Thoughtcrime

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For the anarchist organization/experiment, see CrimethInc.

In George Orwell's dystopian novel Nineteen Eighty-Four the government attempts to control not only the speech and actions, but also the thoughts of its subjects, labeling unapproved thoughts with the term thoughtcrime or, in Newspeak, "crimethink".

In the book, Winston Smith, the main character, writes in his diary:

“ Thoughtcrime does not entail death: thoughtcrime is death. ”

He also makes remarks to the effect that "Thoughtcrime is the only crime that matters."

Contents

[edit] Thought Police

The Thought Police (thinkpol in Newspeak) were the secret police of the novel Nineteen Eighty-Four whose job it was to uncover and punish thoughtcrime. The Thought Police used psychology and omnipresent surveillance to find and eliminate members of society who were capable of the mere thought of challenging ruling authority.

Orwell's Thought Police and their pursuit of thoughtcrime was based on the methods used by the totalitarian states and competing ideologies of the 20th century. It also had much to do with Orwell's own "power of facing unpleasant facts," as he called it, and his willingness to criticise prevailing ideas which brought him into conflict with others and their "smelly little orthodoxies." Although Orwell described himself as a democratic socialist, many other socialists (especially those who supported the communist branch of socialism) thought that his criticism of the Soviet Union under Stalin damaged the socialist cause.

The term "Thought Police," by extension, has come to refer to real or perceived enforcement of ideological correctness in any modern or historical contexts.

[edit] Soviet abuses

In the Soviet era, the USSR frequently used psychiatry as a weapon against dissidents. The diagnosis of sluggishly progressing schizophrenia was used to commit many dissidents to psychiatric hospitals (called Psikhushka in Russia), where they were then treated aggressively with psychoactive drugs. The Tom Stoppard play Every Good Boy Deserves Favour is a fictionalized version of the Soviet experience with psychiatry used for this purpose. Natan Sharansky, among others, have written detailed accounts of their experiences as refusnik detainees in this system.

[edit] Technology and thoughtcrime

Just as technology played a significant part in the detection of thoughtcrime in Nineteen Eighty-Four — with the ubiquitous telescreens which could inform the government, misinform and monitor the population — a number of technologies have been developed to try to detect thought and emotional states. Networks of CCTV cameras are being connected to image-recognition software that intends to detect possible wrongdoers by looking for signs of anxiety. Other technologies range from lie detectors, the penile plethysmograph which was used to try to detect "homosexual or pedophile thoughts", and on to more modern attempts to use magnetic resonance imaging to try to detect brain chemical activity supposedly corresponding to memory or thoughts. All of these technologies have been proposed at one time or another as a way of detecting "bad thoughts".

[edit] In the media

  • Frank Zappa and his band, the Mothers of Invention satirized the concept often, as a recurrent theme in their music, beginning as early as their first album, Freak Out! (1966) — where he pointedly asks the question "Who are the Brain Police?" — as well as in several later efforts such as Joe's Garage (1979) and 1985's Porn Wars.
  • Philip K. Dick's story Minority Report and the 2002 movie by Steven Spielberg demonstrates the consequences of a world in which possible crime (called Pre-Crime) is punished in advance.
  • Coldplay's song Spies depicts the general society illustrated in 1984 as well as the concept of thoughtcrime (with references to the Thought Police) and lack of freedom. It includes lines such as "I awake to see that no one is free. We're all fugitives, look at the way we live. Down here, I cannot sleep from fear, no. I said, which way do I turn? I forget everything I learn." and "And if we don't hide here, they're going to find us, and if we don't hide now, they're going to catch us when we sleep, and if we don't hide here, they're going to find us."
  • One episode in the comic strip Calvin and Hobbes finds Calvin once again objecting to compulsory education. In the middle of one of Ms. Wormwood's lectures, Calvin cries out: "This is a big fat waste of my time!" The final panel shows Calvin trying to escape the room, screaming "HELP! IT'S THE THOUGHT POLICE!"
  • Rock band Cheap Trick's song, Dream Police, is a direct reference to the Orwellian Thought Police.

[edit] See also


Characters Winston Smith | Julia | O'Brien | Big Brother | Emmanuel Goldstein
Places Oceania | Eastasia | Eurasia | Airstrip One | Room 101
Classes Inner Party | Outer Party | Proles
Ministries Ministry of Love | Ministry of Peace | Ministry of Plenty | Ministry of Truth
Concepts Ingsoc | Newspeak (wordlist) | Doublethink | Goodthink | Crimestop
Two plus two make five | Thoughtcrime | Prolefeed | Prolesec
Miscellaneous Thought Police | Telescreen | Memory hole | Goldstein's book
Two Minutes Hate | Hate week
Adaptations 1956 film | 1984 film | 1953 US TV | 1954 BBC programme | Opera
Influence Nineteen Eighty-Four in popular media Parody: Me and the Big Guy

[edit] Further reading

  • Kretzmer, David and Kershman, Hazan Francine (Eds.) (2000) "Freedom of Speech and Incitement Against Democracy". Kluwer Law International, The Hague, Netherlands. ISBN 90-411-1341-X

[edit] External links

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