by Dawn Lioutas

Created on: February 17, 2010

In Oceania everything is controlled. The people have basically no freedom at all-no freedom to think there own thoughts, and no liberty to do what they yearn. Everything people do is controlled-from their thoughts, to their actions, everything they do, or even think, is constantly being recorded and monitored. “Nothing was your own except the few cubic centimeters inside your skull.”

“The telescreen received and transmitted simultaneously”. In every household there was a camera-like screen which watched your “every movement” and “overheard” your every sound, called a “telescreen”. Most importantly the telescreen “could be dimmed, but there was no way of shutting it off completely”. The most disturbing thing of all was that it was unknown when you were being watch, and it was feasible that you were always being watched. People had to live with the “assumption” that they were being monitored 24/7! Although the telescreen cannot watch the entire household, every “peep” throughout the entire house could be heard. People cannot be themselves and cannot live freely with this sort of invasion of privacy, with this sort of control! The party essentially controls how you live and what you do in your house, because if one is constantly being watched, then what they do will be dissimilar to if they weren’t being watched. They will almost subconsciously altar their way of living because they are being watched. Knowing that you are being watched makes you almost “claustrophobic”.

The telescreen could also glean any emotion in a persons face, whether they are facing the telescreen or not, because as Winston remarks “even a back can be revealing.” If one would like not to be “vaporized”(a euphemistic term meaning annihilated), as the party did to one who was caught thinking, it was best to keep their faces inscrutable and reveal as little emotion or thought as possible. The party realizes that it is what people don’t say that is often the most vital or revealing, that is why they try to control people’s thoughts as much as possible. The party loathes “thinkers”, especially people who have even diminutive feelings of opposition towards the party. Therefore the party tries to control people’s thoughts as much as possible by instating “Thought Police”(police responsible for “taking care of”

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