Orwell on Government in Animal Farm
Orwell on Government in Animal Farm
Have you ever heard about a society or government that is extremely screwed up? Of course you have, they all are. You could probably sit back and start a list of everything about your society and government that you want to change. George Orwell did just this and organized his concerns into a novel. The book is a satire about the fall of communism. The attitudes and traditions that Orwell wants to modify in his book, Animal Farm, are those that stifle humanity. Things like totalitarian government, social conformity, and the taking for granted of the good guy are some of the examples that Orwell uses to show what disgusts him about his society.
First, Orwell shows his dislike for totalitarian government. He uses characters like and Napoleon the pig to illustrate how bad leaders make for a very bad government. When leaders who are running a group of people become corrupt, there are horrible consequences. Napoleon starts out as just another disgruntled pig, but becomes a dictator by the end of the book. He feeds off of the power that he has and precedes to want more and more control over all of Animal Farm. He chooses a scapegoat; another pig named Snowball, and blames all the troubles on him just like Hitler did to the Jews in WWII. The book is written about the Russian Revolution and Orwell clearly presents the fact that governments that suppress the people never work.
Second, Orwell wants to get across to his readers the trouble with social conformity. On one level, social conformity occurs within the community of animals. The pigs reign supreme because of their “astounding intelligence” and they make sure that everyone knows how great they are. They give off the message that the only acceptable way of life is theirs’. The pigs want every animal to be as similar to them as possible. They even teach classes on how to read and write so that the other farm animals can be somewhat educated. On another level, the whole body of animals conformed when the revolution of Manor Farm happened. When they fought against the humans they intentionally tried to have the same thoughts and outlooks on farm life. This same way of thinking made them vulnerable to further conformity later on. Napoleon saw that if most of the animals thought one thing was the...