In 1949, George Orwell published his famous novel about a future dystopian society, “1984.” It did not come to pass in 1984 but clearly seems to have arrived in 2021 America.
The main character in the book is Winston Smith, whose job is to fix all published references to what used to be the truth and change it to the new truth. At one point in the book, Winston says, “Every record has been destroyed or falsified … every statue and street building has been renamed, every date has been altered.” Sound familiar? This past year, we’ve seen the tearing down of historic statues, the renaming of schools and public buildings, the banning of people, books and movies. We’ve also had the increased teaching of The 1619 Project in our schools and the teaching of critical race theory everywhere else.
An important step in implementing this process was for Winston to learn double-think, a way of thinking that defies rational contradiction. Today, we see our government saying that people can’t attend church due to COVID-19 but can protest and riot by the thousands. We were told all summer that we were witnessing largely peaceful and patriotic protests, while buildings and businesses were destroyed and lives lost. Months later, when a few hundred of the over 200,000 largely peaceful protesters broke into the U.S. Capitol and caused the loss of life of five people, those breaking in were deemed rioters and insurrectionists, not largely patriotic protesters, as they were all summer.
Rioting and destruction of property ought to be condemned and prosecuted, regardless of the beliefs of the perpetrators, be they Proud Boys, Black Lives Matter or antifa. It cannot be tolerated simply because the media and people in power share the beliefs of the rioters.
Winston eventually becomes disillusioned and is turned over by the thought police to the Ministry of Love, which lives by the slogans, “War is peace. Freedom is slavery. Ignorance is strength.” Some of this doublespeak will no doubt sound familiar to you in 2021 America. Antifa, which stands for anti-fascist, behaves as fascists do and is totally intolerant of any dissent.
This transgression into the world of “1984” ought to frighten us all. We have become an increasingly intolerant society that is abandoning freedoms articulated in the First Amendment, the very freedoms that were instrumental in making us a great and respected nation.
The media and Big Tech have now joined forces with the Democratic Party and are silencing all dissent. The story about Hunter Biden’s dealings with the Russians and Chinese was squelched by Twitter and Facebook, even though it was extensively reported by the New York Post. These same companies, along with Google and Apple, were then instrumental in destroying Parler, a competitor to Twitter. They did this to deny President Donald Trump an outlet for expressing his opinion. Does anyone honestly believe that we will be a better nation when the governing party is not held to account by the media and any dissenting voices are silenced?
There is talk about giving Washington, D.C., and Puerto Rico statehood, hoping to deny Republicans any future control of the Senate. Elimination of the filibuster and the packing of the Supreme Court are also under discussion. These modifications would essentially change this country from a democracy to a one-party totalitarian state. Does anyone honestly believe that would result in a better country?
President Joe Biden passed around 30 executive actions in his first 10 days, more than Trump, Barack Obama, George W. Bush and Bill Clinton combined for the same period. Executive actions are a way of bypassing Congress and the entire democratic process. This is behavior more akin to a king, not a president in a democratic republic.
Almost half the country believes there were significant irregularities in the last election. No attempt has been made to give them any confidence that future elections will be any different. These same people are now being silenced, their livelihoods jeopardized by blacklisting. I don’t see how this ends well, and it certainly won’t bring the unity Joe Biden campaigned on.
This country will only be saved by brave souls willing to stand up and denounce this madness. It was encouraging to see former Democratic Congresswoman Tulsi Gabbard doing exactly that recently. I hope she will be joined by others who see value in democracy and freedom, not one-party rule and doublespeak.
Hylton Phillips-Page is a resident of Rehoboth Beach.
