Not me! Julia! I don't care what you do to her. Tear her face off, strip her to the bones. Not me! Julia! Not me!" This breaking the bond with the one he loved was the final stage in the destruction of his spirit. Now that he has faced his fear and lost to it he let big brother win. When talking about fear one must discern the difference between pain and fear. Pain can be endured and withstood and over time expelled from the mind but fear is immediate it is irrational it controls you and it can make you bend to the will of others and forget those you love.

Book Three Blog Post - Due Monday, 03/14

Hi all - here is your assignment for this post :

1) Choose an index card with a chapter from Book Three.

2) Compose a blog post of at least one paragraph in length in which ...

• You make a clear and original claim about a significant aspect of the chapter.
• Support the claim with two pieces of evidence.
• Follow each piece of evidence with at least two sentences of commentary.

You may have till the end of the day to complete as needed.

Winston in denial

Although his true feelings are against it, bottling up his hatred, Winston tries to make himself believe the the Party slogan. Winston begins to write out on a slate he is given in attempts to believe the slogan in Chapter 4. "He accepted everything. The past was alterable. The past had never been altered... He had never seen the photograph that disapproved their guilt. It had never existed; he had invented it. He remembered

remembering contrary things, but those were false memories, products of self-deception" (page 228). The syntax used in the quote shows his distress with the use of short choppy sentences. He is tryin

g to convince himself that Big Brother is right and he has gone crazy and made everything up in his head. He thought he was

doomed no matter what and to just give up when he found him self shouting Julia over and over and realized that he still hated Big Brother. " He obeyed the Party, but he still hated the Party. In the old days he had hidden a heretical mind beneath an appearance of conformity" (page 231). Winston is feeling a pain of sorrow and anger. He hates the Party and disagrees with them but is unwillingly obeying their rules. He is trying to tel himself to follow their sayings but finds it hard to do so. He finally admits to himself that his new thoughts are wrong and he really does hate Big Brother.

Mind over Matter

In book three of 1984 Winston is taken hostage by the party and repeatedly tortured for his disobedience to the party. The means in which he is tortued varies; one way is physical torture, and another is mental torture. The physical torute easily breaks him, but he is relatively resilient to the mental torture conducted by O'Brien and by the fequent interogation. Winston's weakness to physical torture is seen when he says, "I will confess, but not yet. I must hold out till the pain becomes unbearable. Three more kicks, two more kicks, and then I will tell them what they want" (241). This was going through his head during one of the beatings, and it shows his weakness to physical pain. Although he is not blatantly giving in, he is acknowleding that he will give in. By thinking like this, he is admitting his weakness to the party and providing it with a way to break his rebellious spirit. During a torture spell, O'Brien is attempting to get rid of Winston's independant mind by holding up four fingers and asking Winston how many there are. O'Brien tells Winston there are five, but there are claerly four so Winston continues to say four despite the increasing pain. Winston's resilience to this sort of torture is seen when the author says, "He knew that the fingers were still there, and still four. All that mattered was somehow to stay alive until the spasm was over" (251). In this, Winston is staying true to what he believes despite what the party is telling him (represented by O'Brien). Winston's refusal to accept what the party tells him to be true sybolizes his rebellious spirit that is present troughout the entire book, and also shows his ability to use reason to prove something to be true.

The Inner Party

In chapter 3, of book 3 in 1984, it is shown that the way the inner party presents themselves to the public is an complete front of how they really are behind closed doors. An example of of what the party presents to the public being true rubbish is is Goldstein's book. When O'Brien is asked by Winston if the contents of the book is true he responds by saying, " As description, yes. The program it sets forth is nonsense...The rule of the party is forever. Make that the starting point of your thoughts." This shows that the party's goal is to trap and rid of those that go against them. O'brian stresses that the party is impossible to overthrow. Another example of what the party presents to the public is not true, is that they make the community think their interested in thier own good. This is shown when O'brian says, " The party seeks power entirely for its own sake. We are not interested in the good of others; we are interested solely in power." This shows that the party's primary goal is to gain as much power as possible no matter how unhappy the communtiy becomes. In light of above, The party does not show to the public that all the care about is the power of the party rather than the happiness of the public.

