We are living in a different form of the 1984 police state. Google, Facebook, Apple, and other silicon valley corporations are keeping tabs on everything you do, and sharing it with the NSA, so the government doesn't need the monitoring TV.

The MSM changes history constantly, by ignoring news that shows progressive policy failures, and exaggerating any information that favors a big state solution. Negatives about the founders of our country are emphasized, while their character is assassinated.

State reeducation camps are just a breath away, with calls to criminalize "climate change denial." If Clinton becomes President, and succeeds to pack the federal courts, expect to see a new version of the John Adams Sedition act passed into law, affirmed by the SCOTUS as constitutional. Criticism of the government or its officials will become a federal crime.

2024, not so different from Orwell's 1984.

In 1984 everyone has a TV. the only difference is that it watches you. Sound familiar? The use of the memory hole is rampant in today's government. Obama and Hillary are especially adept at its use. The "Ministry of Truth" is with us today in the form of the so called "Main Stream Media". It is the official propaganda arm of the liberal-progressive movement.

Great book. What's interesting is in the book they can't turn off the TV/screens. They're under near constant surveillance without any choice in the matter.

In a book by Chuck Palahniuk (author of Fight Club), he writes "Big Brother isn’t watching. He’s singing and dancing. He’s pulling rabbits out of a hat. Big Brother’s busy holding your attention every moment you’re awake. He’s making sure you’re always distracted. He’s making sure you’re fully absorbed." He also writes something along the lines that we'll invite "Big Brother" in; the surveillance won't be by force.

Which seems pretty accurate....

We are just about there. Sculpting intel reports to make things look better, a justice department that isn't, a political class that is about keeping it's power rather than serving the citizens and a President that has a pen and a phone and uses them and a Congress that has all but abdicated its share of government.
The real driver is the almost complete adoption of Saul Alinsky's tactics and philosophy by the Democrats and some of the Republicans.
We are about one election away.
(And don't forget the NSA and their databases_

When Orwell, in 1948 turned the last two digits around and created 1984, it was a look down the road at what socialism not only can become, but must become Socialism can only lead to a lack of freedom and as a result, a lack of everything else. In order to maintain such a society, it becomes inevitable that the world becomes what he presents. He used the Soviet model, not realizing that a more powerful form of collectivism was about to arise, based on a government in the form of a religion, utilizing the poor, uneducated, and psychologically sick of the world. The illustration of how this happens is put forth clearly in Orwell's other masterpiece, "Animal Farm." It illustrates the change from a just revolution into an unjust governance.

1984 (book and movies) and Brazil (movie) are just awesome parodies of socialism's failures.

Though it comes in the novel to make eminent sense, I think I'd change the Big Brother mantra from War is Peace, Freedom is Slavery, Ignorance is Strength, to something else for our time. Perhaps: War is Security, Dependency is Freedom, Ignorance (or Acceptance, or Submission) is Peace. Other ideas, anyone?

Hello Abaco,
It is an essential read, IMHO.
'War is peace.
Freedom is Slavery.
Ignorance is strength." 1984, Orwell

Respectfully,
O.A.

I did a search using DuckDuckGo (instead of Google) but now ads pop up for apartments in Dublin on many of the pages I visit. DuckDuckGo says it doesn't track you - if only that were true. I wonder what would happen if I did a search for something dangerous?

The image that stuck with me was the daily rewriting of history and changing former enemies into allies. That is exactly what is happening in DC. The part about the TV watching us, the technology is here. I read the book first when I was abotu a junior in high school, then I made sure my daughter read "Anthem", "a984" and "Brave new World" - the latter of which is exactly what the big pharma companies are doing to people now, with happy pills. We had all the warning we needed, but society quit reaing.

This is one of my favorite books. I skipped the class that the rest of my classmates read it in, but I went back independently to read it. I completed it in a day, more or less, absorbed and thrilled by a sick fascination of "how could this happen?" It's easy enough to look at the TV (which we can still turn off for now) and see.

The book is great, and so is the movie adaptation. IMHO

I have heard that Eric Blair (real name) had a bit of an anti-human bent. After I finish the book I want to research him a bit. A theory I heard was that he wrote the book as a way to flaunt the future in people's faces like a sick joke.

The hardest thing to predict about the future is timing. 1984 was right about all except how long it would take to get there.

Am enjoying this book. The parallels to today are so blaringly obvious and firm that it is almost immaterial to the story for me...haha. I'm enjoying the writing style, the love story.

I like how in 1984 there is so much key information put out that's simply fabrication. One that jumped out at me was about the state-run Lotto. He describes three Proles really having a heated argument about which numbers are more likely to be winners...how their minds, though seemingly feeble, could grasp the most useless facets of the Lotto. And...he states that many of the declared winners are people who don't even exist. That instantly got me wondering about our Lotto...

About 1/3 through the book now. I got some good reading time in yesterday by the pool.

I think we are well into the dystopian setting described in the book. I fully expect some people I know to be "vaporized" sooner than later... I think America is getting very close to that.

I'm getting old. just turned 50...I clearly remember aspects of the story buy can't recall if I read it. I now I owned it, I remember the cover. What a drag it is getting old.

I just finished reading it a month or so ago for the first time. Many similarities to today's surveillance state. Enjoy, I think, or weep like Paul, maybe.

I wonder what will people will say if they read it 100 years from now? On our present course, it might be a reality.