telescreens

[Charles]

I totally agree - I think the amount of control over the people afforded by television is incredible, and I also think it is a sign of Orwell's genius that he foresore this. Another equally amazing prediction he made was that of national lotteries, inwhich individuals are promised the chance to win huge prizes. I live in the UK, and here the national lottery was introduced about 8 years ago. I have always suspected it was introduced for political reasons, and indeed you can see the greed and false hope it has introduced to our society.

[Catherine Blair]

I believe the goverment has more control over the media then<br>we realize. Don't ask me why I think this, I have my reasons but you would <br>call me crazy if I told them to you. Oh well. I think the goverment has ALOT of control, way way more then you can even imagine. And I don't watch TV anymore, I don't even own one.

[Unregistered]

I would have to disagree. My parents grew up in Hungary, and for those of you who don't know, it was under Soviet rule after WWII up until the fall of Communist Russia (1989/1990). If you think some TV commercials or some news coverage on the HUGE veriety of media outlets is 'Big Brother', then you should read a history book, buddy. We here in the US are sooooo spoiled when it comes to experiencing first-hand what it really means to be opressed by your government that liberals pop up everywhere condemning this country in every way possible. True mind-control is to have portraites of Stalin, Lenin, and Marx on every street corner. True mind-control is to sing songs of propaganda of the 'Mother Land' and to agree with the Communist Party or else you will disapear over-night! True mind-control is when you vote for your elected officials, every candidate is a Communist. So, to all those little Lenins and Marxes and Trotskys running around, think twice before you talk about opression in this nation.

[sara]

I notice a great similarity of the telescreens controlling the population of Oceana in the novel, and the way that television controls the population of America, whether we realize it or not. Every aspect of the media- the news, the TV shows, and the advertisements have all been carefully planned out to play on Americans in just the righ manner so that those who produced the media can intill in Americans the same values that they have through a semi- hypnotic devise like the television. It is amazing that even in Orwell's own time, in 1948, when television was not found in every household, that Orwell could make such an accurate prediction of what has become part of his distopian future.