The Power and Immortality of the Party

In chapter three, it is shown that the party has power over everything and that O'Brien is immortal. The party is described as omnipotent and the creator of all that exists inside the human mind. O'Brien claims, "Already our control over matter is absolute... we make the laws of nature...nothing exists except through human consciousness."O'Brien is stating that the Party has control over the human mind and through the human mind they have control over life, nature, history, and everything. O'Brien also says, "If he can merge himself in the party so that he is the the party, then he is all powerful and immortal." O'Brien is saying that by submitting your body and mind to the party then you could be immortal by living through the party thoughts and ideals. O'Brien tells Winston that he helped write the Goldstien book but for all we know he could just be saying that he wrote it metaphorically by just being part of the party.8

On the inside

Despite the physical and mental torture that Winston undergoes, he is determined to prevail against O'Briens torture. Winston, though he has a strong will, O'Brien has the upper hand, he can torture Winston in the attempt to make him sane again. O'brein tortures winston on two levels, that of physical torture and the form that takes a more psychological route. The psychological torture revolves on degrading Winston and though winston tries to prevail through the pain, it is impossible. O'Brien is constantly degrading Winston, slowly breaking him down, an example of this is when O'Brien states "You are a flaw in the pattern, Winston. You are a stain that must be wiped out." This sort of psychological abuse not only damages Winston as a person, but bit by bit it strips away his morale and belief that he can beat O'Brien. The fact that O'Brien is degrading Winston is bad enough, but the hidden message behind it is that he is taking away Winstons hope to believe that he is sane, that his ideas are correct and that Winston is correct in his beliefs. And when O'Brien says " you are a stain that must be wiped out" he is using a harsh diction that even further weakens Winston. However there are two forms of torture, psychological and physical. The physical approach is dealt with in two ways, one through the "electroshock therapy" and a second, which is not so much torture, but a alternative to it, more of a helping hand in the process of rehabilitating a person, in this case Winston. In one instance Winston is laying on the bed when "two soft pads , which felt slightly moist, clamped themselves against Winston's temples. At this moment there was a devastating explosion, or what seemed like an explosion, though he was not certain there was any noise." Here it seems like Winston has expirenced some sort of extreme shock therapy, where the neuron connectors in his head have been severed, thus leaving Winston helpless. The "explosion" sends a line of fear to both the reader and through Winston because a feeling is helplessness is imposed upon him, and a feeling of utter devastation of his ideas and concepts. In the end Winston cannot fight the physical torture, and in the end he is broken, they Physically change is mind, they break the connections between his ideas, they steal his thoughts. However if Winston had only undergone psychological torture, it is believed that he would have of prevailed against the party for a longer time.

Winston's Resistance

In chapter 4 of book 3 in 1984, Winston seems as though he has been broken by the party, as he begins to try and accept their ways, however he soon realizes he is lying to himself and throws a fit of rage that results in his being taken to Room 101. Winston begins to write party slogans on a slate he has been given in an attempt to make himself believe they are true. "He wrote first in large clumsy capitals: FREEDOM IS SLAVERY. Then almost without a pause he wrote beneath it: TWO AND TWO MAKE FIVE."(277) The slogans all use doublethink, something which he has always had difficulty accepting. His inability to believe doublethink is what has landed him in the Ministry of Love in the first place, and it is eventually the cause of his further downfall. Later, Winston grows angry at his torture and calls out to Julia, as he wants to express his resistance to the Party and Big Brother. "Suddenly he started up with a shock of horror. The sweat broke out on his backbone. He had heard himself cry aloud: 'Julia! Julia! Julia, my love! Julia!'"(280). In his fit of anger he realizes that the party will not like that he is still in love with Julia and still hates their forces, so he does all that he can do against them, which is to yell out her name. His resistance is noticed and he is taken to room 101 for this "crime". Although Winston halfway wishes to comply with the party, he simply cannot force himself to believe lies, it is not in his nature.

Evil in Love

Winston is surprised how terrible the Ministry of Love actually is. The first person Winston is surprised by is Ampleforth. Ampleforth is merely a poet who "allowed the word 'God' to remain at the end of a line." (pg 230 Orwell). The crime had to be committed because there are only twelve words left in newspeak that could rhyme with 'rod'. The Ministry is surprised by this because it is treated as badly as treason. The second part is when the starving man frantically tries to avoid being sent to room 101. The man was willing to have his family killed by stating,"You can take the whole lot of them and cut their throats in front of my eyes," (pg 237). The man's desperation was reaching a point where he was willing to do anything. Winston saw, first hand, how the Ministry of Love broke people down to a point beyond repairable.

