It's that time again, to curl up with a comfy pillow and tuck in for 1984: A Dystopian Bedtime Story where I read Part 1, Chapter 7 of George Orwell's Nineteen-Eight-Four.
Last week got a little spicy for Winston, as he relayed one of his seedy nights in the proles for our voyeuristic pleasure. If you missed that reading be sure to check it out here.
If you've been there already, jump right in and listen to Chapter 7, the latest recording, on the YouTube and Rumble Peachy Books channels or click the corresponding embedded links below.
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Below is a post I shared with my social media followers on Twitter, Pinterest, Facebook, and Instagram this past week, in preparation of publishing this read aloud.
Promoting artificial insemination and actively attempting to kill the sex instinct within its members aids as a sound method to control reproduction within the English Socialist (INGSOC) Party of Orwell's imagination.
Comparatively, I have seen our society devalue the preservation of the family unit and the importance of in-person relationships steadily, in tune with the advent of technology.
This lack of physical intimacy, coupled with INGSOCs disallowance of love relationships or marriages, leaves members detached and apathetic. The union between man and woman is seen solely as a means of procreation to provide the Party with future bodies, so a couple in love would never be permitted to be married.
With the omission of relational loyalty and true love, the totalitarian state, in turn, flourishes as the collective reigns supreme, filling all voids with no distractions or competition.
The Party fosters separation and distance between parents and children via early conditioning programs like the Anti-sex League and the Junior Spies. Through intensive and effective propaganda, leaders can mould future members into staunch Party loyalists, routinely reporting their parents for minor infractions.
The Proles are the workhorses for INGSOC and provide sexual relief and entertainment for its wayward members of all levels and descriptions. As the lowest citizens of Oceanian society, the proletariat survives a meager existence of toil and personal experience, allowed to indulge in their unfettered ancestral urges and live, although abysmally, mostly on their own terms.
But one thing both the Party members and their debauched inferiors, the Proles, have in common is that they exist under the conditioning and pleasure of INGSOC, capable, at any moment, of having overstayed their welcome.
Which would you choose, Party or Prole? Or maybe a better question would be, which will you choose?