Orwell's 1984 & JWs

I'm reading 1984 by George Orwell. It's interesting to note the similarities between Big Brother:Organization, Quackspeak:Pure Language, etc.

Does anyone know any good websites that discuss this? I know there's a book i'm ordering about it from Amazon.

Pat
UADNA (Unseen Apostate Directorate of North America)

Hey Pat, Cruise Freedminds for what you're looking for. http://www.freeminds.org/history/timeheal.htm

Thanks, Seven. I just read it and enjoyed it. This was very interesting, among other stuff:There are so many parallels in 1984. It's fascinating. Almost seems written about the JWs. Especially the "pure language of truth" they speak.

Here's a couple of passages from the book that struck me so far:

"If the Party could thrust its hand into the past and say of this or that even, it never happened that, surely was more terrifying... ‘Who controls the past,’ rant the Party slogan, ‘controls the future: who controls the present controls the past.’"

page 20: "In the vast majority of cases there was no trial, no report of the arrest. People simply disappeared...Your name was removed from the registers...your one-time existence was ...forgotten You were abolished, annihilated: vaporized was the usual word."
In JWdom, a JC deals with you (not a trial) and an announcement is made, then 'poof' you're as good as gone, because no one is allowed to speak with you.

page 49: "Perhaps 'friend' was not exactly the right word. You did not have friends nowadays, you had comrades (read brothers)."

In dubdom you have friends only so long as you agree with everything the Mother Organization states. Otherwise the "thought police" will turn you in. No harboring doubts.

pp 54-55: "(speech) jerked out very rapidly and, as it seemed, all in one piece, like a line of type cast solid. For the rest it was just a noise, a quack-quack-quacking. And yet, though you could not actually hear what the man was saying, you could not be in any doubt about its general nature....you could be certain that every word of it was pure orthodoxy, pure Ingsoc. ..There is a word in Newspeak...duckspeak, to quack like a duck."

Sounds like a lot, no all, of the public talks droning on and on, and the other talks. Plus, the ‘sermonizing’ of all JWs—it’s all the same robotic stuff.

Page 58: "The phrase 'our new, happy life' (spiritual paradise) recurred several times. It had been a favorite of late with the Ministry of Plenty (Watchtower) ....It appeared that there had even been demonstrations to thank Big Brother (Watchtower) for raising the chocolate ration to twenty grams a week. And only yesterday, he reflected, it had been announced that the ration was to be reduced to twenty grams a week. Was it possible that they could swallow that, (failed prophecies) after only twenty-four hours? Yes, they swallowed it...with a furious desire to track down, denounce, and vaporize anyone who should suggest that last week the ration had been thirty grams...doublethink...Was he, then, alone in the possession of a memory?"

My comments are in red. Back to my book now!

Pat
UADNA (Unseen Apostate Directorate of North America)

The only thing about "1984" that I felt didnt apply to the witnesses was the method thru which history of the Party was Fabricated.
Material was directly recalled and altered to fit realities that had occured, making Big brother appear an infallible prophet.
The only example i ever saw like this in The Watchtower publications was the altering of certain dates in Russells scripture studies, announced in the March 1, 1915 Watchtower.
Other than that, the Watchtowers method of history fabrication has been much more subtle than anything in Orwell. A massive web of slippery distortions and ommissions spread over years and years of Watchtowers.To truly understand the rotten deceptiveness of Witness history fabrication you would have to have done extensive reading in Old materials. And even then, putting your finger onto a definite LIE is virtually impossible. IMO.
As a last resort they can always claim that you are interpreting it one way, now, in 2002. But that it was interpreted differently, and understood by the brothers differently, in 1920whatever.
How can that be refuted?
They also carefully provide themselves with an "out' somewhere in virtually everything they say, so that later they can say, "we didnt mean it the way you understand it".

Thanks Refiner's Fire for your observations. I'm at work--i plan to post more later.

Pat
UADNA (Unseen Apostate Directorate of North America)

Refiner:
Actually in Rutherford's book LIGHT, the first edition printed "before" blah, blah,
The 2nd edition, same page, same everything except the word before was changed to "after".

