It is a popular trope to compare USA society to that of the society in George Orwell’s 1984. I have read a lot about this and have always contended the argument that Aldous Huxley’s Brave New World is the more appropriate analogy to America, while 1984 is more representative of modern day Great Britain.
Think about it this is my point: In Brave New World, the people are constantly inundated with and endless barrage of constant media, so much so that the masses are apathetic to anything they hear and the elites use this to run roughshod over all the workers.
In 1984, there is endless war the people are’t sure where or why, and big brother censors and controls all info it’s kind of the opposite.
I was watching a very old Simpsons maybe from 1990 it was the one where the Superbowl teams are Washington vs Buffalo. And when the game starts the announcer proudly boasts now broadcasting to 52 countries around the world, including our newest affiliate W Gimmel Alef Nun in Tel Aviv.
It is a very subtle two level joke that I always overlooked because immediately after it shows two french people on the couch watching and they make a face at football and change it to Jerry Lewis and start laughing like frogs.
But the having football in Israel joke is well placed and timed because the only TV in Israel at the time was broadcast UHF. And from the founding of the modern state until early 90s, they had only one channel. Lot’s of countries were like this.
When I was talking to my brother about this, he is younger, I was reminding him that our mom growing up here in USA baby boomer in the 60s, they had only 3 channels but 3 is huge step above 1.
And in 1990 in USA if you include satellite and pay per view there were hundreds of channels to choose from.
It reminds me of Huxley and Orwell because in an age where I live in USA 2019 there is constant never ending flow of bs pumping at me over the screens from big tech but also, every business in USA has a tv inside the waiting room playing cable news. No soap operas, no day time talk, anytime I go anywhere its cnn, fox, msnbc, some lame propaganda mill.
It’s like Orwell’s three minutes of hate have become mandatory. We need to be cognizant of the threats presented not only by the nauseating ad based prattle constantly flowing and the blocking and stifling of truth and factual pertinent info to the people.
Both are dangerous, both are to be avoided.
