Tag: 1984

2022

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Winston Smith awoke from his nap, the tattered science textbook still resting on his chest. It rose and fell with his breathing, the paper-thin book jacket waving in time with his exhalations.

It was dangerous enough to be napping during the day, especially this day, but to have been caught with that volume in his possession would have been personally devastating. Fortunately, it was still mid-morning, and the Happiness Squads hadn’t begun their daily sweeps. He hadn’t slept well the previous night, and it had caught up with him after his breakfast sank into his belly.

Today was the anniversary of the rebellion, a day when “spontaneous” celebrations and protests erupted across the new nation in honor of the heroes of the previous year. The migration and funerals paused on this day. Everything paused.

Winston looked at his upper arm. The redness had subsided from the previous day. In another day or so, there would be no evidence of his insubordination, no way to identify him as one of “them.”

It still struck him as strange. He thought again of the science textbook now safely tucked under the floorboards in the bedroom. Cancer, he had read, was the process of mass replication of mindless cells with the ultimate, suicidal goal of killing its host. His mind made the connection before he had the chance to consider it. How similar was that metaphor to what had happened over the past few years, but especially the past year?

He looked at the paperboard flyer everyone had received in the mail still sitting on his kitchen table. The Happiness Squad would be by shortly to ensure it had been placed in a prominent place. He thought of the mantle, the refrigerator, the door. Getting up, he picked up the placard and decided on the door. That way, he could see it both when passing by the door and, especially, as the last thing before leaving his apartment. He read the words out loud to himself:

Science is fiction.
Freedom is ignorance.
Ignorance is strength.
God trumps all.
Trump is God.

Following last year’s purge (or emergency recall elections, as they were called), evangelicals, once a fringe group of mystics and non-taxed mass delusion peddlers, now comprised 100% of the Senate following last Spring’s purge. Since then, the nation had fallen further as the emergence of the epsilon variant to coronavirus had risen. First, it infected the young and the unvaccinated (or Insubordinate as they were now called). Then the evangelicals had seized control as the moral arm of MAGA nation under Trump.

They first convinced the country that a cloud shaped like a fist with the index finger pointing skyward was the sign God was with them and the solution finally at hand (pun intended). They said the reason for the epsilon variant’s rise was because the vaccinated, the Insubordinates, were emitting undetectable, demonic microwaves infecting the unvaccinated. Science is fiction, we were told. Freedom is ignorance. Absolution walked hand in hand with willful ignorance. Those (scientists) claiming to have an answer (the vaccine) were the first sacrifices to the purge. God would show the way. Trump would lead the way. He was the only one who could solve it.

The death toll from the previous day had topped 500,000 for the sixteenth day in a row. What remained of the South were pockets of the Insubordinate and the Happiness Squads rounding them up. Winston thought of the press conference held last year when Trump told them to reject the evidence of your eyes and ears. It was his final, most essential command. It was then that the evangelicals began to set a firm date for His return to the White House. On the same date, the cloud showed them God was manifestly on Trump’s side.

The Happiness Squads protected themselves, as had the evangelicals, with aluminum foil hats. They believed the metal prevented the transmission of the demonic microwaves and saved them from the epsilon variant. Still, with a 63% failure rate, there were rumblings of its protective properties. Thicker sheets of aluminum foil would soon be produced through the Insubordination Distribution Incentive Output Taskforce recently passed by the reconstituted Senate. The bill’s negotiations had proven difficult to conclude as senators were constantly being replaced, either through epsilon variant deaths or the recently imposed three-week term limits.

The press conference presented evidence supporting the purge. Two maps of the United States were overlaid on one another. The first showed the results of the 2020 election by county. The second showed the death rate by county. With near perfect uniformity, the maps coalesced. This was proof, they were told of the microwave’s effective dissemination of the virus targeting only those who voted for Trump. The Happiness Squads were formed the next day under Generals Sebastian Gorka, Stephen Miller, and Stephen Bannon.

Winston had just secured the placard to his front door when the knock came.

“Happiness Squad, open up in the name of Trump,” said the voice.

Winston hesitated a second, pulled the short sleeve of his shirt over his underground obtained vaccination site, and opened the door.