I imagine there are no KH libraries with the first edition!!

Ho Patio,

I remeber reading "1984" long, long ago, in high school, and I think it is possible that some or Orwell's ideas might have stayed with me enough to create the cognitive dissonance that led to my eventual break. I bless George Orwell!

If I may, permit me to suggest that you get a copy of "Orwell's Revenge: The 1984 Palimpsest" by Peter William Huber. It seems to be out of print now, but in it Huber shows how technology such as you and I are enjoying right now will lead to, not the CREATION of Totalitarian "cells" but their COLLAPSE, as seen with the former Soviiet Union and is now happening with the WTS and Red China.

Let Freedom ring!

- Nathan Natas, UADNA
(Unseen Apostate Directorate of North America)

Hi Pat,

On AlanF's (click down below) Research on the Tower site, there is a section on the Orwellian World of Jehovah's Witnesses - from the book of same name.

That book started as a doctorate(?) thesis for 2 young adults having left the WT after reading 1984. Fascinating insights. The book is out of print, but can be obtained through the library. My local library couldn't (they just looked at me like "whaaaaaaa?") - but USC got it in for me. Very insightful.

Animal Farm is another good one - same type of insights. "All pigs are equal. Some pigs are more equal."

I think the quote you used made the most impact upon me, however. The issue is control.

]Who controls the past, controls the future: who controls the present, controls the past.

Fascinating insight.

waiting

Hi Waiting,

I recently ordered The Orwellian World of Jehovah's Witnesses
by Heather Botting, Gary Norman Arthur Botting (Photographer)

List Price: $17.95
Our Price: $17.95

Usually ships within 3 to 4 weeks

from Amazon. Is that the same book you're referring to?

I will check out AlanF's page on Orwell too. Is that on Freeminds?

Pat
UADNA (Unseen Apostate Directorate of North America)

Oh, sorry, i saw the click you referred to. Bye!

Pat
UADNA (Unseen Apostate Directorate of North America)

Glad I'm not the only one who (re-)reads 1984 and is overwhelmed by the parallels to life as a JW.

The amazing thing is: the first time I read it I was still in, and I didn't see the parallels! I naively thought "wow, what a terrible situation to live in such a controlling, stifling way."

HOW COULD I HAVE BEEN SO BLIND?

The Botting book was one of the first "apostate" books I read when exiting.

===========================
For interesting Watchtower Society literature quotes, complete with references but without any editorial, check out:
http://Quotes.JehovahsWitnesses.com

Hi Pat,

Had no idea that Amazon had that book - will go buy it. It's a keeper.

Hello, Quotes,

Nice to meet you. I read "1984" originally around 1969, while still studying with the jw's. Nadda a clue gathered from it. Stayed a jw for 30 long years.

An intelligent jw gave it to me (my grandmother in law) - she had just read it. Nadda a clue gathered from it. She remained an strong jw till her death 20 yrs. later.

Who knows what will trigger a person? Obviously, not always "1984".

Nice to meet you.

waiting

I too read 1984 in high school and never forgot it. One day at a service meeting (late 70's) they were discussing confessing sins and if you see a wrong committed it's your duty to come forward to the elders. Even children were to turn in their parents, that triggered a memoire of the 1984 book that I quickly dismissed because of the new "truth" I was learning. Had I only known then how closely the witnesses and Orwells book paralleled each other!

Yes I also can thank Orwell for his fine work of fiction. Maybe he studied to be a witless ? lol

HCM

It's uncanny, but in the book it was called 'doublethink.' That's how a JW can read the book, but not see the parallels with his own world, or if as HoChiMin did, just dismiss it. Just blink your eyes and say it isn't so.

However, when the 9/11 bombing at the World Trade Center happened and there was so much info on the Taliban, my oldest son could not help but draw comparisons with the WTBS. He started walking away from the dubs at that time.

Pat
UADNA-CA(Unseen Apostate Directorate of North America-California)

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