The Resistance in relation to 1984

      The poem “The Resistance” is written by Bellamy, Matt, and it relates greatly to the novel 1984 by George Orwell. To begin with, a great theme in the novel was LOVE between Winston and Julia. As mentioned in the poem, “Love is our resistance”, implies that the emotions of love and faithfulness between Winston and Julia will allow them to keep resisting and breaking the rules of the world they live in. knowing of their crime, Winston and Julia are wondering when will the time be when they get caught. Every night, they are in danger because they were breaking the law by thinking, reading, socializing, having sex, going to the Proles, and loving each other. By “will our world come tumbling down” and “will the walls start caving in”, the writer of the poem describes this couple’s fear of the consequences of their actions when the thought police catches them.

     This relates to another theme in 1984 which is the nature of power. The Party focuses on implementing fear in its people so that they do not even think of disobeying the rules. But as Winston and Julia kept constantly breaking the laws, they were expecting anytime the thought police to come upon them. By saying, “Is our secret safe tonight, is this our last embrace?” again implies the huge risks they are taking, in order to be together. Fear is the greatest theme in the poem as well as the novel. By saying, “Quell your prayers for love and peace, You'll wake the thought police, We can hide the truth inside”, Winston is afraid of the thought-police as he rather keeping the “truth” inside his heart and brain than the great suffering that WILL occur to them WHEN they get caught. The poem also says, “it’s outta control”. “It” refers to the actions this couple was doing; they broke the law, but that didn’t stop them. It is like human extinct where they felt satisfaction & compensation in terms of what they were doing.

      “But it could have been right” means that the laws that prevented them from acting as human being should not exist, because loving, thinking and expressing oneself are all human rights. But in the totalitarian world and government, it was considered to be “wrong”. At the same time, the Big Brother in the novel wanted all people to believe that they were living in a Utopian world where everyone lives in harmony and everything done or NOT done is for the best. But in Winston’s opinion, the world he was living in was more like dystopian because it only appears to be a harmonious but in reality it is a suppression of people’s thoughts and emotions.

      In conclusion, this couple’s resistance is love. It is as if Love has finally conquered their fear of the Party. But at the same time, they know that sooner or later, the thought police will capture them so they must enjoy every second they have left together.

War is Peace

         War is not Peace, but in 1984 by George Orwell, it became peace. The word “war” itself lost its meaning and became misleading to refer to peace. To begin with, in the book there were 3 main dictatorships in control: Eurasia, Eastasia and Oceana. This means that there will always be 2 of them allied against the 3^rd, which leads to a state of continuous war. It could be said that this constant war implies that war itself ceased to exist and it became peace. That is because in the past, the purpose of wars was to gain new resources (land, oil, workers…) or for political gain. But in the created world in the novel, there was no need to fight for resources given that there were only 3 powers, each with enough resources. Also the purpose of war was to keep society united instead of fights of territory.

       The concept of Double-think in the novel is also related to “war is peace” although it is a paradox. Quoted from the novel about Goldstein referring to black & white: 

… But it means also the ability to believe that black is white, and more, to know that black is white, and to forget that one has ever believed the contrary. This demands a continuous alteration of the past, made possible by the system of thought which really embraces all the rest, and which is known in Newspeak as doublethink. Doublethink is basically the power of holding two contradictory beliefs in one's mind simultaneously, and accepting both of them. (Chapter 9)

This means that the Party follows a strategy which is focusing on a common enemy becomes a reason and a motive for peace and union in the society. This also distracted from the fact that they are in fact not living happily in their own society, which reduces rebellion and difficulty for the Big Brother. What the government did was exaggerate small victories for the people in order to convince them of the strong country they live in and give them a sense of satisfaction.

Basically, the result would be somehow similar if the 3 powers agreed to live peacefully, but that could give the people a bigger opportunity to wake up, express themselves and even rebel.