O’Brien entered first, followed by three camouflaged troopers wearing their officially sanctioned “tactical” aluminum foil hats and toting “recreational, modern sporting” AR-15’s.
“Why are you not mustering for your parade position yet, Smith?” said O’Brien.
“I did not sleep well last night and fell asleep on the couch this morning after breakfast,” explained Winston.
“There have been reports of mask-wearing in this neighborhood, Smith. Wouldn’t know anything about that, would you?” asked O’Brien, squinting his eyes as though that allowed him to see inside Winston.
“No,” said Winston, “I saw one in the gutter last week, but given its condition, I’m sure it hadn’t been worn since the purge.”

“Sweep the apartment,” O’Brien barked to the Happiness Squad. “You know we’re only here to ensure your happiness, don’t you, Winston?”
“Of course!” answered Winston. His eyes stole a glance at the bedroom into which the Happiness Squad had entered. His pulse quickened when he heard their footfalls on his floor, hoping the loose boards hiding his science textbook would not betray him.
“Sir, we’ve found something,” said the leader of the Happiness Squad. O’Brien stared intently at Winston for what seemed a minute before heading into the bedroom.

Muffled voices emanated from the bedroom. Orders were given.
O’Brien emerged from the bedroom with the tattered textbook raised before him, looking so much like President Trump holding the bible outside the church in Lafayette Square years earlier in his famous photo op that Winston giggled. He was in trouble, and he knew it.

“Yours, Winston?” asked O’Brien.

“Can I ask you a question, O’Brien?” posited Winston, suddenly freed by the truth and warmed by fact.

“What is it?” an annoyed O’Brien asked.

“That book describes cancer as the mass replication of mindless cells with the ultimate, suicidal goal of killing its host,” began Winston. Behind him, one of the Happiness Squad lowered his Happy Gun to clear a nagging cough. “Today is the day of celebration for the beginning of the overthrow of a tyrannical government. January 6th is celebrated today and will be on every January 6th after that. So, my question is: Without the Insubordinates, without the vaccine, without science, who would He blame? Science created the vaccine, and the old government offered it free(!) to its people. Isn’t it possible, just possible, that disinformation, doublespeak, and idolatry have acted as the catalyst for a population ready to mass replicate, through force, if necessary, with the ultimate, suicidal goal of killing this nation? Isn’t it possible?”

The blow to his head came from behind. The Happiness Squad leader provided the final insult. The vaccine would not save Winston now, nor, did it seem, could science and facts save the nation.

The history books would never mention Winston Smith, and his tattered science textbook would disappear in a burst of bright fire along with so many others on a night later that summer named Fahrenheit 452 Night.

Observations from a Recent Holiday

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Orwell 1984

War is Peace

Freedom is Slavery

Ignorance is Strength

George Orwell, Nineteen Eighty-Four

A change in my wife’s chemotherapy regimen recently opened up the opportunity for us to visit Paris and London. It was originally supposed to be an early 25th anniversary gift to my wife last September (our 23rd anniversary), but a sudden, nasty infection forced us to cancel the trip hours before we were to leave for the airport. Crestfallen doesn’t begin to cover our disappointment. When presented with this window of time (before she began a new phase II clinical trial), we decided to schedule a last minute trip and take our twins with us who were home from their freshman year at college.

Armed with my own agenda of sights and attractions I wished to see, I found that instead, I saw the trip through the eyes of my family. My daughter, studying fine art and enamored with art history, provided me with a different appreciation of the architecture, style, culture and art of these cities that I would otherwise have missed. My son, the philosopher, showed me the political and societal differences beyond language that I would otherwise have missed. My wife, showed me that while the Champs Elysses essentially looked like Fifth Avenue or Oxford Street or any chain-choked mall in suburban America, it was the small side streets two blocks removed from the tourist centers that offered the best food, flowers and shopping. And together, they all agreed that while it was important to tick-off as many items from our “bucket list” as possible, we all enjoyed and appreciated sitting at a sidewalk café eating tomato, basil and mozzarella sandwiches on the most amazing bread while watching the world go by the most. To a person, we all agreed that we wished it was our second trip to these wonderful cities so that we could immerse ourselves in the local culture and pace without the pressure of “seeing” everything. I was forcing us to run everywhere, to the detriment of my wife and the chagrin of my children.

Having never traveled outside the country before, it was also interesting to see both how other countries existed, but also how they perceived Americans.

