Monday, March 12, 2012
I am in the beginning stages of reading 1984 but it is already quite interesting. The main concept is that the government is able to watch, listen and monitor people via devices inside people's homes. It is unfortunate that I realize that in a way our society is not too different. Traffic cameras, cameras in buildings, and phone call monitoring all watch us with or without our knowledge.
The characters in the book alter their behavior to give the perfect perception to the government/ society. This also unfortunately relates to our society. Right?
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The fact that this book can raise up so many questions of government conspiracy in the mind of the reader makes it seem like such an interesting book. It does seem like the government is always watching us and monitoring our activity, even though we may not know it. Aside from the examples you've already mentioned, there's also Facebook and really anything else that goes on the internet that the government may be able to view, track and monitor. I've heard of many cases where E-mails from the defendant where used as evidence against them, it's pretty insane to think about really.
ReplyDelete-Yahya H.
Toni :)
ReplyDeleteI think that you are right , in today's society we are watched a lot more than what we think. The technology has advanced so much , some can even keep up . Thanks for this post , I hope to read this book .
- Rachel V.
I do agree with you and 1984 is a book that I am considering to read for my next novel. I also agree with Rachel, the technology we have today is more advanced than ever and it makes me wonder how technology will be altered in the future.
ReplyDelete-Jamie N.
I think it's scary to think that we as a society don't really have much privacy and we are constantly being watched by "Big Brother," but then another question is raised;should we really have a lot of privacy or in some way is it good that some of us are being monitored? Your post makes me interested in more about this topic and I would also like to read this book.
ReplyDelete-Kelly R.
-Kelly R.
I really don't think traffic cameras and spying devices inside people's homes have nearly the same comparison, but I can see the correlation. I've read what Wikipedia has to say about 1984, and it sounds very interesting, especially about people putting on a facade for the government. Do we all put on facades? Who is it that we REALLY think is watching us?
ReplyDelete-Jillian D.
This concepts of government found in this novel which was written after WWII I believe is not strictly limited to our government, rather it more closely resembles a totalitarian one such as North Korea. Although 1984 was written in the mid 20th century it is amazing how we can parallel our society, which has advanced so fast, to the society in 1984.
ReplyDelete-Kenny J
I hope that you're read is going very well. Hopefully you are almost finished or maybe you have finished the novel. Again I am glad that you have chosen to read this novel. If you notice any further interesting things about the novel you should post them as I am very interested in reading other opinions an analysis of the novel.
ReplyDeleteKenny J.
How many people in the class haven't already read 1984? I thought it was one of the school assigned books for sophomore year?
ReplyDeleteThat said, personally I don't really care about the fact of our lives being monitored. Since one, to properly monitor a person 24/7 you would need either 1 person who perfectly match that other person's sleep cycle, and monitor the other one constantly while both are awake, or you need some impersonal surveillance system in place, then you'd only have to assign people to look through the tapes, at say 16x speed or something, of course, to make sense of a 16x speed video one needs some pretty insane brain power, so while it might be possible for some kind of genius to monitor 16 people at once, it requires some pretty insane brain power. (since I can't myself do that easily,I imagine it's pretty difficult) And if you have people with that kind of brain power, you'd be better off putting them to work in engineering and research, to conquer the world or something, although ipso facto, I suppose you can move them to these duties after the conquest of the world. You can't use ordinary people to monitor people since they can probly only handle 1-2 reliable, and you'd need people to watch them, so you would need about 1 person to monitor 1 person, meaning the government needs to be the size of the rest of the country to monitor everyone in that country.
Of course, that's only assuming one wants constant surveillance. Electronical surveillance is far easier, anything one does online is automatically recorded, and I suppose saved onto a hard drive somewhere untill the space is needed. Likely multiple hard drives actually, since at least 3 parties would have access to information about what one does online, the ISP, the website you're visiting, and oneself, or rather, one's computer. Considering I am using the internet right now, obviously I considered these concerns to be less concerning than whatever I'm online to do.
tl;dr
That one can be monitored is, of course, true, but there are things more and less difficult to monitor, considering the internet is one of the easiest, I just sort of assumed that no one gives much of a damnation about privacy who uses the internet.
Or so I would say if my mental model of the world includes models of everyone being at least a certain level of awareness and ... intelligence.
K. Lin
Well, in Mrs. Salvadore's class sophomore year, 1984 had never been assigned that I recall, so I haven't read it before. That being said, I've put it on my to-read list. It does sound like a potential conspiracy theory though, with the idea that "Big Brother" is always watching...eerie to think all your actions are watched, all your words are heard, and all your thoughts can be foretold through this profiling.
ReplyDelete-A. Pruett
I guess I remembered it incorrectly then, that is, I know I read it before junior year, but wasn't sure whether it was freshman or sohpomore year, so I guess it was assigned my freshman year.
ReplyDeleteK. Lin
This really does have a mirror effect on how our world is today. This novel should be an interesting read for you.
ReplyDelete-Jonathan S.
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ReplyDeleteBIG BROTHER! It is creepy to think that government has the ability to track your every movement, and that we must behave a certain way to avoid some sort of disciplinary action. I personally don't think government should EVER have the power that is portrayed in the novel. I believe there should be a level of trust between the government and the citizens to obey an honor system of behaving correctly without monitoring--but that's only in a perfect world.
ReplyDelete-Christopher Lee