The old codger’s been a sci-fi fan most of his life. Loved the tech-forward stuff that had its heyday in the ’30s through the ’50s. Nevertheless, one of my favorites was George Orwell’s classic 1984, which, instead of tech, focused on a dystopian, totalitarian regime governed by “the Party,” which brainwashed its populace with self-serving propaganda. Probably its most quoted passage: “The Party told you to reject the evidence of your eyes and ears. It was their final, most essential command.”
Orwell wrote it in the aftermath of World War II to explore how intelligent, educated Germans, Italians and Spanish in the 1920s and ’30s could be deluded enough to support dictators, be complicit in the murder of millions of their fellow human beings, and further be part of blatant campaigns of aggression that culminated in the deaths of tens of millions more.
His conclusion is clear. If you overwhelm people with repeated lies, while increasingly branding dissent as “disloyal” or “unpatriotic,” and couple that with an escalating targeting of specific groups along with a steady drumbeat of outside threats, you create an atmosphere of tension, confusion, and fear that becomes almost impossible to cut through with truth — no matter how clear that truth may seem.
Whatever our political bent, we have to ask ourselves if we don’t feel some of that same tension, confusion, and anxiety today. What is fact? What is conjecture? What is simply misinformation? Some people may even feel a strange sense of excitement in all of it, like riding a fast amusement-park coaster. But there’s a difference: rides are built, tested, and maintained with safety in mind. They are designed to earn our trust. Can we say the same about the flood of information that pours over us every day?
Folks, again, whatever our political leaning, we have to acknowledge that we’re living in a dangerous and uncertain world. Is this unavoidable? Is it what we want? Is it what any of us need?
So how do we tell if we might be drifting in the wrong direction? Here’s a simple test any of us can try, even an old codger.
Take a recent event — one that’s been recorded from multiple angles. Without listening first to anyone’s commentary, just watch.
Do different videos show essentially the same reality?
Do what people later say about it match what we actually see?
If not, what motive might exist for the difference?
Those are not partisan questions. They’re human ones.
Getting back to Orwell: he had just lived through the consequences of sustained, organized lying on a massive scale. He had to write 1984 when he did. Maybe we still need to hear its warning now.
“The Party told you to reject the evidence of your eyes and ears. It was their final, most essential command.”