Taken from the Washington Post:

… It's a little reminiscent of George Orwell's 1984, where the three slogans of the ruling party were "War is Peace; Freedom is Slavery; Ignorance is Strength." Since the disclosures about Bush's warrantless domestic surveillance program, Bush critics have been citing that other dominant slogan from Orwell's book: "Big Brother is Watching You." But there are plenty of potential Orwell analogies in Bush's use of language, and his historical revisionism, as well.

War Is Peace. The Washington Post, 20 Mar. 2006. Web. 7 Apr. 2010. .

.. and That's How the Rest of Us Roll Away From Domino's

The media is a constructing as well as a destructing tool for businesses, societies and relationships. Online reputation needs careful management. The internet expands and reaches huge numbers of people very fast. This means it could develop the business’s reputation very fast or destroy it very fast.

In order to destroy a company’s image, it does not take a lot of work. In fact, it could be as simple as a YouTube video. Kristy Lynn Hammonds (31) and Michael Anthony/Setzer (32) are two employees in Domino’s Pizza. They were arrested and faced criminal charges for creating a sick video and posting it on YouTube! They did gross and nasty things to Domino’s customers’ food as the video attached will show. They violated all sorts of health codes and standards of decency.

Their charge was contaminating customers’ food.

Their revolting video included Setzer sticking a piece of cheese in his nose then putting it in a sandwich. He also pulled down his pants, wiped a sponge on himself and then washed the dishes with that sponge. They also said in the video, “In about five minutes it’ll be sent out on delivery where somebody will be eating these, yes, eating them, and little did they know that cheese was in his nose and that there was some lethal gas that ended up on their salami. Now that’s how we roll at Domino’s.”

By the time the video was posted on Monday and taken down on Wednesday, millions of people had viewed the clip and Domino’s reputation was already damaged, and the damage of the brand was done. The perception of the quality of Domino’s food shifted drastically from positive to negative, where people are second-guessing Domino’s food. “… Is a nightmare. It is the toughest situation for a company to face in terms of digital crisis”, as said by Paul Gallagher, managing director/head of US crisis practice. Domino’s restaurant had to be closed down.

What was Domino’s reaction? Domino’s response was through social media. They created a Twitter account to be part of the online community. Domino’s spokesman, Tim McIntyre said that Domino’s was going to hold a civil lawsuit. Also, the CEO had to post another video condemning what these two employees did.

So, with social media sites like YouTube that give every employee a global platform, it's critical that business strategies exist to deal with potential bad behavior.

Apollo Moon Landing: Fake or Factual?

Is the Moon landing of Apollo one of the greatest frauds ever?

What would the motives of the US government and media to fake the Apollo Moon Landing? Most reason could be summarized in 3 ideas: Distraction, Cold War Prestige, and MONEY. First, the US government benefited from taking people's distraction away from the Vietnam War which was occuring at the tiem as the US ceased its involvement in the Vietnam War. By Cold War Prestige, I mean that the US felt that it was important to win the "space race" againt Russia. This could improve their publicity, image, and strength as viewed by the USSr and the world (propaganda). It would have been easy for the US to fake the moon landing and guarantee success. Moreover, in terms of money, the NASA raised about 30 billion dolors to go to the moon! This could have ben used to pay many people motivating them for manipulation.

Here are some reasons to be skeptical about moon landing. It was said that Neil Armstrong was the first person to step on the moon. But the picture take by NASA was taken looking up at Armstrong as he was stepping on the moon. This means that the photographer must have been lying on the planet, while taking the picture. Now if Armstrong was the first man on the moon, who was taking the picture? How is it possible that the flag and the astronaut were both brighty lit when their side was to the light? In all the shots taken, the stars do not show. But even if there is an explanation  for no stars, many photos seem to have multiple light sources shining on the surroundings, casting shadows in different directions, even though there is only one (bright enough) light source visible on the moon which is the Sun.. And why is the flag fluttering if there is no air or wind on the moon? The Lander weighed 17 tons and yet the astronaut's feet seem to have made a bigger dent in the dust.

