Hello Elsie...how have you been?...
Yes, we are anonymous here, good grief, for the longest time, I thought you were female, only to find out how wrong I was...now I call that anonymous...
But; if someone, with better access to data than I, thought your screen name was accurate, they could compile a list of all the ladies with sons named andy & mike and then perhpas you wouldn't be quite as anonymous.
"Look me in the eyes," said O'Brien. "What country is Oceania at war with?"
He knew what was meant by Oceania and that he himself was a citizen of Oceania. He also remembered Eurasia and Eastasia; but who was at war with whom he did not know. In fact he had not been aware that there was any war.
"I don't remember."
"Oceania is at war with Eastasia. Do you remember that now?"
"Yes."
"Oceania has always been at war with Eastasia. Since the beginning of your life, since the beginning of the Party, since the beginning of history, the war has continued without a break, always the same war. Do you remember that?"
"Yes."
1984 has long been the first book to which we have turned for a vivid picture of a government that has used war to justify infringement on freedom; that has used speech codes to limit everyone's ability to understand higher concepts or concepts that favour human individuality; that uses powerful media to build unwarranted consensus and rewrite history; and that has used technology to nip political opposition and individualistic or eccentric practices in the bud. Far from being a caricature, it insightfully and skillfully characterizes the tendencies and motivations of unlimited government power, and the horrifying, hopeless result of such government: humanity denied its freedom to think, to be rational, and to dissent...its freedom to be human.
If, after finishing 1984, you find yourself nervous and paranoid, then: good. You have just taken a step closer to respecting the importance of human freedom and dignity, and the dangers in allowing governments to usurp your freedom to dissent or be different. All that remains is to fight to maintain or regain your ownlife (read the book, you'll know what we mean).
http://www.mondopolitico.com/library/1984/1984.htm
Snippets...
One did not know what happened inside the Ministry of Love, but it was possible to guess: tortures, drugs, delicate instruments that registered your nervous reactions, gradual wearing-down by sleeplessness and solitude and persistent questioning. Facts, at any rate, could not be kept hidden. They could be tracked down by enquiry, they could be squeezed out of you by torture. But if the object was not to stay alive but to stay human, what difference did it ultimately make? They could not alter your feelings: for that matter you could not alter them yourself, even if you wanted to. They could lay bare in the utmost detail everything that you had done or said or thought; but the inner heart, whose workings were mysterious even to yourself, remained impregnable.
.
.
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He thought of the telescreen with its never-sleeping ear. They could spy upon you night and day, but if you kept your head you could still outwit them. With all their cleverness they had never mastered the secret of finding out what another human being was thinking. Perhaps that was less true when you were actually in their hands.