More on the topic.
Posted on 06/08/2010 11:33:46 AM PDT by Palter
In 1984, George Orwell told the story of Winston Smith, an employee in the propaganda office of a totalitarian regime. Smith's job at the fictional Ministry of Truth was to destroy photographs and alter documents, remaking the past to fit the needs of the present. But 1984 came and went, along with Soviet communism. In the age of the Internet, nobody could tamper with the past that way. Could they?
Yes, we can. In fact, last week, Slate did.
We took the Ministry of Truth as our model. Here's how Orwell described its work:
As soon as all the corrections which happened to be necessary in any particular number of The Times had been assembled and collated, that number would be reprinted, the original copy destroyed, and the corrected copy placed on the files in its stead. This process of continuous alteration was applied not only to newspapers, but to books, periodicals, pamphlets, posters, leaflets, films, sound-tracks, cartoons, photographs—to every kind of literature or documentation which might conceivably hold any political or ideological significance. Day by day and almost minute by minute the past was brought up to date. In this way every prediction made by the Party could be shown by documentary evidence to have been correct, nor was any item of news, or any expression of opinion, which conflicted with the needs of the moment, ever allowed to remain on record. All history was a palimpsest, scraped clean and reinscribed exactly as often as was necessary. In no case would it have been possible, once the deed was done, to prove that any falsification had taken place.
(Excerpt) Read more at slate.com ...
And in other news, ice was found to be cold!
Those deceived in this way are not stupid people, nor are they liars. The "memory" is really "there," but the event never happened.
Reading William Saletan's 8-part series is really worth your time. Maybe research can actually lead to pro-active ways we can save our true memories and our sanity. Check it out:
Slate’s whole purpose has been falsifying the truth, so how does this suddenly make them the moral arbritors of anything? Jeesh
Slate is -— as you say; but actually, William Saletan is often pretty good.
The Commissar Vanishes:
The Falsification of Photographs & Art
in the Soviet Union
by David King
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