Well, I can see how summarizing 1984 as ‘useless’ is a slight overreaction. If nothing else, 1984 at least serves as a model for how neoliberals misunderstand, oversimplify, or caricature almost all illiberal societies.

Nevertheless, what makes Animal Farm and 1984 so frustrating is the overwhelming number of adults who treat them as acceptable substitutes for actually studying history. George Orwell was neither a historian nor a political scientist, and he never even visited the U.S.S.R. As far as I know, he based his misunderstanding of the U.S.S.R. on the capitalist media’s newspapers, so his caricature thereof in 1984 is garbage in, garbage out. No-one should use his fiction as a means of understanding any society, but this is exactly what neoliberals and social democrats recommend.

Being an anarchist, I can’t recommend ‘banning’ any books, but eventually we shall live in a society that has no need to promote Animal Farm and 1984 to death, and institutions shall be promoting books that are more relevant and more useful for ordinary people; we would be better off if Orwell’s fiction were relegated to the bin of fringe literature rather than the mass-produced and widely recommended works that they are today.

Banning books is the act of sniveling fascists and if you support that or are indifferent to it, I have some bad news for you.

We’ve got a regular Kyle Broflovski on our hands, don’t we? What an insight. You don’t have to read much history to understand that while the Fascists did ban many books, book-banning is a phenomenon that occurred centuries before Benito Mussolini & alii were even born. Logically, this would also imply that those who prohibit Fascist literature are theirselves ‘sniveling fascists’, which is patent nonsense (even if I can agree that banning any literature is misguided at best).

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[–] Aradino@hexbear.net 47 points 2 weeks ago (2 children)

Every time people mention 1984 I think of Isaac Asimov's brutal review of it and Orwell. It's a very fun read.

https://www.newworker.org/ncptrory/1984.htm

By the time the book came out in 1949, the Cold War was at its height. The book therefore proved popular. It was almost a matter of patriotism in the West to buy it and talk about it, and perhaps even to read parts of it, although it is my opinion that more people bought it and talked about it than read it, for it is a dreadfully dull book - didactic, repetitious, and all but motionless.

Got his ass

In fact, so thoroughly has 1984-ophobia penetrated the consciousness of many who have not read the book and have no notion of what it contains, that one wonders what will happen to us after 31 December 1984. When New Year's Day of 1985 arrives and the United States is still in existence and facing very much the problems it faces today, how will we express our fears of whatever aspect of life fills us with apprehension? What new date can we invent to take the place of 1984?

Got their asses

He also turned left wing and became a socialist, fighting with the loyalists in Spain in the 1930s. There he found himself caught up in the sectarian struggles between the various left-wing factions, and since he believed in a gentlemanly English form of socialism, he was inevitably on the losing side. Opposed to him were passionate Spanish anarchists, syndicalists, and communists, who bitterly resented the fact that the necessities of fighting the Franco fascists got in the way of their fighting each other.

Got our asses tbh

[–] CyborgMarx@hexbear.net 34 points 2 weeks ago (1 children)

He also turned left wing and became a socialist, fighting with the loyalists in Spain in the 1930s. There he found himself caught up in the sectarian struggles between the various left-wing factions, and since he believed in a gentlemanly English form of socialism, he was inevitably on the losing side. Opposed to him were passionate Spanish anarchists, syndicalists, and communists, who bitterly resented the fact that the necessities of fighting the Franco fascists got in the way of their fighting each other.

Holy shit Asimov was cooking here, I did not know he moved like this, 20/20 understanding goddamn

[–] Awoo@hexbear.net 15 points 2 weeks ago* (last edited 2 weeks ago)

In the summary he writes at the end he explicitly states he believes that the world will go communist or civilisation will be destroyed.

To summarise, then: George Orwell in 1984 was, in my opinion, engaging in a private feud with Stalinism, rather that attempting to forecast the future. He did not have the science fictional knack of foreseeing a plausible future and, in actual fact, in almost all cases, the world of 1984 bears no relation to the real world of the 1980s.

The world may go communist, if not by 1984, then by some not very much later date; or it may see civilisation destroyed. If this happens, however, it will happen in a fashion quite different from that depicted in 1984 and if we try to prevent either eventuality by imagining that 1984 is accurate, then we will be defending ourselves against assaults from the wrong direction and we will lose.

The only takeaway that's possible from this summary is that he's saying Orwell is fighting on the wrong side with this book and that fighting communism is in essence bringing about the eventual destruction of civilisation. It's very clear and I see no other way to interpret it.

[–] Awoo@hexbear.net 4 points 2 weeks ago (1 children)

Rip now I've just gone and made a redundant comment by not reading the thread before also talking about this review lol

[–] Aradino@hexbear.net 4 points 2 weeks ago

It's a different quote and most people won't bother to read the whole thing anyway so it's still a good contribution