My son noticed (and was not a little bothered by) the soldiers patrolling the Eiffel Tower armed with very large weapons. So too did he notice the constant government monitoring in London via video cameras. These were visible on motorway markers and Tube stations, as well as mentioned repeatedly on notices throughout the city. Ironic, that London (Airstrip 1), would spark this observation in my son. Although to be fair, the only mustachioed poster we saw was not of Big Brother but of Brad Pitt on a poster for World War Z. We neither saw Winston Smith, nor any IngSoc signs.

Rather, I had an interesting conversation (or perhaps only a glimpse of a conversation) with the taxi driver (who was an (East) German expat). Sitting in the passenger seat of the small minivan on the way to the apartment we were renting, he asked me where we were from.

Instinctively, I replied, over the whine of the small engine, “The States.”

“Not Canada?” he asked, shooting me a quick, knowing look.

I admit that it took me a few seconds to digest the meaning of his question. Full of ourselves for being the “world’s police,” United States citizens somehow have managed to believe that we can belittle the rest of the world’s population while assuming  we are both more civilized and, therefore, more entitled and have convinced ourselves that the rest of the world is somehow beholden to us. Apparently, more cautious travelers hide their US heritage beneath a more innocuous Canadian visage.  Surely an interesting question from an ex-East German citizen obviously more sensitive to European viewpoints of Americans than me!

Other, more obvious, observations include the size of the cars driven. Nowhere did we see the parade of Tahoe’s, Suburban’s or tricked-out F-150’s that I see on my way to work here in Houston on a daily basis. Rather, the number of Vespa’s, motorcycles and bicycles moving like fruit flies in and out of traffic in Paris showed that the sudden appearance of a Suburban near the Arc du Triomph would generate both a traffic jam and trigger an enormous number of iPhone photos. All of the cars were very small, and yet, we saw no horrific accidents (or even a fender bender). And while they drive aggressively, there is no animosity in their intentions. It is simply a matter of getting from point A to point B. Perhaps “Road Rage” is an American phenomenon (which, coupled with the number of guns in our population can only lead to more problems). Something else we noticed was the absence of bumper stickers on the cars. There were no French flags or Union Jacks on the rear windows, no stick figures of every family member, no honor roll declarations, no personalized high school football/basketball/baseball/swimming/band/dance stickers, no NRA stickers, no Molon Labe stickers, no Come and Take It stickers, no NASCAR stickers, not even stickers of universities or professional sports teams. Apparently, rear view windows are there to provide visual clearance and bumpers are there to absorb collisions rather than replace our Facebook pages.

Another observation was the amount of complaining we heard. Parisians are very animated in their discussions with those with whom they are dining. And yet, there was, again, no animosity in their demeanor. While I couldn’t possibly understand what they were discussing, the physical cues they exhibited showed them to be in stark difference on whatever subject they were discussing. And while voices were occasionally raised, never once (and this goes for London’s pubs as well) did I feel that a disagreement was about to escalate into a brawl. That cannot be said for most places I’ve been in America. Testosterone and bravado seem to flood the American male much quicker than their European counterparts. In fact, the only complaining we heard in all of the lines we stood in was from Americans.

The gardens at Versailles are enormous, dwarfing the colossal chateau itself. As my wife is saddled with the side effects of chemotherapy (and despite her Herculean spirit), we thought it was a wonderful idea to rent a golf cart to tour the gardens, rather than expend her energy walking the estate. The firm contracted to provide the carts could expand their supply a hundredfold to meet the demand, therefore, the line was long and did not move quickly. As we (finally) reached the front of the line, the young man working there, who spoke English and was of Indian decent) took me aside and said that his family was visiting him in France and he was going to give them the next cart. My first thought was, hey, those are the perks of working here! Good for you! However, the woman from Kansas two couples behind us was not so understanding and went on and on about how she would have done this and that to the kid, blah, blah, blah. Truly, the only complaining we heard was from Americans.

I am not naïve enough to think that everything we saw was perfect, nor that what we did see constituted the “average” life of a citizen of these cities. However, there were stark differences and while I continue to struggle with paralysis in Washington, the torpid national response to everyday gun violence in America, the wholesale abdication of personal responsibility, the vitriol of the Tea Party, the ongoing religious hypocrisy of the right wing, the adoration of celebrity, the acceptance of lower educational performance, the increasing fracturing of societal ethos, epistemic closure as an unintended consequence of the internet and the vapid, ossified acid spewed on AM radio, I am reminded that is up to us to make tomorrow better than today. Our children are watching, and so is the rest of the world, and like our children, they will not wait.