Communism In Society

Throughout history, communism has shown its presence through many different countries and events around the world, which some have defined eras of war and hate. The idea of communism is a society that governs itself, but a superior government has all the power until this goal can be accomplished. Possibly the greatest example of communism in society is the Holocaust lasting for about twelve years. Communism was shown when Hitler and his army wiped out around six million jews for the "better of society." Another well known example of communism is the Soviet Union in the late 1980's. They had originally planed for a society with freedom of speech, press, and assembly but soon came to be where they didn't like people to go against them. They ignored their original ideas and eventually started punishing those who did not agree with their ideas and also the rights of press were striped away due to the Unions dislike of publishing stories against them. Communism at one point in time was shown greatly across the world especially after World War II but since then that number has decreased immensely and today there are not that many countries left that follow the idea. But clearly communism has had an affect on society, not just in specific countries, but all over the word. Such as the Holocaust and Germany's involvement in World War II which impacted the world and events like those are never forgotten.

Socialism

In America socialism had a major increase between 1900 and 1912. It is well known as Government regulating distribution of goods and enterprise.

In the world today people are starting to bring about socialism to change their views and ways of the world. They believe capitalism can not meet the needs of the majority of "us". Some say that socialism is the believing of being saved in a helplessness cry of depression by the government. In the early century members of the socialist party took interest and sent out news letters to tell people the new up coming events. The party included 125,000 people. In the later 20th century socialism was well known for being the perfect man not chained down to government sayings and would not be condemned for the past.

Fascism is an authoritarian type of government that focuses primarily on nationalism and using violence as necessary. Fascist ideals started to pop up during World War I in Italy, and were for the most part welcomed by the people of Italy, who were tired of their poor economic condition and inability to immigrate elsewhere. Fascism generally demotes single-minded thoughts such as materialism and individualism, promoting a more unified state of mind. Rather than peaceful control, Fascism supports violence as a major method of political control. Benito Mussolini, one of the original creators of fascism, promoted it as a government that would use violence when it found it to be necessary, and create a social order based on race. The modern day view in the Middle East of Israel and its allies such as Hosni Mubarak is that of a Fascist coalition against Palestinian supporters. They say that the U.S. and Israel have made allies in Egypt and Tunisia creating a Fascist rule of the area. Their claims are supported by the fact that the old president of Egypt, Mubarak, did not allow aid caravans with supplies to the Gaza strip for the Palestinians there. Fascism is apparent in many societies today, although not so prominently as it has been in the past.

Bibliography

Fascism-http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fascism

What is Fascism? Some General Ideological Features-http://www.publiceye.org/eyes/whatfasc.html

Zionist leaders: Yes to Jewish fascism, no to Islamic democracy- http://www.ptimes.org/main/default.aspx?xyz=BOgLkxlDHteZpYqykRlUuI1kx%2FVDUOFo2HSeCyO1KrsuC%2FuRhcZLbS1C69lg33XEnXJIUObXlusMy8GiwDAf1XiWyZIEOMe8s14sz7P2FWbTJGpm5rkFlKk9NSG92UjemwBoGtBzKnY%3D

Communism in the Past

Communism started when the USSR was founded, and Marx came to power. The political idea spread exponentially during WWII to Western Europe and the countries that fell to the Nazis. After the War ended, It dissolved as quickly as it arrived, for Europe. A few asian countries, however, stayed communist. Communism ended in the USSR when it was dissolved after the Cold War. The cause was not the war itself, but Mikhail Gorbachev wanting to modernize Russia's economy.

Russia's most well known ally in the Cold War, to the United States, was Cuba. Cuba became communist when Che Guevara and Fidel Castro overthrew the old government. Cuba was well known for having missiles, and they are within 100 miles of the United States.

The Asian countries, who kept communism, even after the Vietnam War and The Korean War. The five remaining countries that are still communist today are; Laos, China, North Korea, Vietnam, and Cuba. In the first link provided, there is a visual timeline that shows the spread and disintegration of communism in the 20th country.