Does this make you skeptical enough? If it doesn't, there are more ideas to make us question the "honest" NASA moon landing.

Take the quality of the pictures for example, it is incredibly high! But at the time the moon landing occured, they did not have advanced technologies in their cameras for such good exposure. Also, the film stock was not affected by the intense peaks and powerful cosmic radiation on the moon. The moon's surface during the daytime is so hot that the camera films should have melted.

The most interesting part I found was how the American flag and signs referring to US are brightly lit and focused on. Government seeking publicity much?

The pictures taken are main things to be skeptical about which means that we cannot "blindly" believe what we SEE! could this be the greatest government conspiracy? Was the moon walking filmed in a studio? Do you believe the Moon Landing Hoax?

http://www.cs.dartmouth.edu/~akapadia/moon.html

It is human nature to believe what we hear. We trust the media and don’t question it because assumingly, we believe that they present information which is well researched and honest. That is also because we do not have many choices to check that information ourselves. The public listens to the media all the time, whether they are aware of that or not, until they reach the level that they believe anything they are told by the media.  Media is a method to send messages to people. But lately, people stopped forming their own opinions about what is going on in the world. For example, the media tell us what and who is important, who should run a country, and about authority.

When it comes to politics, media has a huge impact; good and bad. For example, media could help the politician in developing his career but can also destroy it. Although is it wrong, but bias is created because most media are owned by rich people who could be politicians. Media could alter the truth by working its way around it or elaborating the actual facts. For example, the media could hide certain aspects of politicians’ actions which we are not “supposed” to know about. At the same time, the media is able to create scandals and destroying that politician. So basically, the media makes profit by controlling the careers of politicians or by telling us what we want to hear. But media should be forced to be 100% truthful about what they are telling the public, not less and not more in order to deserve out trust.

Some examples of the effects of media in politics are inaugurations of presidents, wars, and “man’s first step on the moon (if that even happened). Coming from Lebanon which is a very diverse political and religious country (17 different religions), I have seen many ways the media influenced people’s opinions about politics. For example, there are at least 4 different TV stations which belong to certain politicians to promote certain ideas, where each TV station would interpret facts differently. I have lately received an email which represents this case in Lebanon. It says that the main event was that a Lebanese was hit by a car on the road between Lebanon and Syria. One station would interpret this as having this Lebanese citizen assassinated for being against Syria; another station would report this as a Lebanese sacrifice against the Israel; and another one would say that America aimed to kill this Lebanese citizen. So this not only describes the conditions in Lebanon but the world. The media is a very affective and dangerous tool influencing people’s minds.

        In conclusion, there must be more restrictions and laws for the media describing what they are supposed to publish or don’t publish. They have an ethical responsibility towards the public, where everyone is touched by what the media do or don't do. But the question is, would politics even exist the way they do without the media?

The Media

I honestly cannot understand why people trust the media. Many people find it difficult to trust others in their own families or neighborhoods, so how come it is possible for them to trust such a mysterious and extreme stranger called the 'media'.
Are they following the rest? Do they feel inferior to the immense authority which is the media? Or do the media show them what they want to see? Media have two sides, at least one of them is altering the truth.
Media come out everyday. There are many forms of media like entertainment, marketing, music... etc. Other than telling us news for example, the media tell us what we are supposed to care about tomorrow.
Mainly, the media have become part of the system. They control our thoughts, interests, and principals making us overwhelmed by all the info we have to digest... The media tell us what we want to hear, but the SERIOUS stuff is not for the audience to know about, the media take care of it...

The media's main goal is to gain ca$h...they would go over the limits to increase profit, they lie and create stories. All of them belong to much larger and wealthier corporations using people and seeking money as well.
But there are always ways to get rid of those who ask questions, think deeply and independently about what the media are presenting to them.
This was a very short description of what I think of the media... The media can easily alter the truth, but yet we are still addicted and attached to them. Why? It seems like the media are doing a great job in showing us what we want to see.