There are several key points that the countries share. The first is that there flag has a star, or has some red in it. Also, during times of war, they will support each other. The extreme nature of most of the communist "iron curtain" has faded, and the countries are more modern and flexible with working with democratic countries.

http://users.erols.com/mwhite28/communis.htm

http://www.historyworld.net/wrldhis/PlainTextHistories.aspgroupid=548&HistoryID=aa58&gtrack=pthc

Communism Concepts

Communism is a form of socialism, or according to Lenin, the first step toward true Communism. True Communism is the belief in a classless society where private ownership is abolished. Along with this private ownership is removed, and all items belong to all members of the Communist party. Communism originated from Carl Marx and was later further developed after the Russian Revolution by Vladamir Lenin. Though the first true ideas were formed by Gracchus Babeus in the 18th century. Overall Communism is a political movement that strives to remove classes and reside in a stateless society that is basically structured on common ownership. In addition it relies on free access to articles of consumption. Communist structures are known to be very dull and gray, used to house groups of people. The term Comrade is also commonly incorporated with Communism due to the strong brother/sister like bonds it hopes to form between neighbors and all citizens alike. Vladamir Lenin once said "Цель социализма - коммунизм" which translates to "The goal of socialism is communism". This concept states that communism if the supposedly "Utopian" outcome of socialism. The basic communist ideals eventually lead on to other political outlooks such as Hoxhasim, Anarchist Communism, and Stalinism. The ideals of Communism are commonly associated with Russia during the cold war, and the east Russo-occupied sector of the Berlin wall and Germany. The common emblem associated with Communism is a Star, the star represents five sharp edges displaying power and unbreakability. However other variants such as the Soviet flag of the 1960's to the 1990's displayed a hammer and sickle, this displayed manpower and efficiency. Communism is generally associated with a distopian world of sorts where there is no freedom what so ever, the atmosphere is bleak with no life or color, and everyone suffers in the world of monotony.

Bibliography

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/communism
http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/communism

Content Quest - Due Tuesday, 3/8

Hi guys - here are the instructions I posted on the board today in class. Your goal = discover the essential aspects of your topic to share with the class. Work to finish your post on your topic before class tomorrow.

1) Use (and cite!) three or more different types of sources -- i.e. political, educational, news, etc

2) Summarize information from each source and post to blog -- really work on summary skills here. Don't copy and paste but synthesize the information.

3) Provide one or more visuals that you feel like symbolizes your topic.

The format of your post does not have to be in paragraph format; this exercise is about summary and content and not as much about writing.

Capitalism

http://www.buzzle.com/articles/pros-and-cons-of-capitalism.html

On the website listed above, the author of the website describes the pros and cons of Capitalism. Some of the pros that are listed are growing environment caused by the open market and the competition of different market retailers and their drive to sell more products than each other; Another pro is that individuals can rise up through the downed economy and use it to their advantage. Some of the cons to capitalism that are shown in the website is that some people who are not as fierce in the competition and ultimately there will be a rise in major corporations. Some people also believe that there are unjustifiable amounts of money not going to the right places and some people find that unfair. Other people believe that this economic system will rid the world of its resources.

http://www.wsu.edu/~dee/GLOSSARY/CAPITAL.HTM

Capitalism has essentially been around for hundreds of years. They claim that capitalism was first started out mercantilism and gradually changed throughout the years into the social and economic system that is currently used in the united states. The Romans were the first ones to use mercantilism in Europe but Arabic cultures had been using that system for much longer

:Owning products as property is called capital, People who work get wages not products, Capitalism is enlightened and individualistic.

Your Worst Enemy

"Your worst enemy, he reflected, was your own nervous system. At any moment the tension inside you was liable to translate itself into some visible symptom." (Orwell 64). I felt that this quote was a very significant quote on the idea of the connection between ones emotions, and how the outside world is reacting to those emotion during the period of this book. This quote is significant to that idea because it is so dire that people keep their bubbling emotions to themselves in this world. The government that overlooks them doesn't like difference, and the slightest sign of difference could result in a tragic ending for someone. Everybody however is not the same and everybody has different views, emotions, opinions, and ideas that are very hard to keep quiet and away from everybody else. That is why its so hard to live in this place because of how severe it is to let it all out. The difference between who continues through life here and who doesn't all depends on how strong one can be holding everything bottled up. Thats the difference.